Age appropriate crafts for Vacation Bible School is a hard one. The gap of ages, from pre-kindergarten to sixth grade make creating a craft that engages all of the children in attendance tough.
In keeping with my desire to create a craft that is worthwhile, I had the children make placemats. Now I realize that most will probably hit the trash sooner rather than later, but... I can say that the majority of the kids, no matter the age, learned something during this project.
First off, the kids painted two different papers. On one they painted "cool" colors while the other was "warm" colors. I explained to them about thinking of the "warm" as the sun and the "cool" as the ocean. Given that we are in Texas with 100+ degree heat, even the smallest children understood the concept.
Another teaching moment came quickly with the Lots of Color... Little Water hand motions. I taught them about using a brush and loading the brush with paint, not water. And then we painted. Some children painted quickly and some not so much...
I then let the pages dry for a day or so and then we cut on into strips and the other into the base. Amazingly, there were many fifth graders that did not know how to weave!!
When we had the woven paper finished, we glued it to the construction paper and the children colored the edges. Finally, we laminated all of the projects.
And here they are...the great thing about this project is the end result looks good and works, no matter the level of ability!
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In keeping with my desire to create a craft that is worthwhile, I had the children make placemats. Now I realize that most will probably hit the trash sooner rather than later, but... I can say that the majority of the kids, no matter the age, learned something during this project.
First off, the kids painted two different papers. On one they painted "cool" colors while the other was "warm" colors. I explained to them about thinking of the "warm" as the sun and the "cool" as the ocean. Given that we are in Texas with 100+ degree heat, even the smallest children understood the concept.
Another teaching moment came quickly with the Lots of Color... Little Water hand motions. I taught them about using a brush and loading the brush with paint, not water. And then we painted. Some children painted quickly and some not so much...
I then let the pages dry for a day or so and then we cut on into strips and the other into the base. Amazingly, there were many fifth graders that did not know how to weave!!
When we had the woven paper finished, we glued it to the construction paper and the children colored the edges. Finally, we laminated all of the projects.
And here they are...the great thing about this project is the end result looks good and works, no matter the level of ability!
Next up? Napkin rings.
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