The challenge of children and collage

In my years of teaching, I’ve noticed that children often choose to draw or paint rather than make a collage. On choice-based art teaching forums I’ve often heard art teachers talk about the challenge of inspiring children to make collages. Are you curious as to why do some children find collage challenging? And why might this be the case when we know that kids often respond strongly to the collage illustrations of Eric Carle, Leo Lionni, Ezra Jack Keats, Ekua Holmes, and other visual storytellers?

Making a collage as an intentional act

I am wondering what happens when we ask children to make a collage as an intentional act?  Why is collage sometimes less appealing to young children than drawing or painting?

What is a collage?

Let’s start with what we mean by collage. Here are a few definitions I found on line: 1. A technique of composing a work of art by pasting on a single surface various materials not normally associated with one another, as newspaper clippings, parts of photographs, theater tickets, and fragments of an envelope. 2. A work of art produced by this technique.  3. A piece of art made by sticking various different materials such as photographs and pieces of paper or fabric onto a backing.  4. An artistic composition of materials and objects pasted over a surface, often with unifying lines and color. One of the early masters of collage was none other than Pablo Picasso.

Collage as Process AND Product

How is collage both process and product? Making a collage is a way of thinking that involves combining, juxtaposing, and recombining disparate elements into a new whole. And collage is also what we call the final product.

Here’s my theory about how children choose an art medium or process.  When children are offered a variety of art-making choices, they gravitate to the material or process that offers the best vehicle for expressing their ideas.  They also tend to repeat the things they are good at while avoiding materials or techniques that make them uncomfortable.   When they can choose from easel painting, pencil sketching, clay modeling which are fairly direct processes, or collage, which is more indirect, it makes some sense that young children are not always drawn to collage.

What are direct vs. indirect art-making processes?

What do I mean by “indirect” vs. “direct” processes?  Every kind of art-making involves thinking.  Creating a work of art is a dance between the idea and the chosen material or materials, and when we make collages, there can be more steps to the final image. Thus, making a collage involves multiple steps. For a child, It’s not as simple as picking up a paintbrush. I don’t mean to imply that making a painting is more simple, it’s just more direct.  To make a collage that is more than just a randomly assembled bunch of papers glued down, a child must employ a thinking process that delays the final product until several intermediate steps are taken.

The stages of development in collage

The developmental psychologist Victor Lowenfeld described several stages of art-making in children, starting with random scribbling. Interestingly, just like with painting and drawing, if undirected by adults, children will go through a “scribble” stage of collage-making. The scribble stage usually involves layering random papers, sometimes on top of one another or placed randomly on the page. The glue can be messy and drippy–in fact–the glue can be a child’s primary interest!

Thinking steps–How to begin a collage 

To get started, a collage artist must first select their materials, then cut the materials into the shapes they want.  Perhaps they have an image in mind such as a landscape or portrait or other image inspired by an experience, memory, or photograph. Next, they must arrange the selected color shapes onto the page. This part of the process usually involves some editing, since not every paper chosen will fit.  The design will likely evolve a bit as the child experiments with what looks good together. The last step is to glue all the elements down onto a paper or board.

Challenges of the process–sticky fingers, etc.

In addition to the thinking steps, there is the process itself that can be challenging.  Making a collage can be messy and glue can be hard to control.  So, to summarize, you’re dealing with a bunch of elements that need to be glued down in a particular arrangement.  You have at least four steps from the initial choosing to the final gluing down of elements.  I have found that it can be hard for some children to stay motivated when there are so many steps.  It takes good executive function skills* (the brain functions that help us organize delay gratification) and a strong visual memory to keep the idea in mind from start to finish.

Observe the child and try to follow their thinking

If you observe your students who make collages, you will begin to appreciate the kind of thinking they are using, and you will also realize why this kind of work is not for everyone.

Composing on the fly–effortless and charming child art

Why do we find children’s art so appealing? Young children naturally compose on the fly.  Their spontaneous compositions are often charming and seemingly effortless.  If you have ever watched a child make a painting, one brushstroke leads them to the next in a free-flowing stream of mark-making. Once the space is filled or the idea is on the page, they will tell you “I’m done.”

About executive functions in thinking

Executive functions are the cognitive abilities that control and regulate most of what we do in day-to-day life. Executive functions include the ability to initiate, plan and organize, set goals, solve problems, regulate emotions, and monitor behavior. Because these skills play a role in all most aspects of life, Executive Function deficits can hamper a child academically, socially and emotionally. While they are present from an early age, problems with Executive Functions often do not become apparent until middle school, when the demands for working independently increase.

The “look” of first collages may not be as appealing to adults

When children are in the “scribble stage” of collage–making, their art may not be as appealing to adults. Given an assortment of pre-cut papers, their work usually results in randomly glued papers that can lack expressive content. There is nothing inherently wrong with this, as long as we give children a chance to explore without any additional expectations. Again, I’ve noticed that collage doen’t seem to be as satisfying to children as the painting process with it’s constant magic.  

A collage opportunity: Offering collage for 3-D projects–toys, puppets, masks

When collage materials are presented as options in a “materials center,” children often utilize these materials for projects such as toys, puppets, or masks.  In the end, it all depends what we mean by the word “collage.” Let’s encourage creative thinking and problem-solving in our classes and workshops. Collage is one challenging process, yet full of opportunities for expressive work and skill development in young people.

Puppets and Stories–a children’s workshop coming up in January 2025

Finally, I want to tell you about a children’s art workshop I’m offering at Meetinghouse Arts in Freeport on Saturday, January 7th, 2025. I’ll be bringing a lot of Beautiful Stuff to the workshop. And I’ll be firing up my cool-melt glue gun to help facilitate children’s puppet-making and storytelling. *Please note that registration is limited to ten participants and scholarships are available upon request.

*Executive Function Overview