Collage Making for Kids

Collage making for kids is a fun and easy activity for all ages but what is great, is that even very young children in preschool and kindergarten can make these. A collage is a technique of using small pieces of paper, images or small objects that are combined to make a piece of art that creates a message or an idea. Making a collage will help children build fine motor skills with the gluing, cutting or tearing. It is also a natural way to develop your child’s identification of color, objects and even texture. Talking about the process will also help build their language development.

Magazine Collage Making for Kids

Make a collage with magazine clippings. My daughter did this as an activity on her own. She selected pictures that she liked from numerous magazines that we had. Some pictures have a special meaning for her and other pictures were ones that just appealed to her. A few of the selected pieces represented our pets.

Materials

Magazines or magazine pages. Some magazines have pictures that might not be appropriate for the classroom so often I tore out pages that and have the children select from a pile of pages in a tray.
Scissors, to be used to trim or cut out images. Another option is to tear out pieces usually best with older children with greater fine motor skills who can tear around a picture.
Glue stick (Elmer's glue just gets really messy and makes the pieces have folds from the water in the glue)
Piece of card stock or cardboard for a sturdier finished product. You can also use construction paper.
Small paper plates or trays to keep the selected pieces ready to glue
Mod Podge (Glossy for a nice sheen)

Steps

Select pictures from a few magazine. We like Cooking and Garden magazines like Cooking Light and Better Homes.
Cut paper to the size your child can work with. You could cut to a special shape for fun or cut it to a specific shape if it is for a theme.
You could select pictures to create a collage with a specific theme like:
-Sports
-Favorite color or select colors like (rainbow colors)
-Animals
-Toys
-Favorite Hobbies
-Pictures that bring "Happy Thoughts"
-Random Pictures for younger children
Cut or carefully tear around each picture. Tearing gives some nice "edge" effect but it will be challenging for younger children to tear without ripping the actual picture..
Arrange pictures on the card stock or paper that you are gluing it to.
With the glue stick, glue each picture one at a time and slightly overlap to cover any white spaces.
Fold the edges hanging over the cardboard and glue down or for curves. Use the scissors trim the extra magazine pieces to the edges of the shape of the card stock that the collage is glued on.
For a longer lasting piece, brush some glossy mod podge over the entire project. Let dry, repeat if a glossier coat is desired and again let it dry thoroughly.

3D Collage Making for Kids

This collage used magazine pages as well but this piece has some multi media elements with some pieces of felt and material and construction paper added to it. Another element is it was made to have 3-D pieces. See the photos below to view how it was made into a 3 dimensional collage.

Side View to See the 3-D Pieces

Here is the side view so you can see all the pieces that are intended to be 3 dimensional. The center spiral, the accordion folded pieces of magazine and the folded pieces of paper to give it elevation.

Tips and Suggestions

Scan through the magazine pages for child appropriate content if it is a younger child.
You could even take the pages out of the magazine and have them choose from your pre-selected pages to make their collage.
If you want to keep this for a while, you could spray lightly with a shiny Acrylic Spray. You can find this type of spray in the craft departments of stores like Walmart or you can can go to an actual craft store like Michaels, Jo-Ann Stores or Hobby Lobby. The spraying would need to be done by an adult in a well ventilated area. Wearing a face mask might also be a good idea.

Add Embellishments

You can add embellishments for older children. This will require Elmer's glue or similar to hold the pieces down. Some suggested items are:

Sequins
Pieces of Ribbon
Colored Yarn
Pieces of Foil, torn or shaped
Glitter

Other Collage Ideas for Children

Decoupage Box

This was also made with magazine pages that were torn to give a nice random edge rather than a cut edge. Here is the complete how to: Decoupage Box" You could use any box, jar or container of your choice.