Tomorrow the boys start their 2nd (and final) week of Y camp for the summer. Ebby and I will be holding down the fort at home, hoping to get lots and lots accomplished. I thought I would share a few pictures of the craft projects I did with the kids during my week as Arts & Crafts mom--so here we go.
- Pirate Islands
I did this project with the older kids (Grades 4-7). It was a last minute idea and a lot of campers really got into it. The base is a ripped piece of corrugated cardboard. They covered the island with wrapping paper/map pages & paint. I gave them lots of materials to pick from for embellishing the islands including salt clay, cork and styrofoam. The kids did a great job making palm trees (from tissue paper and straws), rafts, boats, and assorted other creations.
Campers were able to work on these projects over 2 days (25 minutes each day) and they turned out great. I love putting out the materials, giving a few ideas and seeing what kids create!
- Paper Bag Pirate Puppets. I did this project with the younger kids (K-3rd grade). I made the 3 project samples, explained what we were doing, and let them go to town with the scissors & glue sticks. Amazingly, the kindergarteners seemed to need the least assistance. They referred to the samples, made some choices and stared working.
They made some adorable puppets. Unfortunately I only had the chance to take this one picture (sniff, sniff). Trust me, they were cute ;-)
The rest of the photos are my samples--which I had waaaay too much fun making!
- Eye Patches. Nothing really original here--except that I was able to score a bunch of leather samples from EXCL. Amazingly, most of the scissors we had were able to cut the leather. Very authentic, leather eye patches. And a bonus: lots of the older kids loved the smell ('Smells like new shoes!')
- Pirate pencil cup. This one was actually a back-up project that I didn't end up making with the kids. I thought it was cute though.
I made it out of a toilet paper roll, scrapbook paper and covered chipboard, along with a few die cuts I colored in with marker.
I had a great time thinking up the projects, making the samples, and watching the campers interpret my ideas. I must say though, it was a lot of work. Very hectic pace with only 25 minutes with each group and no break in between groups--just straight through from 9:10 until 12:30. With a wide variety of ages. It gave me confidence though and allowed me to get my feet wet again back in a classroom-type setting. I'm sure that not every camper enjoyed every project, but overall, we all had a good (and creative) time.
If you have any questions about the projects or would like more detailed instructions, just shoot me an email or leave a comment : )
{Materials sources: EXCL, my recycling bin and Oriental Trading}
