coloring

ACK! :gah: I am trying get them into coloring but all they do is put the crayons their mouth. I am thinking the more we work on it the better they will get or are they just not ready yet?

 

They probably aren't ready, mine didn't quite get the hang of it until they were closer to 2. And I still catch Aly chewing on them sometimes. Have you tried markers? Mine weren't as bad with those and 50% of the time didn't chew the marker part of the pen :laughing: It doesn't hurt to keep playing with them but it can be frustrating!

 

Mine are almost 2 1/2 and still every now and then put them in their mouths.

What works a lot better is Magna Doodle or Doodle Pro. No mess, and it gets them used to the concept of coloring.

When they get a bit older you can try again with crayons.

 

lol...I am glad u wrote this. I have one who will make a scratch on paper, the other wants to chew on it and throw it. Oh well..eventually. I think I get stuck on what I think they should be doing rather than letting them progress in their own time.

 

My guys totally did this when we first started introducing crayons. <_< They'd "color" for a bit, then they'd start chewing on them. :bad: At that point we'd tell them that the crayons belonged on the paper, not in their mouths, and if they continued, we would take them away and give them another toy to play with.

It took a while, but it's gotten a lot better and they rarely bite the crayons any more. Just keep trying and they will get it!

 

You are braver than me, I think my older ones were 2 + before I braved crayons!

 

[quote name='Nate and Jack's Mom' date='24 May 2010 - 08:39 AM' timestamp='1274711960' post='1639608']
My guys totally did this when we first started introducing crayons. <_< They'd "color" for a bit, then they'd start chewing on them. :bad: At that point we'd tell them that the crayons belonged on the paper, not in their mouths, and if they continued, we would take them away and give them another toy to play with.

It took a while, but it's gotten a lot better and they rarely bite the crayons any more. Just keep trying and they will get it!
[/quote]

we do the exact same thing in our house. the girls rarely eat their crayons now. the new thing is colouring on their faces. <_< so now we've started the whole process over again. ardon:

 

Great idea!

 

I haven't even tried crayons, I know exactly what would happen to them, rainbow poop anyone?? Ditto to the magnadoodle - my boys love it, although still bugs me when they put the 'pen' in their mouth.

 

Oh my, that's our case here too! My DS eats the crayons and DD colors with them, but she can't have them because he'll take them. We have magna doodles and they love those, but DS also chews the pen. I tried a chalkboard and DS also tried to eat the chalk. It makes me gag thinking about it- texture thing! I can't wait for them to outgrow this stage. I'm ready to hang their color "masterpieces" on my fridge!

 

I second the magna doodle suggestion (and the travel ones are great for the car). They LOVE them still and have from 1 yr. At that age we gave them each one color at a time and watched closely!! Coloring time also lasted all of 5 minutes at a time. I liked the Twistables crayons at that point because it's just plastic to chew on except for the tip. Now they pull the crayon out of those though so we have moved to regular crayons.

 

We started at 15-16months? something like that. Crayons not food. no eat.(if it happens a 2nd time, crayon time was over)
Repeat over and over.
Now we just throw crayons. And they try to eat them, look at me, and say No!

 

I'd give it a few tries and see if they get the idea, but if all you're doing is saying "Out of the mouth," they're not ready.

You might try stamps (with washable ink pads) -- they will get ink all over their hands, but since stamps aren't a very "mouth-able" shape, they may be less tempted.

Mine starting coloring and using finger paint at daycare around 16 months, but I didn't do it at home until several months later. I didn't really enjoy having them do art at home until they were old enough to do it (with certain materials, at least) mostly unsupervised, around age 2.5.

 

I've used aquadoodles. They still suck a bit on the markers but that's ok, it's just water! The cloth like paper that is part of the mat they draw on is what makes the color. It doesn't make a mess anywhere! If you dribble water on the mat, you'd see it turn colors. Some mats are made for multiple colors. The one I has only turns blue, but they still like it. You just fill the marker's with water and let them at it. They can write anywhere, but like I said, it's just water so it doesn't mark anything. I do discourage them to suck on the markers, but at least I know they won't but filling their mouths with ink.

The magna doodle sounds like it would be fun too! I'm probably going to look in to that for the boys too.