May 16th is International Drawing Day, and we’ve lined up some cool drawing activities for kids to try! They’re easy, therapeutic and lots of fun!

When it comes to art forms, things like digital art, murals or portraits seem to be the ‘celebrity’ ones, and drawing is often considered something for little kids. We forget that drawing was our first form of communication – cavemen started by recording their lives in drawings!

That’s why we need a special day to celebrate the significance of drawing in our lives, and we have it – International Drawing Day on 16th May!

Contents show

Benefits of Drawing Activities for Kids

Drawing promotes the strengthening of the finger muscles, improving the pincer grasp
When kids scribble, it strengthens their fine motor skills and hand-eye coordination
Drawing helps kids understand cause & effect, when they see what happens when they put pen to paper
When children draw, it encourages them to think creatively and analytically to solve problems
Drawing is a great way for young children to express themselves when they can do so in words

This Drawing Day, let’s take a minute to remind ourselves of the simple joys of drawing and how much fun it was when we were kids. Here are some fun drawing activities for kids, or even the kid-at-heart!

15 Delightful Drawing Activities for Kids

1. Animal Shapes Directed Drawing Guide for Kids

Can you turn a plain rectangle into a frog? Or how about a circle into a bear? Well, you can do all this and more, simply by downloading our animals directed-drawing printable!

2. Farm Animals Directed Drawing Guide

Little kids who are learning about farm animals will love learning how to draw their favorites with this drawing guide! It’s wonderful when you can use drawing activities for kids along with the lessons they’re learning!

3. A-Z Animal Adventure Directed Drawing Guide

Combining the alphabet with animal names is a popular concept when teaching preschoolers, and this fun printable is a great resource to go with it!

4. 6 Printable Scenery Drawing Prompts

Sometimes, asking kids to draw on a blank sheet of paper can be overwhelming. That’s why we like including drawing activities for kids that have some kind of prompt, like under the sea, or on the beach.

5. Printable Blank Drawing Frames for Kids

Like miniature drawings? In that case, these blank frames are perfect for you! You can create anything you like inside the decorated frames, and you can even cut them out and stick them in your journal!

6. Tessellation Drawing Art Tutorial

Learn drawing from the master – M.C. Escher! He was the master of tessellation, a kind of pattern making with the same shape. Here’s a tutorial on how to make your own pattern and color it as you like.

7. Step-by-Step Warli Art Drawing

Remember how we mentioned that drawing was one of the first ways of communication? Well, it was also one of the first forms of folk art! Use these drawing activities for kids to learn about cultural art forms like the Warli art from India.

8. Printable My House Drawing Prompt

Picklebums brings us a cute drawing prompt that has a lot of playability included in it! Add details to the interior and exterior of the house, and don’t forget to include lots of color.

9. Exquisite Corpse Drawing Game

While the name of this activity sounds a tad morbid, it’s based on a game of the same name. Exquisite Corpse is an art technique where collaborators in a project add their own contribution, which is then assembled. Learn more about this from the tutorial at What Do We Do All Day.

10. Doodle Cubes Drawing Activity

We love everything 3D, so it’s no wonder that we’d include this cube art in our list of drawing activities for kids! The Artful Parent shows us how to use your creativity to create some pretty cubes.

11. One Line Drawing Art Project

Have you tried one-line drawing? It’s just what its name suggests – you put your pen down on paper and keep drawing in a single line without breaking the flow. It sounds intriguing, and Kids Activities Blog helps us with instructions!

12. Summer Mirror Drawing Worksheets

If you’re looking for more drawing activities for kids who get overwhelmed easily, these printables from Woo Jr. should help. They feature half drawings, so kids have a template to follow and replicate on the opposite side.

13. My Favorite Things Drawing Activity

Little Big Artists brings us a project that’s a great classroom activity! Every child will love making little doodles featuring their favorite objects, and it’ll be fun to see what they put down on paper!

14. See Through Drawing Activity

If you’d like something a little different, check out these see-through drawings from Picklebums! It’s not as complicated as it sounds, simply follow the instructions and you’ll be fine!

15. Zentangle Patterns Drawing

Tangles have a bad reputation, but when they’re zentangles, they become art! Ooly shows us how to use zentangles as a fun and therapeutic exercise for kids of all ages.

What we love the most about Drawing Day is that drawing is something anyone can do, and all you need is a pencil and paper – no fancy or expensive art supplies! You can be of any age, any gender or any nationality, and whatever time of the day it is, you can simply pick up a pencil and make a little drawing. Whether you wish to share it with the world is your choice – what matters is that you finally got a picture from your head down on paper!