A craft activity that relates to what is going on in the world around kids usually leads to some sort of learning and conversation. This one is great to do on a rainy day when you can lead kids into asking questions about why it rains, where the rain comes from, the water cycle and any other weather or season related questions they might possibly come up with as they cut and stick and work on those fine motor skills and their hand eye co-ordination.
I love a craft actvity that uses items I already have around the house, I’m not saying everyone will have all of these things and if you don’t you can get them cheaply from a dollar shop or similar.
STEP 1 – Cut up the crepe paper into little pieces. We placed these into a plastic container to keep them all in one place.
STEP 2 – Outline the shape of a rain drop on your piece of card or paper and then get the kids to cut it out. If your kids are capable enough get them to cut out the inside of the rain drop to create a frame, but I did this step for my two who decided they wanted to cut out a second raindrop.
STEP 3 – Place the cut out raindrop onto the contact and cut out a piece with about 2cm overhang around the shape.
STEP 4 – Lay the contact sticky side up on a flat surface and carefully place the raindrop frame onto the sticky contact. I placed a green placemat underneath so it is easier to see as the table we were working on was white.
STEP 5 – Cover the inside of the raindrop with pieces of the crepe paper that you cut. Try to make sure every part of the contact on the inside of the frame is covered. It is also a good idea to try to not overlap too many pieces as they become too dark for the sun to shine through and give you that stained glass affect.
STEP 6- Using both hands carry the raindrop over to a window of your choice and starting at the top press the contact against the window. A credit card or something similar can be used to scrape out any air bubbles, but you will find the contact is very forgiving and you can lift it up and replace and press it out a few times before it loses it’s stickiness.
STEP 7 – Stand back and admire your craftiness!
SOME OTHER GREAT FOLLOW ON/LEAD UP ACTIVITIES
[one_half]If you are after a great science experiment to go with this craft activity try this one about the water cycle from play dough to plato. I’ll admit that we have tried the experiment but at the moment nothing much is happening, but my cluey kids have realised this is because we haven’t had much sun over the past few days.
In the photo you can see the ziplock bag we have put up to help us see the water cycle happening, you can also see the stained glass leaf we made at the beginning of autumn. I’ll have to put a tutorial up for that one day, but at the time I hadn’t started this blog and so don’t have any pics to go with a tutorial…. YET! [/one_half]
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