Help!! Need craft activity for Playgroup!

[Bouj]

We have just joined a new playgroup and each of the mum's take it in turns to provide an activitity each week. Nothing fancy - there have been spiders to make out of egg cartons and pipecleaners, painting, that sort of thing. Its my go on Monday and I haven't got a clue!! Don't want anything that is too messy etc, as I have a 30 minute walk to and from playgroup. All the kids are under 4, the eldest only just turned 3. They majority seem to be 2-3 though (including ds). Has anyone got any brilliant ideas? My first thought after 'bugger' was 'oooh, mumsnet!!!' So, whatcha got?

[bobbybob]

A frog guiro. You need a frog shape on thick card - if they are old enough they could cut this out, or you could already have this bit, they decorate the frog - painting, stickers, crayons - whatever.

Then you get a piece of corrugated card board, with the corrugated bit showing on one side (might have to rip the first layer off a box) and stick it on the frogs tummy.

Play the guiro with a lolly stick along to a tape - if you can find one about frogs so much the better!

[HondaDream]

Seem as though it is summer why not try this.
You will need. Glue sticks and a small bag of sand ( not to heavy to carry) get the kids to draw pictures on paper with glue sticks and then sprinkle on sand. If you want you or kids can cut out simple fish shapes from coloured paper or buckets and spades and stick them on after too.
If you don't fancy that and the sand seems a bit of a bugger to carry here's another nice summer idea
Make sunhats and sunglasses from card. You need card and coloured see through paper for lense of glasses. kids can decorate with stickers or crayons or even sequins if you fance a bit of Dame Edna.

Good Luck used to do this myself but now mine are too big

[Bouj]

Oooh, great ideas! Thanks Have got the whole panicking about making good impression thing too..

[SPARKLER1]

I did the craft and Parent and Toddler's recently. What I chose went down really well.

All crafts were nursery rhyme based so I chose Hickory Dickory Dock.

1 Paper Plate. Draw on clock face and hands at 1 o'clock. If you are feeling creative and have time you could always cut out clock hands and use paper fasteners to make moving hands (great for older kids learning to tell the time).
I printed the nursery rhyme on a small piece of paper and the kids glued them onto the clock face.

To make the finger mouse you need to cut out "fat" heart shapes, and sellotape the edges together leaving a gap to put child's finger into. Cut out tinier hearts to use as ears. Draw on eyes and whiskers (or alternatively use stick on wobbly eyes and pieces of cotton for whiskers. Use a piece of string for the tail and sellotape on where finger is inserted.

I then used a hole punch and put a hole on the edge of the clock and tied the mouses' tail to tie onto the clock - to keep them together.

It's good to be organised and have all the necessary pieces cut out and ready to use and the plates already numbered up. The kids' and their parents can do the rest.
Really simple.

Good luck!!!!

[Littlefish]

Weaving: Get some large twigs from the garden, preferably with a few smaller twigs attached. Weave in, out and around with a variety of different lengths, colours and thicknesses of wool, string, ribbon, lace, fabric and paper.

Windchimes: On a long piece of string, thread metal milk bottle tops (washed), penne pasta to separate, balls of silver foil, crinkly cellophane and anything else that might make noise. Hang up outside.

If they don't need to take it home, then water painting is great if you have an outdoor space or wall. Simply get pots of water and a range of different size paintbrushes. Let the children "paint" the floor or wall. It's great for encouraging big movements!

Musical instruments: 2 x yoghurt pots filled with a choice of sand, dried lentils, dried peas etc. stick together with parcel tape. Wrap in crepe paper. An alternative to yoghurt pots is clean tin cans, with a piece of paper over the top, held on with sticky tape or an elastic band.

A bit messy: Symmetry pictures - fold pieces of paper in half. Get the children to paint blobs on one side. Then, fold the paper in half again and press down. Open up and you have a symmetrical picture.

Fish: Cut out a fish shape for each child and lots of different colour cirles. Children stick the circles all over the fish to make scales.

[Ameriscot2005]

Mosaics or other pictures out of little squares of tissue paper.

[Bouj]

Wow, fab ideas. Thanks - what a crafty lot you are!

[BadHair]

Dingle Dangle Scarecrow puppet:
Draw a face on a paper plate. Stick wool, straw, whatever on to make the hair.
Draw two arms joined in the middle, and two legs the same.
Thread string with pasta tubes and sellotape one end to back of paper plate. Leave about 3 tubes worth of space then sellotape arms to string. Leave 10 tubes then sellotape legs on.
Sing the Dingle Dangle Scarecrow with a Flippy Floppy Hat song and use puppets to do actions.

OR

Make puppets for another song or nursery rhyme by cutting out shapes and colouring in, then sticking on to lolly sticks. We did this for Baa Baa Black Sheep.