Every one of these ten pages follows the same small bear through a year. He plants flowers in spring, flies a kite and builds a sandcastle in summer, jumps into a pile of leaves in autumn and builds a snowman when the snow comes. In between he bakes cupcakes, reads under a tree, paints a picture and takes a hot air balloon somewhere.
It is a whole book rather than ten unrelated drawings, and printing them in order gives a child a story to follow as much as a set of pages to colour.
The complete book is one free PDF — cover, all ten pages, ready to print or staple into a booklet. No account, no email, nothing to sign up for.
A bear’s year, in order
The pages are arranged as a year, and it is worth printing them that way rather than letting a child pick at random.
Spring opens the book with the garden — planting, watering, worms in the soil. Summer brings the bike ride, the kite and the beach. Autumn is the leaf pile, with the rake abandoned against the tree. Winter closes it with the snowman.
The four indoor pages — baking, reading, painting and the balloon ride — sit between them as the quieter days. If you are colouring one page a week, that gives a child something that lasts a season rather than an afternoon.
Which pages suit which age
The kite page and the snowman page are the most open, with large shapes and plenty of white space. Start there.
The bike ride, the balloon and the baking sit in the middle — busy enough to hold attention, not so detailed that a six-year-old gives up.
The autumn leaves, the beach and the garden are the hardest. The leaf pile alone has around forty individual leaves, and the beach border has a dozen shells. Those are pages for a child who enjoys the slow, methodical part of colouring, and they will happily take an hour each.
Colouring tips
Brown from the crayon box makes a flat, dead-looking bear. Lay down a light tan across the whole body first, then go over just the edges — around the outline, under the chin, along the legs — with a darker brown. That single trick gives the bear roundness without needing to know anything about shading.
On the leaf pile, resist doing every leaf a different colour. Pick three — a red, an orange, a yellow — and repeat them. A pile in three colours reads as a pile; a pile in forty colours reads as confetti.
The balloon is the best page for a beginner to look impressive. Colour the eight panels in alternating shades and it comes out looking far more skilled than it was.
On the painting page, colour the blobs on the palette first, then use only those colours for the flower on the canvas. It is a small rule that makes a child think about colour choice before they start.
Things to make with the finished pages
- A seasons display. Pin the four seasonal pages in order along a wall or bulletin board.
- Bunting. Cut the small shapes from the beach and leaf pages, punch two holes and thread string through.
- Cards. Any page folded and mounted on card works. The reading page and the snowman page make the best ones.
- A window scene. The snowman page backed on dark card and taped to glass reads well from outside.
- Your own book. Print all ten, fold and staple down the left edge, and colour the cover — your child ends up with a book they made rather than a stack of loose sheets.
About these pages
Every page in this book was drawn for KidsColorOnline by KidsColorOnline Team. They are drawn to one spec so the whole book feels like a set rather than a folder of unrelated pictures — one bear, one style, one year.
Using these pages
Everything here is free for personal, classroom and library use. Print as many copies as you need — for your family, your daycare, your preschool or your school.
Please do not resell or reformat them, or host the files elsewhere. If you would like to feature them on your own site, we would love that — please credit KidsColorOnline and link back to this page rather than uploading the files yourself.