Paying attention to the little things is vital to providing your preschoolers with a top-notch learning experience. Practicing their motor skills may seem trivial in the moment, but the benefits will last them a lifetime.
We all want to give our kiddos the best all-round education that they can get and our collection of 30 fabulous cutting activities will do just that! Forget about those traditional exercises, as we’ve put together some of the best ideas that you can use to incorporate into your lesson plans to help your children practice their cutting skills in unique and exciting ways.
1. No Yeti Yet
Intertwining the curriculum is a no-brainer to teachers like me and you, but finding the proper lessons to do precisely that can be a bit challenging. This isn’t one of those challenges; No Yeti Yet book goes along perfectly with building scissor skills!
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2. Low Prep Cutting
This super simple scissor skill activity literally only involves a piece of paper and a little bit of time. If you’re short on funding for activities or just don’t have time to run to the printer today, draw some lines on construction paper and have your students cut across!
Learn More: These Two Little Hands
3. Cutting Shapes
Another one that is low prep and just requires one piece of paper! You could honestly even make this one with something out of your box of scrap paper. It’s that simple but very beneficial to enhance those motor skills.
Learn More: Walthamstow Montessori
4. Straight Line Cutting
What a great way to practice cutting in straight lines! Paper chains are a great decoration for any classroom and are perfect for beginner scissors enthusiasts. This is great for cutting practice because if it’s not straight, it doesn’t really matter.
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5. Dino Cutting
This one might be a bit more challenging for students than the first few, but it will be highly beneficial to motor strength development. An activity for toddlers that isn’t only engaging but also focuses on hand-eye coordination.
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6. Modes of Transport Advanced Cutting Skill
This activity goes great with our transportation lessons, and students absolutely love showing off their cutting skills but this point. Even use what they cut out to make a little mat of transportation that can be used during recess or free time.
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7. Halloween Cutting Tray
Using a tray for different cutting activities is really beneficial, not only to your kiddos but also to you! The tray helps to keep everything under control and in one area. Using this cutting tray activity with Halloween stickers and construction paper will be a winner for all!
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8. Playdough Cutting
Playdough scissors cutting activities will prepare their hands and build a foundation of robust and essential cutting skills. Using dough scissors students will be able to easier cut and warm up their hand muscles.
Learn More: Silly Miss B
9. Straw Cutting
Moving up from playdough, cutting straws is a great next step. Essentially giving the same idea as cutting playdough, using plastic or paper straws will work the same but add a little bit of a challenge to the hand muscles.
Learn More: Play at Home Mummy
10. Cutting Pasta
This was an absolutely huge hit in my classroom! Activities for preschoolers that are easy and low prep great all around. All you need for this is some cooked pasta, maybe a little food coloring, and a pair of scissors! Your students will love how easily they can cut through the pasta.
Learn More: Read to Me Activities
11. Scissor Skills Video
It might be fun to show a short video on the ins and outs of using scissors! Mr. Fitzy has a super short (1 minute) video about how to use, hold, and a little bit about scissor safety! You can make this video go a little bit slower, pause as you go, and allow students to practice the skills.
Learn more: Kiddo TV
12. Cutting Magazines
Cutting magazines is an excellent way for students to not only practice their scissor skills but also choose what they would like to cut. Kids are pretty good at knowing their skills, so give them a little freedom with a magazine page of their choice and see what they can do!
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13. Focusing on Motor Skills
The main technique of scissors skills activities is to help students gain those muscles in their hands. Opening and closing the scissors is one way of doing exactly that. With these blunt-edged scissors, students will solely focus on opening, closing, and picking up items.
Learn More: The Fine Motor Store
14. Cutting Song
Playful cutting activities are so much fun in Preschool classrooms, and so is singing! Why not combine them both. Teach your students this cutting song and have students sing along as they cut. This song also works with some phonological awareness, which is always a plus.
Learn More: Heidi Songs
15. Cutting Nature
Cutting nature is a super fun activity that provides lots of practice for students. Not only do students get to practice their scissor skills, but they also get to go outside and find different things in nature to cut. Safely bring some scissors outside for building additional scissor skills.
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16. Sea Animals
Using kid scissors, have your student create tentacles on an octopus or jellyfish! Your students will love using their plastic scissors to create their sea creature pictures. They’ll also love to show off their work on a display board.
Learn More: Inspiring Minds Studio
17. Cut the Fingernails
This is a super cute activity that I immediately fell in love with. Create this simple cutting activity using a piece of paper and colored paper for the nails. You could even use white nails and have students color them after cutting.
Learn More: Pinterest
18. Perfect Scissor Skills
Showing off your student’s scissor skills is bound to boost confidence in your little ones. Not only providing a place to showcase their work but also filled with plenty of practice with scissors, like this house cut out!
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19. Haircut Scissor Activity
I haven’t met a child that does enjoy cutting hair, so let them! Students will also have so much fun cutting and scrunching the hair before even cutting it! Don’t forget to explain to your kiddos NOT to cut their own or anyone else’s hair, but let them enjoy this fun scissors activity.
Learn More: Moms and Crafters
20. Firework Art
Dye some coffee filters in different colors and allow students to cut them into fireworks! These can be hung up around the classroom and even used to make one big firework display. Use coffee filters or paper plates, depending on your student’s cutting strengths.
Learn More: The Laws of Play
21. Christmas Cutting Activity
The holidays might be a few months away, but planning ahead is never bad. Watch your students master scissor skills while trimming the tree! This will be a great holiday decoration for the classroom or to take home.
Learn More: Tots Adventures and Play
22. Trim the Lion’s Mane
Preschool scissor skills are constantly developing throughout the year. Create this lion with them and have them cut their own strips and glue them to the lion’s mane! Some students can scaffold this by gluing the mane on previously and just having students trim it.
Learn More: My Arty Classroom
23. Carrot Toes
Carrot toes are such a cute activity that using scissor tools in real life. Students not only have to cut out their footprints but also use their favorite scissors to add the leafy greens to the toes. Allow students to be creative with the carrot tops making them any length they choose.
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24. Spaghetti Salon
Spaghetti is super easy to cute and great for beginners! Glue the spaghetti on a few different cardboard head cutouts and have students use their regular safety scissors to give it a haircut. You could even make a little salon out of the different heads! Students will absolutely love it!
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25. The Three Little Pigs Cut & Glue
Make this super simple little puppet show by cutting out the three little pigs. Have students then glue the big toilet paper rolls! This can easily be made on your own.
Learn More: EYFS Teacher and Mummy
26. Continuous Cuts
Continuous cuts will help students to gain more strength when using their scissors. A great way to practice that is to make this snake, and the student cuts with scissors continuously, without stopping!
Learn More: Gluesticks and Games
27. Cutting Popsicles
This inexpensive and super fun summer activity is perfect for anyone trying to perfect their preschool scissor skills. Not only will they get to create a popsicle picture, but they also will practice rounding with the scissors.
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28. Flower Power Cutting
Using different scissor tools, students can create the flowers of their imagination. Whether they use their favorite scissors or any old scissors lying around, these flowers are bound to come out beautiful.
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29. Build It, Then Snip It
Students will love to take turns wrapping the yard around the different playground equipment, and they love snipping it off even more! Make sure to use blunt-tip scissors and use extreme caution when transporting scissors outside.
Learn More: Munchkin Nursery
30. Leaf Cutting
Cutting leaves is not only a great scissor skills activity, but it is also a way to get the kids outdoors! You can either have them collect some leaves at home and bring them in or go out and gather some on the playground. Don’t forget to provide kids with a leaf-cutting tray so they can examine the leaves after.
Learn More: The Toddler Activity Guide
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