It’s widely known that children develop a lot of their skills and interests during their earliest years, so introducing them to a wide range of activities is important. Arts and crafts are sometimes underestimated in their importance for young learners, particularly when you consider the immense variety of skills these activities use.
There are many ways that craftwork benefits the growing minds and bodies of our young ones, which is why, at our boarding school in Devon, we make it a key part of our curriculum. From the obvious to the unexpected, here are some of the main ways arts and crafts can benefit children.
Develops Creativity
Of course, time spent creating spaceships out of card or family portraits with watercolours helps to promote a more creative mind. Unfortunately, creativity itself is a widely undervalued skill, but developing it early can lead to a whole range of benefits.
Creativity can prove beneficial in terms of helping kids discover new ways to achieve their goals. While other essential skills such as mathematics are concerned with finding the right answer, creativity allows children to focus on the process, which then translates into improved problem-solving skills in other areas.
Helps Promote Emotional Expression
One of the most important skills for any growing child is the ability of expression. Just as with adults, when words fail, crafts can help kids to portray what they enjoy, what they are scared of, or what means the most to them.
Creates Shared Experiences
When at home, engaging in a shared arts and crafts activity can help to establish a stronger bond between you and your child. As mentioned above, artistic projects help children to express their feelings, so sharing the activity can also help you to understand what your child is feeling a little bit more.
Beyond establishing a stronger emotional bond, a group craft activity also helps promote social and teamworking skills for your young ones. Allow your child to take the lead on a project, and they can learn how to delegate tasks and explain ideas more clearly, vital skills for later in life.
Aids Brain Development
We all know that crafting helps to promote creativity. However, there are many more skills that crafts can help develop in young minds. Creativity itself helps to build synapses in the brain, connections that help us make more sense of the world around us. These help us improve our ability in a wide range of more logical tasks.
One of the other significant benefits of crafting is the improvement of motor skills. Our hands are full of tiny muscles that are trained the more we use our fingers on delicate tasks. As with many talents, the more improvements made at a young age, the bigger the benefits in later life!
Shows Skill Development
If your youngster is stuck for finding a hobby or passion in early life, then crafting could be the answer. Creative projects like this are great because they show children how and where they could improve in a fun manner, which promotes repeated activity.
Over time, children can look at all the things they’ve made and see where they are improving. This visible progression then motivates them to try more challenging activities, creating a circle of improvement that can create excellent benefits.
Builds Confidence
Confidence can be so important to growing children, but it’s something that comes in many different forms. Creative projects can help to foster this confidence, allowing them to thrive in their growing world.
Arts and crafts teach kids that it’s okay to make mistakes, which can be hard to learn otherwise. This acceptance of errors will allow children to be more accepting of new challenges in the future. Also, as their crafting skills continue to improve, confidence in their abilities will begin to grow. Again, this all feeds into creating a mindset for children where they believe they can try anything without fear, which helps aid future development.
Arts and crafts are an essential part of a child’s development. They are also an excellent way for parents to support their child’s growth while they’re not at school!
If you’re looking for ways to keep your children feeling creative at home, check out our favourite garden activities for children!
