Almost all children love to sculpt various figures and use all kinds of materials for this creative process - from sand on the playground to culinary dough. This activity is not only very exciting, but also useful. In the process of creating beautiful crafts from plasticine, the child is busy with an interesting activity that directly affects his mental development, emotional state and instills a sense of beauty.
How is modeling useful for preschool children?
Modeling from plasticine receives a lot of attention in kindergarten and primary school. Children every now and then make beautiful crafts from plasticine with their own hands, which are used for homemade theaters or various competitions and exhibitions.
Modeling is useful for the mental development of a child. Plasticine perfectly develops fine motor skills of a baby’s hands, and this directly affects the correct development of speech, good memory, logical thinking and coordination of movements. By creating light and beautiful crafts from plasticine, the child learns perseverance and patience, develops abstract and logical thinking, and creative abilities. The baby also learns the basics of independence.
When a child works with a plastic mass with both hands (making a ball or sausage out of plasticine), both hemispheres of the brain are involved and interhemispheric connections are strengthened. This promotes the development of attention, memory of all types and the ability to compare images and facts.
In addition, activities with plasticine have a positive effect on the baby’s mental and emotional state and the central nervous system. This is a quiet pastime that helps reduce excessive activity and normalize sleep, reduces irritability and excitability.
Modeling classes introduce the youngest children to colors and shapes, and also give them the experience of tactile perception “soft-hard”, “dry-wet”, “warm-cold”. While working on three-dimensional figures, children analyze the features of objects, learn to see details, and develop knowledge about the properties of the world around them.
What crafts from plasticine can you make with your own hands?
You can create a variety of crafts and themed works from plasticine. It would be appropriate to use additional materials: acorns, pasta, cones, flowers and leaves, chestnuts. Most often, children make the following crafts:
- Animals. These figures are quite simple to make and look beautiful. You can make a spider, shark, squirrel, cat or dog, giraffe, lion, bunny, octopus, turtle, caterpillar and any other animals.
- Flowers. Using plastic mass it is easy to create cute decorations and compositions. Preschool children can make a tulip or a daisy, and older children can already create a beautiful rose.
- Toys. Making a craft that you can then play with is even more interesting. Dolls, mermaids and angels are suitable for girls; boys can make a car, plane or tank.
- Vegetables and fruits. Even the smallest can do such light and beautiful plasticine crafts. Children can make an apple or watermelon, a lemon slice, grapes, strawberries and raspberries.
- Heroes of your favorite cartoons and fairy tales. It’s enough to simply mold fixies, Smurfs, Masha and the Bear, Cheburashka, heroes of the game Minecraft or birds from Angry Birds from plasticine.
Crafts from plasticine for the little ones
The youngest children can be introduced to plasticine (or better yet, modeling dough, edible plasticine or modeling mass) as early as one and a half years old. First, let the baby crush a small piece of plastic mass in his hand. You can trust him to cover a picture or a plastic jar with plasticine.
When the child gets a little used to working with this material, you can start creating the first simple crafts: try to make a snake by simply rolling out a sausage from plasticine of any color, or a caterpillar. For a caterpillar, you need to sculpt several plasticine balls of approximately the same size and connect them together, and then add eyes and antennae.
Step-by-step crafts master class for children 2-3 years old
Older kids can handle more complex crafts. For example, it’s not at all difficult to make a chicken with your own hands, and in any color: yellow, red, green, white. For eggs, it is better to choose brown or white. Additionally, you can build a perch. It is recommended to use black beads for the eyes.
The chicken can resemble both a real one and any fairy-tale hero with bright plumage.
First you need to sculpt the body and the ball head and connect both parts. Then add the crest and beak. Then you need to fashion beautiful wings from green plasticine and also attach them to the body of the bird. The perch stand can be made in brown or green. A beautiful plasticine craft made by a 2-3 year old child (with the help of adults, of course) is ready.
What 3-4 years?
Children love to watch colorful fish, so why not build their own aquarium? How to make a beautiful craft from plasticine? To create an aquarium fish, or better yet several, you will need plasticine of different colors, a board and a knife for plasticine, as well as additional decorative elements (beads, seed beads).
You can make fish of different shapes and sizes. You should add fins and a tail to the sculpted body (oval, round or triangular), attach eyes and decorate the figure with various sparkles, sequins, beads or other elements. You can create a whole thematic picture from several different fish.
We sculpt a tiger cub with children 5-6 years old
Beautiful crafts from plasticine are interesting to make not only for kids, but also for school-age children. Moreover, the complexity of products increases. Preschoolers and first-graders can make a very beautiful craft from plasticine - a tiger cub - on their own.
To create a tiger cub that walks through the desert or lies on a platform at the circus, you will need orange, white and black plasticine, a stationery knife, beads or small black buttons for the eyes.
First you need to make an oval out of orange plasticine, which will be the body of the tiger cub, and then start creating the paws and tail. To make the paws look realistic, claw notches are made on them using a special knife for plasticine.
Next you need to make the tiger cub’s head and attach all the necessary elements to it, namely eyes, ears, mouth. It is better to make the inside of the ears from white plasticine, just like the mouth of a tiger cub - so it will look like a real one.
Now you should paint the tiger cub in a natural color. To do this, you need to roll sausages of different lengths and widths from black plasticine, which are used to decorate dark stripes on the body and tail of the tiger. The same elements can be used to make eyebrows or mustaches. The figurine is ready.
Step-by-step creation of an elephant - craft for children 6-7 years old
To create an elephant you will need: gray and pink plasticine, buttons or beads for the eyes, a board for working with the material. First you need to roll five balls of gray plasticine - one larger one for the body and four smaller ones for the elephant's legs.
You can make cuts on the forefoot for greater realism. It is also good to decorate the legs with white circles - marigolds.
Next you need to sculpt the elephant's head. It is necessary to make notches on the trunk, indicating folds. To create the ears, gray and pink plasticine is used, rolled into a cake. Next you need to connect all the parts of the figure.
Once the base is ready, you can start decorating. You need to roll up the tusks, tail, add eyes and eyebrows. You can give the elephant bangs.
Application on cardboard for primary school children
The most beautiful crafts from plasticine can be made using the applique principle. For example, make a picture “Space”, depicting flat planets, flying saucers and satellites, distant stars and comets. All elements must be attached to black cardboard in any order. You can even add aliens.
Hedgehog made from plasticine and seeds for a competition in kindergarten
A hedgehog is a beautiful plasticine craft for children, which can always be presented at an exhibition or competition. First you need to draw or print a prickly character on white or colored cardboard, and then fill the needles with seeds glued to plasticine or glue. It is important to ensure that all the seeds are directed in one direction - this will look neat and beautiful. You can glue mushrooms, apples, leaves or rowan berries to the back of the hedgehog. A beautiful craft made from plasticine turns out to be very realistic and voluminous.
Making a Christmas tree from plasticine
A Christmas tree made of plasticine is a craft for children who already know how to work with scissors. First you need to roll a ball out of green plasticine mass, then make a cone base out of it. For convenience, it is better to secure the workpiece on a wooden skewer. Next, you need to make small cuts with scissors, forming needles. It is recommended that the finished green beauty can be decorated with small plasticine balls, beads and seed beads. It turns out to be a really beautiful craft that will become a real interior decoration on the eve of the New Year holidays.
Creativity is one of the main ways to develop psychophysical skills in boys and girls of preschool age. Therefore, modeling from plasticine for children 5-6 years old in kindergarten occupies an important place among educational activities. Modeling classes promote the development of fine motor skills, attention, imagination, improve memory and speech skills. A child, mastering the techniques of modeling from plasticine, can create a small masterpiece with his own hands.
You can start sculpting with your baby when she turns 2 years old. The youngest creators are fascinated by modeling from play-doh plasticine - a soft, healthy material made from natural ingredients. Multi-colored and lightweight Play-Doh plasticine will be an excellent gift for your baby, because the figures made from it freeze in the air.
Plasticine modeling lessons for children consist of a series of step-by-step operations. Use pictures showing modeling patterns for kids, this will help them better understand the sequence of actions. Before starting classes, the teacher is recommended to print out these images (they can be designed as a presentation).
An older child at 3-4 years old or 5-6 years old can work with ordinary plasticine, since at this time the muscles in the children’s arms are already stronger. The technology of modeling from plasticine is elementary; preschoolers quickly learn all the ways to work with this substance. A group of children will complete the task efficiently if they print out photos of the figurines that will be made.
The simplest thing you can start making with your own hands is different types of food for toys. To work, you need a stack - a knife for cutting plasticine mass.
- Spaghetti is made by cutting long, thin, white or yellow sausages into pieces;
- The scrambled eggs will come out if you place a small yellow dot in the center of an oval white pancake;
- Hard cheese can be made from yellow triangles, in which holes are squeezed out with the tip of a pencil;
- The loaf will be made if you make a stack of notches on a dense beige sausage, like in real bread.
How to sculpt Food. Making scrambled eggs from Play-Doh plasticine
We sculpt animals
Sculpting animals is a more complex process for which you need to create a step-by-step action plan. Let's look at how to make a giraffe.
- For modeling, prepare 1 toothpick, pieces of orange, gold, white and dark shades.
- Make the body - a large yellow ball, which then give it an oval shape;
- Make 4 cones - these are the legs of the animal;
- A long yellow sausage strung on a toothpick is his neck;
- A small yellow ball is his head, a small orange snake is his tail, small orange triangles are his ears;
- Assemble the figurine parts together;
- Make eyes on the head from black and white plasticine.
We make toys
Modeling toys is a fun activity, because later children can play with the created figures. Animals and birds, cartoon characters are the best friends of preschoolers.
DIY vegetables and fruits
A wonderful way to introduce children to the world of plasticine is to create models of fruits that grow in the garden. Modeling vegetables, as well as modeling fruits, will help the little ones learn these groups of concepts. Autumn is the best time for such activities.
Let's look at how to quickly create vegetables and fruits:
Modeling fruits from plasticine, such as apples or oranges, is possible even for the youngest children. To do this, make balls of red, orange and yellow colors. Decorate the fruit with green leaves.
Vegetables such as carrots, potatoes or tomatoes are very easy to make. To create the carrots, make an orange cone and green leaves into oval shapes. Potatoes are brown balls, tomatoes are red.
Making mushrooms from plasticine with your own hands is not difficult. How to make porcini mushrooms and fly agarics?
- Make 2 thick sausages from a white piece - these are mushroom legs.
- For the cap of the porcini mushroom use brown, for the fly agaric – red. Make 2 small pancakes, which you then roll to form hats. Put all the pieces together.
- Decorate the fly agaric's cap with white dots, and attach a skirt made of thin white sausage to its leg.
Master class with step-by-step instructions
Master classes on modeling are events where preschoolers can show their creative abilities. If you are using plasticine, a modeling compound that hardens in air is exactly what you need. Each lesson in the technology of making figurines becomes more complicated, but choose tasks depending on the age of the baby. A sculpting child, achieving success, also develops his emotional sphere.
For the younger group
Simple animal figurines are intended for the younger group; with 3-4 year old children you can sculpt food, do plasticineography, and make simple crafts from natural materials.
For the middle group
At the age of 4-5, boys and girls can sculpt animals and birds, fairy-tale characters, and create crafts from pine cones, acorns, leaves and plasticine. This age is a great time to start sculpting dinosaurs.
For the older group
Children 6-7 years old can easily cope with the modeling process. They will be interested in creating complex toys with lots of details.
Make large wall panels or volumetric compositions from plasticine together. Invite preschoolers to create a model of the solar system or their own magic kingdom.
Let's sculpt a hedgehog
To make a hedgehog, take brown, black, white, red plasticine and one pine cone.
- Make an oval hedgehog body from a brown piece;
- Sculpt the head in the same color in a teardrop shape;
- Then press the cone halfway into it so that a thick coat of needles forms on one side;
- Make legs from 4 small brown sausages, stick them to the body;
- Make the hedgehog's eyes and nose from white and black pieces;
- Create apples from red balls and thread the hedgehog onto needles.
Modeling from plasticine is a pastime that helps children create and develop the best qualities that will be useful to them in adulthood. Step-by-step sculpting instructions make the process even more fun and rewarding.
Modeling from plasticine for children
Plasticine horse
You can make a wide variety of gifts and toys from plasticine. In kindergarten, special attention is paid to modeling, as it develops fine motor skills, perseverance, patience and imagination. Plasticine crafts have a positive effect on abstract thinking, logic, and even the speech of young children. You can try to teach your child to sculpt at home, because he can do this from the age of 1.5 years.
DIY children's crafts from plasticine
Today there are many special books for plasticine applications, as well as special tools for modeling. It is necessary to prepare a workplace for the child so as not to stain everything around with plasticine. To start classes you will need a table, a board, and a plasticine knife.
First, let the child knead a piece of plasticine in his hand. After this, trust him to cover a picture or an ordinary glass jar with plasticine. When your baby gets used to working with this plastic material, you can try making simple crafts, for example, a snake or a caterpillar. They are made from strips or plasticine balls.
It makes it easy to make small details. You can try making combined crafts, for example, from chestnuts and plasticine.
Dinosaur made of cones and plasticine
Caterpillar made of chestnuts and plasticine
We sculpt from plasticine. Step by step diagrams
The cheerful cow is perfect for agricultural themed craft ideas.
Plasticine modeling develops fine motor skills in children's hands, lays the foundations for future handwriting, and develops imagination and creative thinking. Many parents think about how to teach their child to sculpt from plasticine. It's actually simple.
You must first introduce the baby to plasticine, roll balls, sticks and sculpt cubes together. Then, when the baby grows up to 3 years old, you can learn to sculpt more complex figures in stages. You can sculpt animals, flowers, people, fairy-tale characters and anything else you can imagine.
Children have a lot of fun when you work with them, communicate with them and teach them something. This way, plasticine will give you more time with your child; you can teach him how to sculpt animals well in stages. Using photos is good for teaching; such visual lessons will be useful for children.
To mold a dog step by step, you will need to take orange, blue, black and brown plasticine:
We make a large circle, two smaller circles of the same size. We also roll two identical circles, but the colors are brown and black, the size is very small.
We form the dog’s head from a large circle, ears from smaller balls, a nose from a tiny circle, and use the last tiny ball as a spot on the fur. We sculpt it on the place where the dog's eye will be.
We make eyes for the dog, for this we roll two small balls from blue plasticine and sculpt them in the place where the eyes will be. We make pupils from black plasticine, and eyebrow sticks from brown plasticine.
We will make the body of the dog very simply, roll it into a ball and make a cone out of it with a rounded bottom. We make two spots of brown plasticine on the dog’s body. Insert a toothpick and place the head on the toothpick.
We make three circles from plasticine and add one brown one. We roll them into paw sticks, slightly flattening them at the ends.
Roll up their brown plasticine into a squiggle-tail.
How to Make a Dog from Plasticine
Rose made of plasticine. Master class
Visual lessons are very useful for children. For example, if you decide to sculpt animals or flowers for the first time, you will need to do everything in sync with your child. The baby will watch what you do and repeat after you. Such lessons will be useful in that children will have the opportunity to do everything on their own, but at the same time they will have an example and everything will work out.
Now you need to try to learn lessons in which you can beautifully sculpt flowers, for example roses, if you have already practiced creating animals. Flowers are quite easy to make, since they have a lot of the same elements, look at any photo of flowers. For example, how to make a rose step by step:
First you will need to create a small circle from plasticine.
Roll this circle into a “roll”.
After this, we make a circle of the same size and put it on the “roll”.
When the rose is ready, you will need to roll a stem out of green plasticine, and also make a receptacle and stick it on the finished bud.
Plasticine crafts for children
Figures made from smart plasticine
Smart plasticine has very interesting properties. It can exhibit the properties of a liquid, a rubber-like substance, and also a solid. But at the same time, smart plasticine is not oily, does not stain your hands, and can be easily washed.
Of course, you shouldn’t sculpt animals, a car, or flowers out of it, but this kind of plasticine is good to crush in your hands, throw against a wall, or tear like paper. Children from three years old enthusiastically sculpt figures of people from smart plasticine, roll balls that can be used as bounties and do other things with such an interesting toy.
We sculpt a person
We have already tried to sculpt animals and flowers, now it’s worth giving lessons that relate to how to sculpt a person step by step. When working with children, invite them not only to watch, but also to repeat after you the entire sculpting process. Children from three years old will be interested in trying to sculpt people.
First you will need to knead the plasticine well. After that, divide it into the following parts:
Circle for the head.
Two hand sticks.
Two sticks for feet.
Now we have all the preparations ready and we’ll just start assembling the person. You will need to sculpt a neck from a log for the body and give it a waist. After this, place the head on the neck, stick the arms and legs in the right places. Children 3 years old cope with this task easily. Make a bow out of plasticine, then you will get a little girl, and if you make a cap, you will get a boy. You can fashion him a car and put him behind the wheel. There are many ideas for sculpting in photos, it’s worth looking through them and getting inspired.
How to make a man from plasticine
Not long ago I published an article about how you can organize your first classes in . In the article I talked mainly about educational games with dough that will help the baby learn to pinch off, cut the dough, leave prints on it, and in general do a lot of interesting things with it :) Today I would like to continue the topic of modeling, but dwell a little more on modeling is no longer from dough, but from plasticine, and bring to your attention options for the very first plasticine crafts with your baby.
Modeling classes are known to be extremely beneficial for children. Even during such seemingly simple actions as rolling out a kolobok or sausage, the child’s imagination and creative thinking develop. The child learns to perceive three-dimensional images, and at the same time trains fine motor skills, which has a very beneficial effect on the development of speech and on preparing the hand for writing. In other words, modeling in general has a very beneficial effect on the intellectual and emotional development of a child, so it is very advisable to include it in regular activities with your child.
Often mothers think that it is too early to sculpt with a one-year-old baby, because... the child will most likely want to taste the plasticine. However, even if your child tries to try it, don’t give up on your creativity lessons right away! Try to demonstrate to your child what plasticine is capable of, show how many unusual things can be made from it. Even if the child persistently continues to “try” the modeling mass, then at first sculpt from. Firstly, nothing bad will happen if the child tries it, since it is absolutely natural, and secondly, after several tastings, the child will most likely refuse this activity, because... the dough tastes very salty.
All the crafts in this article can be made from either plasticine or dough (store-bought, Play Doh, or homemade). The only thing worth noting is that when you make stickers on paper, the plasticine will stick to the paper much better than the dough. If you do work with plasticine, then choose the softest plasticine for practice so that the baby is not disappointed after his first attempts to sculpt.
Always remember that creative activities should last no more than 5-10 minutes. Do not hold or force your child to sculpt with plasticine if he does not want to or is naughty. Even slight pressure on the baby will lead to the fact that he will eventually lose all interest in creativity. Therefore, if a child refuses to sculpt, just offer him this activity after some time (in a day, a week, or maybe a month), most importantly, don’t force it!
Where to start modeling classes with a child 1-2 years old
Naturally, you shouldn’t sculpt complex crafts in your first lessons. Now our task is to master the basic and simplest skills of working with plasticine. So, what should you teach your child first:
- Pinch off a piece plasticine with thumb and forefinger
- Knead plasticine in the palm of your hand
- "Flatten" small plasticine balls with your index finger. At first, the mother makes the balls for the baby, then gradually we learn to roll the balls together.
- Roll the bun between two palms. It is preferable to use both hands (rather than rolling the bun on the table), since in this case both palms are massaged, which is twice as beneficial for the baby’s motor skills. If it is difficult to roll a ball with two palms, at first you can learn to roll the bun on your mother’s palm. Give the resulting ball different images, so your simple manipulations with plasticine will take on meaning. For example, by adding a leaf to a ball, you can turn it into an apple, and with the help of a match or a toothpick you can easily make a real bun that rolled away from grandma and grandpa!
- Roll the sausage between two palms. An ordinary plasticine sausage can easily become a cucumber for a hungry doll Masha or a worm that will then crawl along a baby’s hand.
Well, now there are various options for plasticine crafts that you can create even with a one-year-old toddler.
The simplest crafts from plasticine
For all crafts, you will need to draw or print a picture template in advance. In the article I added the ability to download the simplest b/w templates. If you wish, you can pre-color them, or, if you have a color printer, find more interesting color analogues of the templates. I think the baby will like any option, even black and white.
Try to ensure that when creating a craft, the child plucks off each piece of plasticine himself and, if possible, rolls it into a ball.
- Ladybug –
- Chicken grains –
- Snowflakes –
- Watermelon with seeds –
- Specks on the fly agaric –
- Tree with leaves –
Crafts made from plasticine with the arrangement of elements in specific places
- Beads –
- Rungs for stairs . Invite your child to help the girl climb a palm tree to get coconuts - there’s no way to do this without a ladder. –
- Train wheels –
- Flower –
- Zebra stripes –
- Plasticine hide and seek . Hiding the bun from the fox -
You can also use ready-made manuals in your classes. This is very convenient, because... does not require any additional preparation before class. Here are the manuals we used:
- (Ozon, Labyrinth, My-shop)
- (Ozon, My-shop)
