Kids Art: Printmaking with Toys

I love that printmaking, as an artistic medium, can be as simple or as complicated as you wish.

Obviously with toddlers and young children, simple is best!

When choosing objects for children to print with, you need look no further than the toybox or playroom. Toys are great for making prints with.

The printing featured here was made with an assortment of wooden and plastic blocks.

Use a flat tray for your paints. In this case, a simple polystyrene meat tray and child friendly acrylic paint.
We experimented with printing on brown paper bags versus plain, white copy paper; art does not need to be expensive to create.
By starting with light colours, you can keep adding paint and create darker colours to add to your masterpiece, in a similar way to our monoprinting experience, we added layers of colour. It was hard to know which was more fun, the colour mixing or the printing.

One of our finished masterpieces.

Variations for you to try with toys;

• Large animal and dinosaur figurines make fun paw prints and tracks
• Cars, trucks and trains, especially those with bumpy tyres for interesting prints
• Large trucks on big sheets of paper make your printmaking a real physical activity
• Large plastic shaped pegs from peg boards
• Lego can be used to make some really interesting pictures and effects with older children who are more detail conscious
• For preschoolers and older children, have them wrap wool or string around a block and secure with tape

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