Design a pictogram

What can I use instead of sticky notes and fancy coloring materials if I don't have them for the 'What does this mean?' test and coloring steps?

Use small squares of scrap paper or the corner of torn notebook paper in place of sticky notes, and substitute markers, crayons, colored pencils, or even cut colored paper for the 'Add color' and 'sticky note' steps.

My postage-stamp-size copy looks unreadable—how can I fix the readability before showing friends?

When the small copy is unreadable, simplify by erasing extra details and thickening the bold shapes from the 'Simplify your drawing' step, then redraw the tiny version with a darker marker so the basic silhouette reads clearly.

How can I change the activity for a 4-year-old versus a 12-year-old?

For a 4-year-old, focus on choosing one idea and making one clear thumbnail with stencils or sticker shapes and help with tracing and coloring, while for a 12-year-old add a constraint like two-color maximum, test legibility at multiple sizes (including the postage-stamp test), and encourage digital tracing or sharing on DIY.org.

How can we make the pictogram project more creative or useful after we finish the final traced version?

Turn the final traced and colored pictogram into a sticker or laminated label, create a set of matching pictograms for different ideas, or animate a simple flipbook of the thumbnails-to-final process before uploading the finished design to DIY.org.