Visuals bring life and excitement into your life. As far as our sight can go, there are colors and visuals all around, and where there are colors, there is design! From simple logos to pictures on store boards to huge pictures on huge billboards, one can visualize design!
Imagine diving into the world of colors and playing with them. Sounds fun, doesn’t it? And who can do that better than a kid? Kids possess some of the most creative minds, bringing unique ideas to life.
So, something as creative and innovative as graphic design is meant not only for adults but also for kids. Gen Z kids have showcased exceptional capabilities. They learn fast and offer some of the highest levels of creativity.
Let’s now explore more about graphic design at a young age, how it can benefit children, and the different tools and projects that can help them learn it.
Basic Skills for Graphic Designing for Kids
True, graphic design is all about colors and design, but there’s more to it. The field is about maintaining a subtle balance that enhances the complete design, creating a worthwhile appearance.
Here are some basic graphic design skills that kids of young age should learn as they step foot into this dynamic field:
1. Visual Clarity
Clarity is the key to an effective design!
Ensuring legibility and clarity is essential, whether designing a pamphlet with multiple paragraphs or a poster with just a tile. The designs communicate with the audience, so if they are not easy to read or understand, the entire piece is useless. It includes developing an understanding of the basic arrangements and layouts, which include:
- Balance
- Text and image alignment (should be in line and at an equal distance from the sides)
- White space around the elements
2. Typography (fonts and text)
Continuing with the above point, learning basic typography helps maintain clarity and legibility throughout. Furthermore, learning the correct use of different fonts helps young minds create some of the most unique designs.
3. Basic Shapes and Lines
The design is all about shapes and lines. A good understanding of the basic shapes (circles, squares, triangles) and lines (straight, curved) makes the foundation of this dynamic and creative world. Kids with a better understanding of shapes and lines are better able to craft a balanced and effective design that showcases their creativity.
4. Color Manipulation
Colors attract all, and kids are specifically drawn to them. There is no wall in the house is there, but a colorful line is there on it in a home with kids. So, there’s a lot more to colors than just colored pencils or crayons.
Colors portray one’s mood and impact one’s emotions. Kids who are fond of colors should understand the individual and combinational use of the primary (red, blue, yellow) and secondary (green, orange, purple) colors. A good understanding of the different color schemes (complementary, analogous, monochromatic) can enhance one’s design capabilities.
Famous Tools for Learning Graphic Design for Kids
Several free web resources are available for kids to explore the colorful and dynamic world of graphic design.
1. Canva
Canva is one of the most basic tools for bringing a kid onboard his graphic designing journey. The tool brings forth some of the most creative options (templates and design elements) for designing print and digital materials like posters, Instagram posts, pamphlets, etc.
- Age group: 7 years and above
- Website: Canva for Education
2. Tux Paint
Tux Paint is a free drawing tool that allows kids to polish their drawing and color-using skills. It offers features like stamps, brushes, and special effects, enhancing kids’ creativity and design.
- Age group: 3 -12 years
- Website: Tux Paint
3. Pixlr
Similar to Photoshop yet simpler than Photoshop, this free tool helps kids understand how a simple effect can change the mood and impact of an entire image. It features an intuitive interface, letting kids practice photo editing and create appealing graphics.
- Age Group: 10 and up.
- Website: Pixlr
4. Google Drawings
It’s a free tool that integrates with Google Drive. It’s good for practicing basic designs and making infographics and diagrams. It also allows collaboration and sharing during work, making design even more fun.
- Age Group: 8 and up.
- Website: Google Drawings
5. Scratch
The tool combines graphic designing with coding, letting kids code and design their own interactive stories, games such as Flappy Bird, and simple animations. The tool also enhances the kids’ creative thinking capabilities.
- Age Group: 8 and up.
- Website: Scratch
Fun Graphic Design Projects for Kids to Spark Creativity
While graphic design tools help kids embark on a more professional approach, certain fun projects with different graphic design activities for kids help to develop a kid’s interest in designing. These include:
- Poster Designing: Challenging kids to design a poster for a science fair to attract an increased audience to their stall. Together with creativity, it enhances their understanding of visual layout and arrangement.
- Logo Making: Assigning kids to tasks such as logo-designing for an abstract business, company, or educational YouTube channels for kids, with the intent of marketing and branding. Urge kids to use a balance of colors that define the business’s identity and goals. It lets kids think out of the box and come up with exciting new designs.
- Designing a Card: Giving tasks such as custom-designing birthday cards, event invitations, and business cards with appealing visuals and distributing them among friends (audience). It enhances children’s understanding of balancing colors, design, and alignment and how design can help reach an increased customer base.
- Custom Designing the T-shirts: Challenging kids to custom design T-shirts with prints of their favorite characters and market the character among their friends. Telling them to design the character in different poses sparks their interest in graphic design, pursuing later in life.
- Create a Mood Board: Kids can create a mood board on Pinterest or simply a collage of images from a magazine. This activity allows them to better understand patterns and image alignments and how a single wrong placement can change the entire image’s expression and mood.
Why Kids Should Learn Graphic Designing?
Learning graphic design at a young age benefits children in a number of ways. Where it allows expressing themselves visually through design, graphic designing also inculcates personality-grooming skills in kids, such as:
- Enhanced creative and imaginative skills
- Problem-solving tactics
- Critical thinking
- Visual communication
- Enhanced confidence
- Cross-curricular learning
What Parents Can Do?
Parents, it’s now time to set your kid free from your wing and explore the world. You can start by enrolling them in interesting and exciting graphic designing courses that help kids maintain their pace with the present times and grow to be creative and skillful individuals. For instance, you can:
- Provide resources offering easy access to design tools.
- Encourage practice even if they fail to create a good visual.
- Celebrate efforts and reward them to boost their confidence and interest.
- Seek opportunities that can provide easy learning resources for your designer kid.
Take Away Words
Learning graphic designing for kids is as exciting as it sounds. Not only does it develop the kids’ creativity, but it also enhances their confidence, shaping them to be confident people. With effective tools, proper guidance, and encouragement, the kids can embark on their design journey, gaining success all the way up.
“Creativity is nothing, but a mind set free.”