Turn crumpled pieces of paper into colorful artwork in this fun art project for kids. This easy art activity is inspired by the children’s book, Ish, by Peter H. Reynolds! The colorful paper has such a cool texture when finished and can be used for making collages or writing notes!

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The Preschool Book Club is back this week with creative activities for kids inspired by the popular children’s book, Ish! Every other week we’ll be sharing some fun activities for kids based on the book of the week. (Be sure to check out all my activities for kids inspired by children’s books!)

See it in action here!

Crumpled Paper Art Inspired by Ish

In the story, Ish, a little boy named Ramon loves to draw, but loses his confidence when his picture is laughed at by his older brother. Over and over he crumples his drawings and tosses them on the floor and is ready to give up on art. But, his younger sister has been secretly gathering the crumpled drawings and displays them. She teaches Ramon that art isn’t about being perfect, but about thinking more -ishly!

We were inspired by all of Ramon’s crumpled papers in the story to make our own crumpled paper art. This is a great process art activity that really gets the kids excited about creating!

Crumpled Paper Art Project for Kids

Materials for Crumpled Paper Art

White construction paper
Watercolors (We used liquid watercolors.)
Paintbrush
Scissors or paper cutter

Directions for Crumpled Paper Art

1. Cut your white construction paper into smaller pieces. We split ours into fourths so we ended up with four 6 inch x 4.5 inch pieces per sheet of construction paper.

2. Take one piece of your cut construction paper and crumple it up into a ball.