Kids Create: Scissor Adventures + free printables

One of my goals this year is to do more projects with my kids and to share some of them with you!

When I first started blogging, I held a little series with projects I did with my kids and called it Kids Create. I’ve decided to bring that back as an ongoing series with a new post…maybe…every week. I can’t promise that I’ll be consistent but I’ll try. 🙂

The series won’t have just crafts for kids. I’m going to throw in just some ideas I like, things I make for my kids that give them something to do, learning activities…lots of stuff. I’m hoping it will be as fun for you as I think it will be for us.

Today’s activity is about making kindergarten readiness fun for my four year old.

It involves something all kids can’t wait to get their hands on…scissors!

And we’ve made using them, into an adventure. The good kind. 😉

The idea is simple. You make a road or a path, let them decorate all around it and then…

Cut -It-Out on the dotted line (I will always love Full House).

You could draw your own path, or make one in Word like I did. Or…you can print my free ones from here, here, here and here.

I’ve also included a maze. Reid drew Ninjago golden weapons as the prize for making it through to the middle of the maze.

This is the face he gave me when he got to his prize. Cute right? He’s a keeper.

The fourth printable is a dot to dot. (I’ve improved bits of it and changed the name, but the shape is the same). They cut from dot to dot following the numbers 1-10. At the end they can see that they cut out a star!  You can trace it before cutting if you like.

Reid didn’t really seem to like this one as much and didn’t want to finish cutting it. I thought it was a cute idea though. 😉 You could make your own dot to dot using letters to teach the alphabet as well.

The sky’s the limit. Make it to suit your child so they will enjoy practicing their scissor coordination…and shape recognition, numbers, and letters practice (if you use it for the dot to dot) at the same time. Sneaky!

If they are really new to scissor use, consider getting a pair of safety scissors with a little kick stand between the handles. This helps the scissors pop back open so they can get the feel of opening and closing the scissors while they work up the strength to do it on their own. Preschool age children often are capable of closing scissors but not opening them.These kinds of scissors with the kick stand/spring, help with that. I found this pair at the Dollar Tree a few years ago but I think they still carry them.

Also be aware, that for younger kids they may only be able to snip fringe around the outer edges of a piece of paper.

The curvy parts can be tricky. Try holding the paper and turning it for them so they can stay on course. I had to do this a couple times before Reid got the hang of turning the paper himself.

I love how kids open and close their mouth when they cut with scissors. Such adorable concentration.

We made up stories about imaginary adventures our scissors were taking and when he got all the way through we enjoyed a little treat to celebrate.

Such fun. 🙂

If you want to make your own scissor adventures using one of my printables, here they are again:

Maze
Road One
Road Two
Dot to Dot

The roads and maze printables are left plain so that you can customize them to however you want.

Happy kid crafting!