Prep: 5 Minutes / Activity Time: 10-15 Minutes

Comic strips often have appeal for children, even before they learn to read. The animation and fun characters bring out the best in imagination, and the short, simple stories are easy to understand. Use comic strips to encourage your child’s creativity.

  • unlined paper
  • pens
  • colored pencils
  • skinny markers
  • comic strip frames from newspaper
  • glue or glue stick

Step 1:  Cut apart a two- or three-frame comic strip suitable for young children that you find in the newspaper. Glue the comic strip frames onto a large sheet of unlined paper.  

Step 2:  Ask your child to use his imagination and dictate or write a caption under each picture to create his own story. If your child dictates the story, you can print it for him.  

Reduce the number of frames.  Cut out just one frame of a comic strip suitable for young children that you find in the newspaper. Glue the comic strip frame onto a large sheet of unlined paper.  Ask your child to use his imagination and dictate a caption under the picture to create his own story. Write the caption that your child dictates onto the sheet of paper.  

 Add an additional creative step for your child.  Ask your child to add another frame to the “comic strip story” by drawing his own picture and adding the caption.