“Art is as natural as sunshine and as vital as nourishment.” –MaryAnn F. Kohl

For some reason, schools nowadays put heavy focus on Math and Reading. I don’t get why they don’t give as much time for the arts. In my daughter’s school, the first graders only had art classes every other week. I’m a bit sad about that because 1) my daughter loves making art; and 2) creative activities make up some of the building blocks of a child’s development. I do love their focus on academic excellence, but I would love if they can also allow kids to explore the arts more.

But anyway. That is for another discussion.

Because the minis don’t get as much ‘art time’ in school as we’d like, we make up for it at home. It’s messy, yes, but we encourage creativity in this house. I absolutely love seeing them draw, paint, mold, and build because I get to have a peek at what’s inside their young minds. And believe me, it’s incredible in there! You won’t believe how crazy genius kids’ ideas are!

Let Them Draw Their Thoughts and Feelings with BIC Kids Coloring Materials

We have a lot of BIC Kids hanging around our house because my kids draw and paint A LOT.

When I was younger, I used to journal to put my thoughts and feelings on paper. What I noticed with our minis is that they release their thoughts and feelings through drawings. When we discovered that, we bought each of them a sketch pad and let them journal through drawings. That’s how we find out if there’s something bothering them or if something excites them.

BIC’s kids’ line are designed for children aged 2-10 years old. The coloring tools are washable (thank God) and are made to be extra-resistant to prevent them from breaking too fast.

These are available in National Bookstore, by the way! I highly recommend this line because it’s ah-mazing for kids and a blessing to parents. Like I said, they’re washable so parents need not worry about the mess after because you can easily clean it up. And, they’re made to withstand kids’ use. I know you know how kids are so good at breaking coloring materials! LOL.

Other Ways We Encourage Our Kids to Get Creative

Our Wooden Blocks Set is another favorite come play time. We got ours from Toys R Us (they sell the blocks in tubs). They love building all sorts of structures with those blocks. What fascinates us the most is that they use Minecraft to plan out their block structures then execute the plans with their wooden blocks. We’ve seen them create what looked like buildings hanging from a cliff with interconnected towers.

I swear, kids are geniuses just waiting to be set free! We just need to provide them with the right materials!

One of the simplest toys that our minis truly enjoy are clothespins. As in the ones we use to hang our clothes with to dry under the sun. We first discovered that this is a hit with kids when we saw my son’s school letting kids build robots and jets with them. So I bought a box of it and it became an instant hit at home!

Other than these Creative Boosters, we’ve let go of all other toys. We still allow the kids to play with their iPads though since they practice building and coding in Minecraft. Other than that, we only have our coloring materials, wooden blocks, and clothespins. These are more than enough for them!

Do you have creative boosters for your little one too?
Share ’em with us through the comments section below!