With Halloween just around the corner, it’s time to get into the spirit and craft some super spooky characters!
Making paper cut-out characters is quick, fun and great for getting little ones practicing their cutting and sticking in a fun way, helping young children build on their fine motor skills this Halloween season.
There are three free, printable templates to choose from for this Halloween Paper craft including mummy, witch and a pumpkin man, or scarecrow. Your child is sure to find one of these Halloween crafts that they’d love to make!
Supplies you will need for this Halloween Craft
- Our free, downloadable templates [download link for the PDF files at the end of this blog post]
- A printer – If you don’t have one at home your local library may offer printing.
- Scissors.
- Glue – A glue stick works best.
Optional Extras – We have lots of wonderful ideas for making these cut-out characters even better!
Here are the bits and pieces you might like to include for some extra fun with your Halloween activities.
- Card
- Colouring pens or pencils
- Embellishments
- Split pins
- Lollypop sticks
- String
- Dice
How to make your paper cut-out Halloween characters
- Download the character template of your choice ready to complete your chosen Halloween activities. Will it be mummy, witch, pumpkin man or all three?
- Print out your template. To make your characters extra tough you may want to print onto card or glue on to card before you cut them out.
- Cut out the pieces. If you are making these with toddlers or younger children you may need to do this step. Give older children the chance to practice their cutting skills by letting them cut out the pieces for themselves.
- Let your little one have fun moving the pieces around the body of their character until they are happy with the positions.
- Use a glue stick to attach the pieces. Another task that’s perfect for little hands!
- Tada! Your creepy creation is complete!
- If you want to continue on the halloween fun with this printable activity, now make some different characters.
Halloween Craft Cut and Stick Mummy
Halloween Craft Cut and Stick Witch
Halloween Craft Cut and Stick Pumpkin Man Scarecrow
Extra Fun
Now that you know how to make a simple paper cut-out character it’s time to think about those optional extras!
- Colouring – The templates come in both full colour and black and white outline versions. Print the outline templates if your child would enjoy colouring their own character. They could use our colourful templates as a guide or come up with their own crazy colour scheme.
- Embellishments – Bring the characters to life with sparkle and texture by adding embellishments. Do you have a craft box full of sequins and glitter to add? Or, maybe you have some bits and pieces around the house? Toilet paper would look fab as the mummy’s bandages. Wool could make the witch’s broomstick stand out or some scraps of fabric could be used for real patches on the pumpkin man’s dungarees!
- Split pins – Would your little one love it if their character could dance, wave and wiggle their arms and legs? Split pins are what you need. Instead of using glue, attach the limbs with split pins instead. Now your child will be able to move the body parts into any position they’d like.
- Lollypop sticks – Turn the characters into puppets by gluing or sellotaping a lollypop stick to the back. Now they can be used to put on a spooky Halloween show! Simply make some space for your child to hide behind the sofa and they can peep their puppet over the top and put on a marvellous performance.
- String – Make lots of characters and turn them into Halloween bunting! Sellotape the characters at regular intervals along a piece of string. Hang your bunting above a doorway or down a staircase for a unique decoration!
- Dice – Turn this cut-out craft into a fun Halloween version of ‘build a beetle’. Cut out a set of body parts for each player and an extra sheet for numbering. Number each part on the extra sheet, this is the number that players must roll to win that body part. Take turns to roll the dice, the first player to roll all of the numbers and build their character wins! The mummy is a good start to build with one dice. The witch and pumpkin man have more pieces so will need 2 dice and recognition of higher numbers.
Learning Opportunities
Crafting with little ones isn’t just lots of fun and mess, they can develop some important skills too. Making these cute characters is a clever way to help them learn;
Cutting skills
From about age 3 children are able to start cutting short, straight lines. While this won’t be enough to cut out the individual pieces of the characters, they may be able to cut out a section for you to finish off.
At age 4 they will start to be able to cut curved lines and may be able to do some of the simpler shapes.
By age 5 many will have developed the fine motor skills needed to cut out all of the parts. Kids all develop their skills at different rates so these ages are just a rough guide.
These fun cut and paste worksheets are the perfect way to work on scissor skills.
Sticking
Sticking or Pasting is a really useful skill to master as it will give little ones the ability to tackle lots of different crafts!
You may even save some money on stickers!
This activity is a great way to work on sticking skills within the Halloween theme.
Body Parts
Can they name the different body parts that they have cut out? Where do they go?
Add a fun quiz to this craft by asking them to find the body parts one by one. Can they find the tummy, leg or head?
Creativity
Isn’t it great to let kids loose on a craft and see what they come up with? Maybe it’s using unique colours? Perhaps it’s applying embellishments in a cool way that you hadn’t thought of?
Sometimes it might be rearranging the body parts in hilarious new positions! You don’t even have to make sure all of the body parts go on the correct character.
Pumpkin man would look funny with the witch’s hair and her dress might look fantastic on the mummy!
Free Printable Cut-Out Halloween Character Templates
Click the download button below each character to instantly download your free, PDF templates.
Choose the black and white outline version if you would like to save ink or start the activity with a fun colouring-in session using the plain white version.
Download the full-colour templates if you would like bright, colourful characters that are ready for play or display.
I hope you have a brilliant time creating these spooky characters! Feel free to share this craft idea with your friends or pin on Pinterest.
For even more Printable Paper Cut Out Characters check the selection from Just Family Fun. This link has a selection of twenty cut and clue characters which are fun all year round, including animals like cat and cow or fun people like Knight or fireman so your child is sure to find a few that they would love to make!
More Printable Crafts
If you enjoyed this fun Halloween activity, try out some more of the activity pages and Halloween themed worksheets we have available here at In The Playroom.
We have tonnes of free printables and activity ideas, coloring page, halloween party ideas and more.
- Make a fall fairy with printable template
- Halloween Printable Puzzle Craft
- Autumn Leaf Cutting and Sticking Craft with printable template
- Free Printable Pack Educational Witch Activities for Halloween Learning
Enjoy! Happy Halloween!
Anna Marikar, mum of four and seasoned blogger, has spent over a decade sharing her parenting journey and passion for kid-friendly crafts and free printables.
Her easy-to-follow craft ideas and practical parenting advice have transformed In The Playroom into a cherished resource for parents.
Great Halloween craft idea! These paper cut-out characters are not only fun but also help kids practice cutting and sticking, improving their fine motor skills. The free templates for mummy, witch, and pumpkin man make it easy to get started. Optional extras like coloring, embellishments, split pins, lollipop sticks, string, and dice add more excitement. Happy crafting!