Children’s Art Making with Beeswax Crayons

Children’s Art Making with Beeswax Crayons

It’s been a beautiful summer and now “back to school” is fast approaching with September just around the corner. With colder weather comes more indoor activities and whether at school or at home, letting your young child explore art materials like paint, beeswax crayons or clay comes with lots of wonderful benefits for your young child! 

The Benefits of Art for Young Children 

Diane Trister Dodge, the author of the Creative Curriculum, explains that during art activities, young children can:  

• Learn concepts such as colours, shapes, lines, properties, textures 
• Be creative and imaginative while expressing themselves
• Learn about cause and effect, some problem-solving, sizes, symmetry, design, balance, patterns
• Develop fine motor and eye-hand coordination
• Explore: by stirring, marking, painting, rolling, cutting, twisting, folding, flattening, dripping, blotting and tapping. 
• Learn to combine and transform materials, fill up surfaces with colour, paste, or paper scraps, pieces of old jewellery, fabrics, cotton balls, paper, cardboard
• Develop their fine motor muscles and control
• Concentrate and complete a task
• Develop their self-esteem and feelings of control and mastery
• Sort and compare objects noticing similarities and differences in the characteristics such as colour, shapes, design, size

(Excerpt from Dodge, The Creative Curriculum for Preschool: Volume 2 – Interest Areas, 2011)

Making Children’s Art At Home Easy 

And while supplying art materials for your little one may seem complicated, parents can do a few simple things to support art-making at home, such as; 

• Having seating and a table that is the appropriate height for your child to sit easily. 
• Choosing a location with good natural light and close to a sink for easy clean-up. 
• Keeping materials well-organized and within your child’s reach for easy and frequent access. 
• Stocking an array of materials for different art projects (paper, crayons, paint, glue, children’s scissors, stickers, natural materials). 

Choosing Children’s Art Materials 

Choosing materials for your child’s next art project can be tricky but keep an eye out for natural and non-toxic ingredients and pigments. Made by Bees Beeswax Crayons are made from 100% Canadian beeswax, natural and food-grade ingredients. The ingredients are carefully heated, mixed, and measured to produce ten pretty colours. The vibrant colours are beautiful to look at and leave great pigment on the page. The natural and food-grade ingredients also ensure that our beeswax crayons are safe for children over one and less harmful than traditional paraffin-based crayons. 

In addition to the natural benefits, the crayons are moulded and designed with little hands in mind. We know all too well how often young children snap, unwrap, or peel traditional crayons, resulting in a messy box of broken and unused art supplies. Made by Bees' beeswax crayons are 4-5x larger than regular crayons to fit into your child’s grasp at a young age while being thick enough not to break. The larger size of the crayons makes them ideal for toddlers and preschoolers developing fine-motor skills. While colouring, your child has the opportunity to develop their hand-eye coordination, the physical strength in their hands, and their muscle memory.

We also created a “bee-autiful” Montessori-inspired wooden, crayon storage caddy to develop fine motor control further. The caddy acts as both storage and a puzzle-like activity for your child to practice fine-mobility skills and encourage them to clean up their colouring area independently. 

Want to Learn More?

To learn more about our beeswax crayons, visit our FAQ page or shop the crayons and caddy.

To learn more about the benefits of art-making with preschoolers and toddlers, click here. 

To learn more about the benefits of making art with crayons for young children, click here.