Most of us have a drawer with a stack of paper in it and about four crayons that still work. Not a craft cupboard. A drawer.
It turns out that’s plenty. Everything below needs one sheet of paper and, at most, one crayon. One of them doesn’t even need the crayon. We’ve put them in order of how much you have to do, easiest first, because some afternoons the deciding factor is how much of you is left.
Worth knowing before you pick: the folding is a five or ten minute job, which is sometimes exactly right. The other three have longer legs and can stretch past twenty if they take, so save those for an afternoon where a long stretch is a good thing rather than a problem.
Fold it, one fold at a time
No crayon needed for this one. Take a square of paper and show them a single fold. Then wait. Then show them the next one.
The pace is the whole thing. If you fold the whole shape and hand it over, you’ve made a thing and they’ve watched you. One fold at a time and it’s theirs, even when it comes out lopsided, which it will. Works from around three.
Simple Paper Folding
Fold a square of paper step by step into a simple shape. Adult shows one fold at a time.
Shaped to your child and the moment you are both in.
Draw it first, then tell me about it
This one’s for after something has happened. A walk, a party, whatever went on at nursery. Put the paper and crayons down and ask them to make it, rather than asking them to tell you about it.
Two things make it work. Don’t correct anything, not the colours, not the shapes, not whether the dog looks like a dog. And when they’re finished and you ask about it, ask about one specific bit. “What’s this bit here?” gets you an answer. “Tell me all about it” usually doesn’t, for the same reason “how was school” doesn’t.
At three or four you’ll get marks and shapes and roughly one sentence back. That’s the whole thing working, not a version of it that fell short.
Draw-It-Then-Say-It
After an experience, the child represents it first by drawing, then narrates their creation to a parent.
Shaped to your child and the moment you are both in.
Trace a shadow
Put a small object on the paper somewhere sunny so it throws a shadow, then draw round the shadow rather than round the object. A toy dinosaur is ideal.
This one wants decent light, so it’s a bright-afternoon activity rather than an always-available one. If it’s grey out, a torch propped up on a couple of books does the same job and arguably makes it better, because then they can move the light and watch the shadow stretch.
Shadow Trace Art
On a sunny day, position a small object so its shadow falls on paper and trace the outline.
Shaped to your child and the moment you are both in.
For the older ones, draw the map
One of you hides a small object somewhere findable, then draws a map of the room with a couple of landmarks on it, the sofa, the door, the big plant, and an X where the thing is. The other one follows the map and goes and gets it.
This wants about five and up, because linking a drawing to the actual room is the whole skill and it’s a tall order much before that. If your child is the mapmaker and the drawing comes out hard to follow, sketch the room yourself and let them add the X. Then swap over.
The theme is the part they’ll care about. Pirate treasure, dinosaur fossil, fairy gem. Same game, completely different afternoon.
Draw-a-Treasure-Map Hunt
One player draws a simple map with a hidden treasure for others to find by following it.
Shaped to your child and the moment you are both in.
The paper was never the limiting factor
We think a lot of afternoons get written off because the thing we imagined doing needed something we didn’t have. And then the drawer with the paper in it sits there unopened.
You’ve got a sheet of paper. That’s four afternoons, at least. Nobody in this house has ever regretted getting the paper out, and every parent we know has a stack of the results they can’t quite bring themselves to throw away.