3 Ways to Repurpose Scribbled Children’s Activity Book

Today we are going to show you how we upcycled one of toddler’s workbooks in 3 different ways. Repurposing books or book pages is another of material prompts for #junkplay challenge and we used what we already had at home. You can use our ideas as an inspiration since you probably don’t have exactly the same workbook. And enjoy the play!

I’m sure you have workbooks (and books) decorating by your toddlers artwork, better known as scribbles! Don’t we all?

How to Recycle Children’s Activity Books?

As you can see from the image, our toddler loves to color and scribble over her workbook pages. Still, most of the pages in this little workbook were intact. We used Pepa the Pig activity book which includes 2 short cartoon stories, a bunch of worksheets and 2 games. Nice mix of things to keep kids occupied.

Supplies We Used to Make New Activities

Things we used for all of these ideas we are going to show here are:

• old activity book
• scissors
• painter’s tape
• clear tape
• glue tabs
• laminator
• zip lock bag
• toys we had on hands

IDEA #1 – Repurpose Activity Book Stories into Busy Bags

As I mentioned, Pepa the Pig workbooks have short stories inside so we cut pictures from these stories and added some items we had at home to create 2 different busy bags child can use to retell the story and play along.

One story was about Pepa and George visiting dentist so I added a little boy and a girl along with a brush in a busy bag.

The second story was about camping out. We don’t have a tiny camper toy so I ended adding a jeep and tiny figurine inside that busy bag.

All of the pictures were laminated for durability. Another thing these pictures can be used is story sequencing.

IDEA #2 – Activity Book Pictures to Playroom Decoration

There were several pictures inside the workbook we used. Nice, full-color pictures. So, I decided to keep them as they are.

We just cut them out of the workbook, laminated them (we didn’t have any picture frames we could use on hand), added glue tabs on the back and stick them on a wall in children’s room. For one we used painter’s tape to make a frame.

You could probably use washi or masking tape to make a frame if you wish.

IDEA #3 – New Family Board Games

Our activity book had 2 board games inside. Since we are upcycling this workbook and probably will not keep the scraps that remained, we decided to cut out both of the board games and laminate them for durability.

Now we have them in a drawer with other board games and can pull it out and play.

Since it’s larger format than pouches for a laminator, I taped 2 pouches together with clear tape. And added plain printer paper on the back before running sheets through a laminator.

There you go! We now upcycled scribbled activity book into 2 board games, 2 busy bags and 5 new pictures on the wall! All from one scribbled workbook!

Do you have activity books you could upcycle? What are you going to do with them?

Today’s post is part of 60 Day Junk Play Challenge and we had as material prompt today BOOK or BOOK PAGES.Stop by Our Daily Life to see what they have done with their board book! Love that project!

To read more about Junk Play Challenge and get involved upcycling your trash for play, stop by our 60 Day Junk Play Challenge page.

Other Activities with Recycled Materials to Try

Here are few suggestions:

• Raid your recycle bin to find a variety of household items and use them for rubber band fine motor play.
• Turn bottle caps into stamps to use them for a name recognition activity.
• Try one of every toddler’s favorite activities – posting pom poms into a plastic bottle.