Sesame Street Coloring Pages

The street has been teaching children letters and numbers since 1969, and most parents printing these pages grew up on it themselves. These Sesame Street coloring pages put the whole neighborhood on paper, each friend doing the thing they are known for.

Elmo giggles beside a goldfish bowl, splashes through a puddle in a raincoat and rubber boots, rides a tricycle past pots of flowers in his helmet, and turns up as a chubby little version hugging a striped beach ball. Cookie Monster hugs a heaped plate of cookies with crumbs flying off it, then carries a tray of his own baking across the kitchen. Oscar the Grouch leans out of his dented can with the lid on his head, frowns beside his striped pet worm, and shares his heap of trash bags with a raccoon. Big Bird peeks around the railing of the stoop, cuddles a teddy bear in his nest of straw, holds a flowered umbrella over a little girl, and walks beside Mr. Snuffleupagus, who shows up again in a rooftop garden of tomatoes, watering can in Elmo's hands.

Bert and Ernie share breakfast at a small round table. Ernie soaks in a claw-foot tub with his rubber duck and plays a harmonica on the steps under a crescent moon; Bert reads beside his lamp with a tray of paperclips in front of him and plants seeds in a window box. Abby Cadabby waves her wand in her tutu and flies over the city rooftops trailing sparkles, then joins Ernie for a picnic. The Count stacks apples one on top of another beside a full basket. The rest of the street gathers for the big scenes: a band with a drum, a trumpet and a tambourine on the steps of the 123 brownstone, a merry-go-round in the park, a crowd squeezed under one umbrella in the rain, a snowman with a long striped scarf, leaves raked into a pile.

Every friend has one color, and children know it

This is the rare set where a toddler already knows the answer. Elmo is red, Cookie Monster is blue, Big Bird is yellow, Oscar is green, the Count is purple, Snuffleupagus is brown and Abby is pink. Bert is yellow too and Ernie is orange, each in his striped sweater, so the stripes are the child's to choose. Ask a child which crayon Elmo needs before handing over the page, and the coloring becomes a color lesson without anyone calling it one.

The friends are easier to tell apart than their colors suggest. Big Bird's feathers, Oscar's shaggy fur and Cookie Monster's googly eyes are all drawn in, so a child who picks the wrong crayon still colors the right character. And there is one fact worth keeping for later: in the very first season Oscar was orange, and he only turned green the year after. A child who wants an orange Oscar is being historically accurate.

Where to start with a small child

For a two or three year old, choose a page with one big friend and almost nothing around them. Quick to color, above the grid, keeps those, beginning with:

• A shaggy monster with bushy eyebrows
• Ernie in the bath with his rubber duck
• Elmo giggling beside a goldfish bowl

Those pages are thick outlines and wide open shapes, which is exactly what a crayon held in a fist can manage. Big Bird on the stoop and Oscar in his can are good first pages because the child can name the character and finish the page in one sitting.

For an older child, or a parent coloring alongside, Lots of detail gathers the full street scenes, where every step, window, leaf and flower pot is a separate shape:

• Abby and Ernie having a picnic
• Snuffleupagus and Elmo in a rooftop garden
• A band playing on the 123 stoop

Counting with the Count, and other small lessons

The street was built to teach, and the pages still do. The Count's apples are a counting page: color them one at a time and count them out loud, the way he would, with a laugh after each number. The band on the stoop has 123 over the door, the address every fan knows, and it makes a good starting point for writing numbers. The seasons each have a page, snow, rain, falling leaves and a summer garden, so a set can follow the calendar through a school year.

The kitchen pages carry their own lesson about waiting. Cookie Monster bakes a whole tray, and a furry friend stands on a stool to sneak one from the jar on the top shelf. Talk about which one is the better plan while the crayons are out.

Printing a stack for a party

Every page is a free PDF in A4 at 300 dpi. On A4 print at 100 % scale; on US Letter choose "fit to page", which shrinks the drawing by about six percent. The printing guide walks through both. Press Add to pack under the pages you want and print them together as one file, which is the easy way to prepare a birthday table or a rainy afternoon. The CoComelon coloring pages and the monster coloring pages sit well beside these for the same age.