First Day of School Coloring Page: Turn the Doorstep Photo into a Keepsake

A first day of school coloring page is made from the photo almost every family already takes: the child on the doorstep, backpack on, slightly too-big uniform. Turn that photo into a line drawing, add the child's name, age and the date, and let them color it during the first week. Do it every year and you have a set of pages that shows the child growing, in their own coloring. Here is how to choose the photo, which detail level suits each grade, and how to keep the tradition going.

Quick answer

1. Take the doorstep photo in the morning, in daylight, with the child facing the camera and a plain door or wall behind.
2. Make a coloring page from it: Simple for kindergarten, Medium for grades 1 to 3, Detailed for grade 4 and up.
3. Add a keepsake border with the school year as the title, plus the name and age stamp.
4. Print on 160 gsm card, color it during the first week, and file it in a folder with last year's.

Why make a coloring page from the first day photo?

The doorstep photo is taken and then lost in a camera roll. A coloring page gives it a second life:

• The child spends twenty minutes looking at themselves on the first day, which is a quiet way to talk about how it went.
• The page carries their name, their age and the year, so it dates itself.
• Colored by the child, it records what they could do at that age: the five-year-old's scribble, the eight-year-old's careful shoes.

A stack of these, one per year, is a better record than a dozen near-identical photos.

Which photo should you use?

The classic doorstep shot usually works, with a few adjustments:

• Face the light. Morning sun or an open sky in front of the child, not behind. A backlit child becomes a silhouette with no face.
• Plain background. A front door, a fence, a wall. A hedge in full leaf adds thousands of lines; a brick wall is fine.
• Full length or three-quarter. Include the backpack and the shoes. They are the details that change most from year to year.
• One child per page. If you have two children, take a photo together for the fridge, and a separate photo of each for their own page.
• Hold the sign, or do not. A chalkboard with "First day of Grade 2" is popular, but small handwriting turns into a gray smudge on a coloring page. If you want the words, put them in the page title instead.

Our guide on photos that make good coloring pages has more on lighting and framing.

Which detail level by grade?

• Preschool and kindergarten (ages 3 to 5): Simple. Big shapes, thick lines, a page they can finish in one sitting.
• Grades 1 to 3 (ages 6 to 8): Medium. Enough detail to show the uniform and the backpack straps, not so much that they give up.
• Grades 4 to 6 (ages 9 to 11): Detailed. This group wants it to look like them and will spend an hour on hair and shoelaces.
• High school: Detailed or Expert, if they will do it at all. Many will not, and the page still makes a good keepsake uncolored.

If you want the same look every year, pick Medium and stay with it. If you want the page to grow with the child, step up one level every two or three years.

Setting up the yearly tradition

A tradition only survives if it is easy. Keep it to three steps:

1. Same spot, same morning. The doorstep, before you leave. Thirty seconds.
2. Make and print the page that evening or at the weekend. With the school year as the title ("2027, Grade 1") and the name and age stamp, there is nothing to remember later.
3. Color it in the first week, on the first quiet afternoon, and file it in a display book or a flat box.

By the third year the child will ask for it. By the sixth, they will want to look through the earlier ones first.

Ways to use the finished page

• Framed by the front door until next year's replaces it.
• Sent to grandparents as a PDF or a copy in the post. Grandparents who live far away get a page they can color too.
• The cover of a school-year folder that holds the year's certificates and drawings.
• A page for the teacher at the end of the year, with a thank-you on the back.
• Side by side with a last-day photo page in June or December, to see what a year did.

If you make a page for each child plus a copy for grandparents, a small pack brings the price down; see pricing.

Frequently asked

When should the child color the first day page?

In the first week, not on the first day itself. The first day is long and most children come home tired. A quiet afternoon on day two or three works better, and the page gives you a natural way to ask how school is going without asking directly.

What paper should I print it on?

160 gsm card if the page will be framed or kept in a folder, because it stays flat and takes crayons and pencils well. Ordinary 80 gsm printer paper is fine for a copy that goes to grandparents or gets stuck on the fridge.

Can I make a page for the last day of school too?

Yes, and it makes a good pair. Take the last day photo on the same doorstep, make the page at the same detail level, and store the two together. The difference between a September page and a June page, colored by the same child, is often bigger than the difference between years.

Try it with your own photo

This school year, you could turn the doorstep photo into a coloring page with your child's name, age and the year on it. Coolorio makes printable coloring pages from photos in four detail levels, with a keepsake border and a title. Photos are deleted after 7 days. See how it works to make your first page.