At a Glance
This printable black cat craft is a simple cut and paste Halloween activity for preschool and kindergarten. Coloring, cutting and glueing together the pieces builds scissor skills, fine motor control and spatial awareness - and the finished cat doubles as a spooky season decoration or a puppet for some Halloween dramatic play.
It’s almost Halloween and this build a black cat craft lets your little learners put a spooky kitty together piece by piece.
There is a full color version ready to go straight from the printer, plus a black and white template your kiddos can decorate however they like.
If you are setting up a little craft center, you may also want to check out the rest of our printable Halloween crafts.
Time to get making!
What Skills Can Your Children Learn And Practice?
When making this cute lil black cat, your children will have the chance to practice and develop some skills such as:
- Scissor Skills – if you feel they are ready, let them cut out the pieces themselves.
- Fine Motor Skills – picking up the small pieces, holding them steady and pressing them down all call on a good pincer grasp and plenty of hand strength.
- Hand-Eye Coordination – lining the ears up on the head and getting the paws to sit at the bottom of the body takes careful and steady hand control.
- Spatial Awareness and Sequencing – working out which piece goes where, and in what order, turns a simple craft into a proper little problem-solving task.
- Pencil Control – if you print the black and white template, coloring in is great practice for grip, pressure and staying inside the lines.
- Creativity and Decision Making – the plain version is open-ended, so they get to decide what their cat looks like.
This simple craft will also give them a chance to practice their concentration and perseverance skills as they may find it tricky to place the pieces exactly where they want them to go.
How To Prepare This Simple Cat Craft
First you’re going to want to download the black cat templates by clicking on the download button at the bottom of the page – I’ve made a color and a black and white version.
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Other materials you’ll need:
- Safety scissors
- Card stock or Craft paper
- Some good glue
- Some coloring pencils or pens or other artsy materials
Once you’ve downloaded the templates, you’ll need to print them off onto paper or card.
Then, you can cut them out. Or if you’d like your children to get some cutting practice, you can let them have a go.
Then you can stick all the pieces together to make the black cat.
It can be really nice to let your kids have a bit of free rein here and see if they can work it out – kind of like a puzzle.
If they’re struggling, the order I’d do it in is:
- Stick the ears to the head
- Stick the collar to the body
- Stick the head on to the body
- Stick the rear legs on
- Stick the front paws on
- Stick the tail on
(I expect you could have worked that out but I do like to be thorough…)
The finished one should look something like this:
What a cutie.. I mean so spooky!!
If you want to, you could always laminate the pieces before putting them together and use them as a puzzle. That way, the different parts would be kept nice and they can use them again and again.
After that you’re all done!
Let your kids practice their cutting and sticking skills in a simple and fun way!
But Wait… There’s Also A Black And White Cat Template!
I’ve also made a black and white version which would be an awesome way for your little ones to practice their coloring skills and personalize their pet in their own way!
So why not crack out the pens, crayons, paints or collage (or all of them if you’re feeling adventurous) and let your kids get creative!
Some Other Ways You Could Use This Black Cat Activity
There’s plenty more you can do once the kitties are built. Here are a few fun ideas to stretch the learning a bit further.
Make a Reusable Puzzle
Instead of gluing the kitten together, print the colored version (or let your child color the black and white one first), cut out the pieces, and run them through a laminator. Add some sticky tack or velcro dots and you suddenly have a reusable puzzle! They can build and rebuild their furry friend as a quiet time activity or a morning center activity.
Story Time Puppets
Print it on to card or laminate it once assembled then stick the cat to a popsicle or craft stick. Black cats show up in so many Halloween stories that your little ones will have no trouble inventing adventures for theirs, whether it is prowling around a pumpkin patch or hiding from trick-or-treaters. This kind of dramatic play is lovely for storytelling and vocabulary.
Add Some More of the Halloween Crew
Why not try some of our other Halloween characters and let your kiddos build a full spooky lineup, then arrange everyone into a scene on a big sheet of paper. You could even get them to add a moon, a fence and a few bats etc and turn it into a display piece.
Make It Fluffy!
Skip the crayons on the black and white template and go for a little texture instead. Torn tissue paper, scraps of black yarn, cotton balls or a bit of felt if you have it would be great!
Name That Cat
Once the cat is finished, ask what it is called. Then have your little learners write the name on a small strip of paper and stick it on as a name tag and it doesn’t matter if they can’t form letters yet – mark making with purpose is brilliant!
Make It a Black Cat Day Celebration
National Black Cat Day falls on October 27, four days before Halloween. It can be a nice time to have a little chat about why some people think black cats are unlucky and whether that seems fair. You can find more dates worth marking on our Special Day Calendar.
However you use this black cat craft, I hope you and your little ones have fun with it!
And you can browse all the other printable cut and paste crafts here.
Enjoy and let’s nurture those neurons!
