How to teach photography to children

Welcome back everyone. This week's episode of "How to..." focuses on how to teach photography to children. You already know that your kids want to take pictures, but are they ready to handle your camera with care? Ask yourself this: can they walk across the room without tripping over their own feet? Can they hold something without having the unstoppable urge to play with whatever they're holding? Can they hold still for 2 seconds at a time? Are you prone to high blood pressure?  If you answered "yes" or "no" to any of these questions, then you are both ready to hand over a large portion of your money in the form of an expensive piece of electronics to your child! Good luck, and let's begin.

Hi kids!  I hear you want to learn how to take pictures.  That's great!  Photography is a great hobby.  It can also be a career for some of you when you grow up.  Or it can earn you a few bucks from your siblings when you take pictures of them doing something they shouldn't and threaten to tell mom.  Ha, ha!

But first, in order to prevent damage to the camera, you should put the camera strap around your wrist or neck, depending on what kind of strap it is. This will prevent breakage of said camera, an occasion which is inevitably followed by loud, angry shouting from your parental unit. If a strap is not present on the camera, then your parent may either buy one or use duct tape to affix the camera firmly to your hand. Not like they are worried or anything.

Next, after the camera is turned on, look around to find something interesting to shoot.  Got something?  Remember, it should be interesting.

Now once you have a subject, make sure you have your subject within the frame.

Make sure you get the subject's head in your pictures.

Don't be so literal.  Get the head and the rest of the body parts!

No! Not yours!  Keep your thumbs and fingers away from the lens!

It is important to hold still while taking the picture.  Doing cartwheels while photographing will lead to blurry photos (not to mention worried noises from your parents).  Now hold really still and push the shutter button.

Try again.

Okay, that was a little better, but it's still blurry, and your subject is missing.

Ahh! Not so close!  Back up a little.

Uh-oh.  You have to watch out for the flash.  It can make your subject look possessed.

If you can, try and capture the mood or attitude of your subject.

Things like that help tell the "story" of the picture.

Now, is your subject properly framed?  Are you holding extra still?  Good, now try again.

picture by Michael age 4

Great!  If you take lots of pictures you will inevitably have a couple good ones in there.  Just keep trying.

picture by Jesse age 7

Tune in next time for "How to cook with kids."  (Now gently tap the egg on the edge of the counter.  AHHH! Not so hard!)

*All pictures were taken by children, except for two: the kids in the plane and Michael's head in the garden.