Dear Parents:

Art projects in the home can help reinforce the lessons learned in school, and with your help, they can produce some amazing end results as well. This activity will not only help your child learn to better follow step-by-step instructions and improve their hand-eye coordination, but will leave you with a pop-up family album to enjoy, too!

What you need

1. unbreakable hand mirror
2. large index cards or sheets of stiff paper
3. child scissors
4. glue
5. markers and crayons 

What your child will learn

1. to compare similarities and differences
2. to follow step-by-step directions
3. to develop hand-eye coordination

What to do together

1. Sitting beside your child, hold up the mirror and look at each other's faces. Talk together about your features. How do you look similar to one another? How do you look different? Invite your child to work with you to create an exciting pop-up family album.
2. Make a pop-up nose by folding an index card or stiff paper in half. Crease it. Then make two parallel cuts, about an inch apart, in the center of the folded edge. Pull up the cut section like a tab. Crease it well and then fold it back down. Unfold the card and position the tab from behind so it pops out inside like a nose as you open the card.
3. Create a picture of a family member by illustrating more facial features around the nose. Try tricky embellishments such as making little cuts in a piece of paper and gluing it above the nose to make fringed hair ' or glue it below the nose for a mustache. For curly hair, cut out a medium-sized circle. Then draw a spiral in the circle and cut along the line. Glue it above the nose and watch it bounce.
4. Your child can draw other facial features with the markers and crayons. Then write the name of the person he illustrated beneath the picture. Continue making pictures of people in the family. Then staple them together to create a moving family album.