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Crayola Kids
Pros: A wealth of content includes kids' activities and games as well as art-related lesson plans, craft ideas, and valuable tips and strategies for teachers.
Cons: Crayola marketing is relentless, and the bulky site can be difficult for kids to navigate.
Bottom Line: Even though Crayola markets its products with a heavy hand, the site's cornucopia of ideas for classroom activities and other teacher resources make it well worth a visit.
Teachers could browse the lesson plans, craft ideas, and professional resources to find inspiration and advice that's relevant for them and their classrooms. All activities indicate that multiple Crayola products are needed, but for most projects, teachers can really just use whatever they have on hand. The site provides a wealth of ideas on how to integrate art into almost any subject area as well as information about other initiatives that might be useful for teachers, such as contests, social responsibility projects (recycling old markers, for example), and more. If kids go on Crayola Kids, teachers can help them create stories or coloring pages individually, with a partner, or in small groups. They might, for example, create illustrations for a cartoon online, print it, and then write the text offline. Teachers will need to provide a reasonable level of supervision, however, so kids stick to the task and don't get lost in the marketing or other irrelevant areas of the site.
Crayola Kids offers kids and teachers a wide variety of online activities and offline resources –- all related to Crayola's arts products, of course. In the Kids Zone, kids can make their own avatars, creatures, and gizmos; create a cartoon story; make a coloring page out of a favorite photo; and more. Some, but not all, activities require a special access code printed on Crayola products. The site also provides games, in which kids might create a fireworks show or go on a treasure hunt, for example. Teachers can access a rich library of art-inspired lesson plans and craft ideas that touch on practically every subject area -- such as how to get along on the playground, the importance of sleep, or geometry. Lesson plans are organized by age/grade, category (subject), subcategory, and materials needed (i.e., which Crayola products you'll need). In addition, professional development and teaching-tips articles offer advice on topics ranging from classroom management to engaging parents.
Crayola Kids.com is a stage on which Crayola wants its products to shine, and it does a good job of pointing out the infinite number of ways those products can be integrated into the classroom. But if you can look past the site's relentless marketing message, you'll find a great resource, rich with wonderful ideas on how to integrate art with learning (no need to actually use all those Crayola products). Specific lesson plans and more general advice and professional development articles can be a great source of inspiration for teachers. In fact, Crayola Kids works best as a teacher resource. Kids who visit the site will enjoy the online creative activities, and those who can get past the complicated game instructions will likely enjoy those too. But the site is massive, and it's easy for kids to get lost clicking through teacher material, product promotions, and the online store.
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