10 Educational Games With Paint For Babies & Toddlers

ByKelly Garnett

Painting is a fun activity that I have never heard a kid turn down. It is loved by children everywhere and easy for parents to set up and keep their kids entertained for anywhere between 20 minutes to an hour or two. The only way to make painting even better is if you were able to somehow make it educational too so that your kids can learn and have fun at the same time.

Some ways that you can turn painting into an educational activity is to turn your painting into a puzzle to help with memory, paint with healthy food to teach about nutrition, paint and then clean up to teach them how to clean. Use the fun of painting to teach your kids life skills.

If you would like to learn a bit more about how to teach your kids wonderful life skills through their fun painting projects, have a look below at some great practical ways that you can do this. Painting is so fun to kids, and they love to learn, so let us teach them through painting.

Paint And Cut Out A Puzzle – Helps Improve Memory 

Painting is usually a sure win when it comes to entertaining your toddler and even your baby, but once they have finished painting, you are left with their masterpiece and can not do anything with it once they hand it to you but store it away.

A great way to be able to use your toddler’s love for painting in an educational way is to laminate their painting, draw a puzzle design on the laminated part and cut out the pieces.

It will be a great hit with your toddler when they get to put together a puzzle that they created.

It may not last very long, but when the pieces start coming apart, you can invite your toddler to create a new puzzle.

Puzzles help children improve their memory, helps with attention to detail, helps heighten their IQ, as well as helping them with practical things such as learning how to solve problems.

Help turn your toddler’s painting into a mental exercise and turn their fun project into an educational game.

This game is more suited for toddlers than babies. However, older babies may be able to participate if you simply cut up their finger painting into two or three easy to assemble pieces.

Painting With Water – Teach Your Kids About Evaporation And The Water Cycle 

Would you believe it if you heard that there is a way you can have mess-free painting time with your kids? Well, believe it, because painting with water is a great way to entertain your kids and not have any mess to clean up afterward.

You can use this opportunity to teach your kids about water; teach them about the water cycle and how we have water in our taps and home, and where it comes from.

You will be able to teach your kids about evaporation through this activity, so if they are learning about the water cycle, this is a great practical project to do with them.

It really is simple, simply get a nice big plastic cup or bowl filled with water, gather some paintbrushes and head out to the street, driveway, or pavement.

Painting with water is exactly what it sounds like; let your kids dunk their paintbrushes in the water and paint on the pavement or driveway.

The water will last for a minute or two on the ground, and after that, it will disappear. This means that your child can paint for as long as they want to without ever running out of space or “paint.”

This activity is more suited for a toddler than a baby as far as the educational part goes. However, your baby will still have a great time dunking their hands or paintbrush in the water and splashing around on the driveway.

Paint Inside A Cardboard Box – Help Your Kids Practice The Alphabet 

This activity is really great for when you receive a large package from something that you have bought, for instance, if you buy a new couch or fridge, or even a few new pillows if they come in a big enough box.

This task will help your toddler learn and practice the alphabet while they also get to have fun with a cool new project.

All around the inside of the large empty box, write out each letter of the alphabet. Let your child sit inside of the box and give them some paint and paintbrushes.

Tell your child to paint over each letter and say the letter as they paint it. After they have painted over it, let them paint it freehand underneath it again on their own this time.

They will find it really fun to get to be in the box and paint all over without worrying about where the paint will end up, and they will be learning the alphabet at the same time.

This activity is better suited for a toddler as it may be too boring for a baby to simply sit in a box with some paint since they will not be able to copy anything.

Finger Painting On Foil – Let Your Kids Practice Their Fine Motor Skills 

Fine motor skills are something that can always be practiced and be worked on in toddlers and babies, and this is one fun way to give them lots of practice using their fine motor skills.

Giving your baby or toddler a sheet of tin foil to paint on gives them a fun and reflective surface to paint and gives them a new medium to work on; foil is more slippery to paint on than paper.

Letting your child learn how to steady their hands more when they are painting on foil teaches them more control in their hands than what they usually need to use.

The foil will be even more fun for your baby to paint on; this is because they will generally use their fingers instead of a paintbrush, and this will create lots of fun sounds and textures for them.

This activity is fun and great for both toddlers and babies.

Painting With Food – Teach Your Kids About Nutrition.

Letting your kids explore food is always great, and even though in general “do not play with your food” is a good rule to have in your house, what if every now and then, they do get to play with their food?

Taking some time to teach your kids about different food groups and what they do for your body will help your kids be more interested in eating them, and a fun way of doing this is by letting them paint with colorful food.

Teach your children about what different colored food is good for in your body, and then find a corresponding colorful food that they can paint with, for example:

  • Purple food – purple food, like red cabbage, beets, and grapes, are good antioxidants and vitamin B9, which will help our body grow cells.
  • Red food – red food, like bell peppers and strawberries, is high in vitamin c, and vitamin c gives us antioxidants and helps protect our body’s cells.
  • Green food – green food like kiwi, spinach, and green beans are high in vitamin K, which helps our body’s blood.

To then teach them about these foods and what their colors mean, give them a blank piece of paper and foods in these colors that stain easily for them to “paint” with.

For example:

  • Purple food – beets.
  • Red food – strawberries.
  • Green food – kiwi.

Your kids will get to paint with the food they are learning about, and this will also make these foods more fun to them, which in turn will make them happier to eat them.

This activity will be good for a toddler to learn; however, your baby will also be able to participate in the painting part.

Painting & Cleaning – Teach Your Kids About Cleaning

When it comes to painting, it is usually far more fun for the children than it ever is for the parents as the kids get to have fun and then leave cleaning up to their parents; but why not teach your kids how to clean up too?

Pick out a couple of pictures that need to be colored in, like blank pictures out of a coloring book, and have the pictures laminated.

Set up your paint for your child as usual, but instead of a blank page, give your child the laminated picture to paint on.

Once they are done, show your child how to prepare a cloth or a sponge to clean something up with, and let them help you putting on some soap and getting it wet with the warm water.

Once they have their damp cloth or sponge, show them how to clean the paint off of the laminated picture.

If you have a plastic table cover that you use when your child is painting, you could even encourage them to clean this if you would like.

This will teach your child how to start cleaning up after themselves in a fun way.

This activity will be more suited for a toddler than a baby since babies are not able to clean up after themselves yet.

Painting According To The Season – Teach Your Kids About Each Season.

Each season will bring a new and fun look to your garden, home, and surroundings. Each season brings new foods, temperatures, and drinks. Let us see how to use paint to teach our kids about what each season brings.

You can start off by painting a tree for each season. Ask your child to look at the trees outside and paint what they look like. 

This may be green in summer, red, yellow, and orange in fall, white in winter, and full of colorful flowers in spring. 

Let your child paint the tree and then ask them what their favorite food for warm weather is, and let them paint it next to the green or colorful tree, ask them what their favorite food for cold weather is and let them paint it next to the white or red/yellow/orange tree.

Tell them what the names of these cold and warm weather seasons are and teach them why there are different leaves on the trees during these seasons and why we eat different foods and drink different drinks.

Let them paint out what they learn and allow them to process their feelings about each season out on their painting.

This activity is more suitable for toddlers than it is for babies; however, you can make a tree painting and use your baby’s handprint for the top leafy part of the tree as and when you reach a new season, and you can keep these pictures as keepsakes to see how your baby’s hand has grown throughout the year.

Conclusion 

Paint is a great and fun medium for your children to enjoy when it comes to arts, crafts, and fun projects, but now, it can also be a great learning tool for them.

Teach your kids how to use paint to practice their alphabet or numbers, and the fun repetition will help them take it in, especially if your child tends to learn better from doing and touching more than seeing and hearing.

You can also teach your kids real-life skills using paint. For example, you can teach your kids about nutrition by using food for them to paint with, or you can let them make a mess with paint and then teach them how to clean up after themselves.

Paint is a great learning tool, and its potential to help educate your kids is limitless, especially if you use homemade paint that is toxic-free, as this allows your child to freely use it even if it ends up all over their hands, face, and body.

Let your kids dive into their paint and use it to help them learn new things every day; they’ll love it and come out the other end smarter.

References

I am a qualified early-years educator with over 15 years of experience working with children from newborn to 12 years old. I have attended multiple educational CPDs, first aid courses, sign language courses, and child psychology courses to develop and enhance my own personal skills.

Visit our "About" section to find out more about me.

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