Shark Craft

Make this fun and easy shark craft using cotton buds to make a cool painted dot effect.

Perfect as a shark week activity, as part of an ocean theme (or, eeek, maybe a beach one?) or just because sharks are awesome.

You can draw the shark yourself but why not make this easier to prepare and use our free shark template.

All you’ll need is paper, access to a printer and a few simple materials that most of us have already at home.

Shark Craft for Kids

We love easy activities but like a lot of parents I know that I sometimes like a change from the normal ‘get the paper, paints and paintbrush out’.

You’ll still get to grab the paints for this paper shark craft but changing up the way you are painting gives it a really different effect.

While you can of course draw the shark yourself using our printable template can help make it that bit easier to get this activity ready for your child too.

Craft Supplies

• Shark template (see below)
• Kids paints -grays and blues are perfect
• Reusable plate or tray
• Q-Tips (cotton buds)

Shark Craft Template

I made this craft using our free printable shark template. We love using templates for kids crafts as they’re perfect if you’re not sure on how to draw something or if you are getting an activity ready for a group in a classroom or preschool. Drawing thirty sharks for a group of kids can take quite a while!

The template is available to download as a free PDF and you can print off as many copies as you like. I’ve also shared more ideas in the post for different ways to create shark art.

If you like using templates for kids craft you can check out all of our free templates here, all of them come with ideas for activities too.

Shark Craft Instructions

Print out your shark template. You can use normal white printer paper for this as I have or if your child is likely to use a lot of paint then white cardstock can sometimes be better to stop the paper becoming over-saturated.

Pour some paint onto a reusable plate or tray. I normally keep an old plastic plate for this purpose but as mine had gone missing I re-used an old lid from a tub of margarine.

These can also be washed and reused again for paints if you would like.

Pouring the paint out onto a tray makes it much easier for your child to access with their q-tip and also means that they can mix colors more easily.

I didn’t have a gray paint available for my shark but instead mixed a bit of white and black paint to make one.

If you have paint in small pots (less likely to fall over) with an opening large enough to dip your q-tip into then you might find this easier and it also means that you are less likely to waste any paint.

Next grab your q-tip and dip this into the paint before using it to dab onto the shark, making dot patterns.

Younger children may find it harder to make the dots and do more of a scribble with their cotton buds but of course this is absolutely fine and using q-tips is a great way for kids to practice their fine motor skills.

Another option for toddlers and preschoolers could be to use craft pom poms rather than q-tips to paint with as these are a little bit larger for little hands to hold onto.

Using pom poms to paint with can be a little bit messy so if your child doesn’t like the feeling on paint on their fingers then you can always use a clothes peg to clip onto the pom pom.

You can stick to using one colour for your shark but I prefer using a few, just because I think it looks nicer. This is just personal preference and depends on what paints you have in stock.

While I’ve gone for more shark and ocean themed colours I also know that when my kids were preschoolers it’s highly likely that we would have ended up with a sparkly purple shark.

I generally just embrace that but if for any reason you are after the more traditional colours (for a room display etc) then just make sure that you get the colours out that you want using when you are preparing this activity.

Because (other than making grey paint) I didn’t want the colours to mix I’ve used different cotton buds for each colour, which you may wish to do as well.

Once you’ve finished decorating your shark it’s finished and ready to dry before displaying.

More Ocean Crafts for Kids

Want to make some more fun shark crafts? Grab a glue stick and scissors to continue the theme with this easy paper bag shark puppet with its pointy teeth ready to bite!

We love this super cute paper plate narwhal craft that’s easy peasy to make.

Finally for a simple paper plate sea themed craft why not make this paper plate sea collage, this was a great activity for after preschool in our house.