Here’s a happy little project for preschoolers. This kept my three-year-old busy for only about ten minutes but that of course depends on the day. The four and five year-olds were occupied for upwards of 30 minutes with all the cutting and gluing and coloring. Here is the turtle template which could also be used as a coloring sheet. (I used a picture from this site to make the template, the first hit on google for sea turtle. By the way, an older gentleman asked me the other day if I had Google – cracked me up!)
I printed out the same drawing onto colored sheets of paper. (You can print on lots of different kinds of papers including paper shopping bags in a laser printer if you only trim them to the correct size first.)
I tried to use only complementary colored paper, crayons and sparkle glue. A few other colors joined us accidentally. In the end my five-year-old insisted on cutting out her entire turtle and pasting it on a neon orange background which actually looked quite stunning.
We had made these color wheels together a while back and they have been very useful visuals for reference. At the time we made them I helped with cutting and gluing and actually did the entire project for my then two-year-old. I think I let her stick the shapes down on the background circle. The kids each have a sketchbook with a pocket page in the front and they keep these color wheels in this front pocket.
I used a regular white sheet of printing paper but I would suggest a heavier back piece for this project. As you can see, my children cut out large areas to glue down but this could b a much more elaborate project for older children if much smaller pieces were used. Tiny colored pieces of paper would look stunning on a black background.
You never cease to amaze me, Rebecca!