Simple Activities to Help Teach Photography to Kids

Introducing your kids to photography is a great way for them to develop a new hobby, gain self-confidence, and increase their creativity. You can help teach photography to your kids by giving them an inexpensive digital camera and finding fun photography related projects to increase their technical and creative skills. A positive experience will hopefully instill a drive for them to want to continue taking pictures.

Here are 6 simple photography activities that you can do with your kids that will help teach them valuable concepts when taking photos. These ideas are just the start to an unlimited amount of fun you could have with your kids. Make sure to participate as well with your own camera, and you can also teach your kids how to download, edit, and even print the photos you’ve taken.

Zoom In

Challenge your child’s imagination by finding an interesting subject right in your own home and take a close-up of it. You can show something as simple as the center of a cucumber and it’ll reveal an entirely new perspective that we would normally ignore.

Take Unconventional Selfies

Because “selfies” have become so popular, it would be a great idea for you and your kids to play around with this topic. There are so many different photography projects that you can come up with based around the self-portrait. For example, instead of shooting your stereotypical bathroom mirror selfie, try to limit your self-portrait to shooting your own shadow. Keep the ideas fun and simple to start with, and as interest and skills grow, introduce lighting and composition concepts to make your photos even better!

Experiment with Motion Blur

Kids love to move around! This is the perfect project for your busy children who like to be on the go. Have your child spin in a circle while they’re holding the camera facing their face. The idea is to get the shot of their face sharp while the background is blurred. This is a bit of a tricky project because you need to have your spin and the shutter speed set at just the right speed. You could also try to zoom your lens and rotate the camera during the exposure to get a similar blur.

Experiment with Textures

A great way to enhance your visual recognition skills is by focusing on one element of photography like texture. The challenge in this project is looking at many different types of surfaces while searching for complex patterns that can be found on the surface you’re looking at. Texture is everywhere and stands out the most when light comes at it from an angle. An ideal surface would be something like the bark of a tree. This type of project will be helpful for your student to learn how to recognize the different qualities that an image can have and then capture it. This idea can easily be done with other types of elements like color and shapes.

Shadows

Using natural light from the sun or creating your own light from something like a flashlight, find objects that will create unique shadows. This activity can teach your child that sometimes the main subject is not the most interesting concept of the photo composition.

Reflections

You can find reflections nearly everywhere that you go. Smooth, shiny surfaces work the best. Look for glass, water, or shiny metal and have fun shooting what ver is reflecting onto that surface. Small puddles are excellent because they isolate only parts of outdoor subjects, like a light post or building.