Inspired by Creative Play Central’s cool play dough pictures and a fashion model colouring/drawing book my girls got for Christmas, I decided to make some very simple play dough mats this afternoon.
I thought Noah might have fun making faces and people, but I had no idea how much fun the rest of us would have too!
It started out with just Noah at the table using the coloured dough to make facial features and clothes and hair, but before long Morgan joined in and then the girls and eventually we were all creating, even me!
Morgan started out making someone who looked ‘just like me, choosing the palest skin tone (he is very fair!) and double checking that his eyes were in fact blue. The girls got carried away designing clothes and shoes and elaborate accessories, and Noah made monsters… which is his subject of choice at the moment.
It was so much fun to choose a body or a face and then get crazy with dough and accessories, and the activity sparked lots of conversation and learning about body parts, clothes and how everyone looks different.
We used modelling clay (plasticine) because we happened to have some and the colours are so bright and fun, but it would be just as great with shop bought or homemade play dough.
I added a few accessories like beads, sequins, googley eyes, cut up pipe cleaners and gems, just for fun!
You can download the people play dough mats here.
And the faces play dough mats here.
They come in four skin tones and all you need to do is print them and laminate (or use self adhesive book covering) and you are ready to create!
We’d love to see what you create with these play dough mats. Feel free to upload a photo or two and share them on my facebook page!
Make sure you check out our other free printable play dough mats!
You can find the fun food play dough mats here
You can find the gardening and growing play dough mats here.
These are seriously fabulous. I can’t wait to get creative myself! LOL
They turned out fabulous!! We are going to have to give this a go! :) Thanks for sharing – you create such wonderful printables!
Kate, this is one of the best Playdough activities I’ve seen yet!
Thanks for sharing! What a great idea!
Kate these are AWESOME! R is going to love these.
This is amazing!We are doing this today!
These are brilliant. My son just opened a new container of play clay yesterday. Do you know the book my Robert Munsch about play clay?
I will have to search for that book at the library! We love Robert Munsch! His website is fab too!
Such a wonderful idea! Very clever!! :-)
What an awesome idea. Thanks x
Hi Kate,
I can’t open the printable play dough mat faces. I was able to do the people but not faces. Any clues? It’s a great idea!
Cheers
Emma
Sorry you are having trouble with the faces Emma…
Do you get a specific error message when you try to open the file?
Did you try downloading them again… perhaps they were corrupted on the way down?
Kate – you are such a creative gem. What a winner of an activity!
Can I say BRILLIANT? And can I say it again?
Looks so so fun! I hope Aarya likes it too :)
What a fabulous play resource. I’m impressed by the playdough plaits. :)
Kate, thank you so much for including us in your post! I love your colourful and gorgeous creations. As you know we are huge fans of play dough dress ups too – they’re always lots of fun to create. Play dough plaits must be the flavour of the month, my daughter has been including them in her play dough and craft creations too :)
Love, love, love these. Thank you for sharing, I cannot wait to use these with my kindy and pre-primary students :)
Hi! Love these! The faces doesn’t work for me either. No error message, just keeps running and running. ?
It must just be the heavy load on my server… perhaps try again now that the demand is a bit less? If you still have problems let me know.
Thank you, lovely Lady, for sharing this brilliant resource! What an awesome activity and such a helpful tool for the little ones. So many avenues to explore and engage them! :)
I love these, Kate! It’s awesome that you included a number of different shades! Thanks so much for sharing your awesome printables. I featured your post as the Free Printable of the Day at the Living Montessori Now Facebook page and on Pinterest. :)
These are lovely! Thanks for sharing!
Thank you! I am going to add these to my son’s human body unit. I think I might give him white fuzzy wires or dough for the bones and colored dough for the organs.
What fun! This will be great to put as an invitation to learn this summer.
Thank you so much! These are so great! My 4 kids have been creating all morning! Sharing, laughing, not arguing! This mom is happy!
Thanks so much for this great printable (and your other brilliant printables which I found via Pinterest and have used a lot too, I’m really grateful for you sharing your skills!). I used this for my kids and their friends for a playdate this week and it was a big success! Thanks again!
I LOVE this! Just found it on Pinterest…printing out to use during some hot afternoon downtime today. Thanks!!!
Great idea! Thanks so much!
These are great except for the full size people mats are not printing well. The page is a normal 8.5″x11″ and I tried reducing the printing size even but it still is cutting off the feet. Any suggestions?
You need to set your printing options to ‘fit’ or ‘shrink to fit’. We use A4 sized paper here in Australia which is a tiny bit different in size, but if you choose shrink to fit it will shrink everything ever so slightly so they fit on a US ‘letter’ sized page.
Hello!!!!
Sorry for my english, i’m french!
I love this!!!
Merci pour le partage et bonne continuation!!!
Vos idées sont très bonnes et très utiles pour nos enfants!
Great ideas!
Thanks you very much
Bye,bye from to France!!
Fantastifc. Have printed off and can’t wait to have a go. Thank you for sharing.
I’ve just used these with my two kids (3 and 5) and one of their friends and it was lovely to see the different ages playing together. I loved how they wanted to talk to each other about the people they were creating. Thank you!
These are all so nicely done. It is a great versatile group of items and you are a treasure to share them free! God Bless!
Hi there, I came across your website the other day. LOVE it!!! Thankyou!
Can I ask a question? When you do the playdoh mats and use playdoh and other bits and pieces, do you pull all the accessories out of the playdoh and reuse? or do you chuck out. My 2 daughters get all the playdoh colours mixed up and wondering what you do with it then.
Thanks
Rachel.
We try and rescue and reuse the dough as much as possible. Sometimes it’s not easy or not worth it, but mostly it is.
Often our play dough is a mishmash of colours after a few plays, but the kids are not too bothered by that. Usually we make our own play dough though so it doesn’t last forever anyway.
I hope you enjoy the play dough mats, if you’ve got any ideas for new ones please let me know!
this is amazing! thank you for sharing :D