With Spring right around the corner, preschoolers will have fun creating a variety of colorful crafts fit for the season. Whether painting a masterpiece on the easel or designing a flower garden, there are many activities that will encourage early learners’ imagination while building fine motor skills. Here are a few ideas to get started.
7 Spring Crafts for Toddlers
Tissue Paper Tree
What you need:
- Construction paper
- Tissue paper (small pieces in assorted colors)
- Glue
- Marker
- Scissors
- Cardstock
What to do:
Choose a color of construction paper for the trunk and branches of the tree. Have students lay their forearm (trunk) and hand (branches) down on the paper and trace around it with the marker. Cut out the tree and glue it onto a piece of cardstock for the background. Next, take the small pieces of tissue paper (pastel colors are perfect for spring), scrunch them up, dip them in glue, and stick them onto the tree to create early spring blossoms. After the tissue paper tree has dried, hang up to display throughout the classroom.
Cupcake Flowers
What you need:
- Cupcake liners (assorted colors)
- Chenille Stems
- Pen
What to do:
Using the pen, poke a small hole into the center of the cupcake liners. Little learners can thread a chenille stem through each of the holes, balling up the end in the center of the liner. When a number of flowers have been created, secure them together with a chenille stem to make the most beautiful spring bouquet.
Pom-pom Caterpillar
What you need:
- Pom-poms
- Glue
- Chenille Stem
- Wiggly eyes
What to do:
Select pom-poms to create the caterpillar. Glue the pom-poms together to form a line making up the body of the caterpillar. Fold the chenille stem into a “V” and glue between the first and second pom-pom. This makes up the caterpillars antennae. Carefully attach a pair of wiggly eyes onto the first pom-pom and let the glue set. When completely dry, preschoolers can engage in a bit of imaginary discovery and dramatic play with their new caterpillar friends.
Dandelion Wishes
What you need:
- Pom-poms
- Tacky glue
- Glitter
- Twigs
What to do:
Roll pom-poms around in the glitter, pressing it into the pom-poms. Glue one pom-pom to the tip of a small twig creating a dandelion. When completely dry, place a bunch in a flowerpot or vase. Perhaps they can be wedged into the ground outside as the wishing trees of the fairy garden. Toddlers will enjoy making wishes, blowing on the dandelion and watching the magic sparkle as the glitter is released from the flower.
Rainbow Chime
What you need:
- Beads (assorted colors and sizes)
- String or twine
- Plastic cup
- Paint
- Single hole puncher
- Jingle bells
What to do:
Paint the plastic cup any desired color. Once dry, punch holes around the top of the cup. Thread a piece of string through the center of the plastic cup creating a knotted loop (on the bottom of the cup) to hang the chime once it is completed. Attach a piece of string to each hole in the cup by tying a knot so the string doesn’t come out. Lengths of the string can be all the same or varying. Place beads onto the pieces of string and finish off with a jingle bell at the bottom. Tie a knot at the end so beads do not come off. Repeat this process until all pieces of string are full of beads and bells. Hang up and enjoy the sounds of the wind.
Filter Wreath
What you need:
- Paper plates
- Scissors
- Coffee filters
- Liquid watercolors
- Paintbrush or dropper
- Ice cube tray
- Hole punch
- Ribbon
What to do:
Fill the ice cube tray with a variety of watercolor paints. Cut out the center of the paper plates and help children paint the paper rings a spring color of their choice. Put aside to dry. Using either a brush or a dropper, add colors to the coffee filters. While they are drying, punch a bunch of holes around the colored ring of the plate. Children can then stuff the coffee filters through the holes, fluff up the filters, and hang up their new springtime wreath with a pretty ribbon.
Rain Sticks
What you need:
- Cardboard tube (from paper towel or saran wrap)
- Aluminum foil
- Brass tacks or thumbtacks
- Dried rice
- Pony beads
- Craft foam stickers
- Glue
- Tissue Paper
What to do:
Teachers and parents – prepare the tubes first by pushing brass tacks or thumbtacks all throughout the tube. The more tacks, the better, as this helps make the sounds of the rain. Once the tacks are in, toddlers can roll up the tube tightly in aluminum foil, stuffing one end closed. Add some dried rice and pony beads into the tube so that when it is shaken, it makes noise. Stuff the extra foil into the top opening to close off the tube. Coat the tube with glue and decorate with tissue paper and foam stickers. When it dries, little learners will enjoy their musical rain sticks.