The Benefits of Crafts in Storytime
Adding a craft to storytime offers many benefits to children and their caregivers. Crafts provide opportunities for children to interact with each other and parents, and they can also enhance skillsets and bolster self-esteem. Crafts do not need to be an expensive or elaborate. Many crafts can be created with household materials, such as toilet […]
Adding a craft to storytime offers many benefits to children and their caregivers. Crafts provide opportunities for children to interact with each other and parents, and they can also enhance skillsets and bolster self-esteem. Crafts do not need to be an expensive or elaborate. Many crafts can be created with household materials, such as toilet paper rolls, cotton balls, Q-tips, and construction paper.
Here’s a closer look at the benefits crafts can bring to storytime, along with some resources to help generate craft ideas.
Benefits of Offering Crafts in Storytime
Social Skills:
- Crafting with others helps children learn to share, cooperate, and work well together.
- Crafts promote respect for a child’s own work and the work of others.
- Children and parents bond when working on a craft together.
- While making crafts, children are exposed to language-rich conversations about what they are making and how they are making it.
Fine Motor Skills:
- Tearing, coloring, cutting, drawing, painting, and gluing help small hands to develop hand/eye coordination and muscle strength.
- Crafts promote visual and perceptual development.
Problem Solving Skills:
- Crafting involves making decisions. Children choose their materials and figure out how to construct their craft.
- When encountering difficulties with a craft, children must figure out a way to correct the problem.
Self-Regulation Skills:
- Crafts require patience. Children must wait to use different materials and wait for their crafts to be finished.
- Sometimes crafts do not work out the way we planned. An unexpected outcome helps children develop flexibility.
Self-Esteem:
- Completing a craft successfully gives a child a sense of accomplishment and pride.
- Children see a tangible result of following directions.
- Crafts allow children to channel their inner artist and create a souvenir of their storytime experience.
- Crafts allow children to express themselves creatively.
Craft Websites for Your Child:
