Free printable materials for children

Question

My daughter (2.5) loves colouring books, but she uses pretty much one every day. Could someone recommend a decent free online resource of printable materials for children? (at 2.5 years of age these would be mainly colouring books, but maybe some games would be more appropriate for older children). Ideally in pdf format for high-quality printouts.

Answer 1

Here are a few places that I have found that are kind of home school related but I figure I will use as color pages to help my kids learn as they are playing.

• http://www.mrprintables.com/printable-alphabet-book.html
• http://www.schoolsparks.com/kindergarten-worksheets

Here are some pinterest searchs that may have what you need:

• http://pinterest.com/search/?q=kids+color+pages
• http://pinterest.com/search/?q=kids+printables

Answer 2

One quick idea that comes to mind is all the line-art or black-and-white clip art in your computer's office suite. If you have MS Office then there is a huge library of clip art, and even more available online.

You could select a bunch of suitable images and print them out. If you do this, do a quick calculation on printing costs first, because it might still be cheaper to buy a stack of books than a stack of ink cartridges...!

Answer 3

Often if you go to the websites of her favourite characters websites (Peppa pig, for example) you'll find things to print for colouring in ("things to do" or "activities" normally).

Another approach you may want to consider is something that can be reset, for example:

1) White-board

2) Blackboard

3) A reusable colouring book like ReColoritz

Answer 4

I saw a link to the following website and remembered your question. This site has paperdolls from 27 different countries you can print, color, and play with.

http://www.education.com/slideshow/exploring-cultures-paper-dolls-world/paper-dolls-world-asia-I/

Answer 5

You can search Google Images or bing images for a character of her choice with keywords like coloring pages and let her select from the thumbnails which image to print.

In Google Images selecting for black and white images can save you the need for additional keywords.

The sites that come up in the search often have a collection of coloring pages.

Answer 6

There are many pages two of my favorite are: http://www.coloring.ws/coloring.html and http://www.crayola.com/free-coloring-pages/

The first one is great because there is a wide range of pages and can be searched by something that interests your child. The second on is Crayola's site - this site is great because it has more than just coloring pages, it has a variety of projects as well, which may be great especially as your child grows. I have found if you are looking for something specific, search that topic and coloring page and you will generally find free pages to print off for example "bear coloring page" will provide you an extensive list of pages.

Answer 7

I just came across this description on how to create coloring book pages from your own photos:

Turn your family photos into fun kids' coloring books for free! This simple tutorial will teach you how to turn any photograph into black and white outlines that you can print out at home. [...] I'm going to talk through this process in a lot of detail, but that's only so that a complete beginner will feel comfortable. Don't be intimidated by the number of steps; you can actually complete the project in about 5 minutes!

(hat tip to Lifehacker.)