http://www.care2.com/greenliving/beyond-paper-eco-friendly-crafts.html
Beyond Paper: Eco-Friendly Crafts
By Terri Hall-Jackson, contributing writer, Care 2
Sometimes I think kindergarten teachers should be arrested because of the mounds of paper that are sent home on a daily basis. The father of my child’s preschool buddy looked mortified at me when I said that, but I could wallpaper my entire home with the voluminous amounts of printables and doodles that enter our doorway Monday through Friday, September through June.
I was kidding about the kindergarten teachers, of course. I love, love, love and deeply respect them. And I love seeing my children express themselves artistically. But the extensive use of paper does drive me nuts.
When doing crafts at home, may I suggest going paperless? Or at least recycle paper by creating a bin of paper that is clean on one side for kids to draw, doodle and play games on. If you are interested in crafts that don’t require the use of clean sheets of paper, consider the following activities.
1. Make a mosaic out of scraps of broken tiles, pictures from old magazines, paper scraps, odd cards from board games that are no longer played with. Potential material options are limitless.
2. Instead of using paper, how about making your own recycled paper and holiday cards, using ingredients such as newspaper, junk mail, paper scraps and dried flowers?
3. Check out resourcefulschools.org to learn how to make a kite, woven placemats, book covers and more out of old paper bags.
4. Before dumping items into the trash or recycle containers at home, consider if there’s any potential artistic use for them. A milk container could become a bird feeder. Can you see that baby jar as a snow globe or a paperweight? For more ideas on turning trash into art, check out The Imagination Factory’s Trash Matcher.
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18 comments
add your comment »Great article. I plan to teach kindergarden and I am always looks for great, green ideas. Thanks.
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Thanks Terri!
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Great article, we used to make alot of crafts with egg cartons, ice cream bar sticks . You can use the egg cartons to be mini planters to get your seeds started off also milk cartons do well also. Thanks for the advice .
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"Catch them young for constructive ventures" is an excellent idea and several options narrated by Terri are praise worthy.Thanks Terri.
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AS our world tries to conserve resources, I agree in class rooms, even with the computer age, we still see lots of paper used by students and teachers. I think your ideas about re-using things such as milk cartons, and other containers is awesome. Plus, by getting the students involved in bringing them from home, whether it be an empty egg container, jars, lids, possibly used greeting cards, and allow the kids to also use their imagination of what they could bring to school that could be re-used for something wonderful and crafty! What an incredible way to teach our youngest children about living greener....
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As a kid, I enjoyed creating paper mache animals & dinosaurs from newspaper strips, held together with flour & water paste. They can be painted with poster paints, & are just as much fun to play with as the plastic animals sold in stores.
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When I was a little girl, my mother and I had a memorable afternoon making and molding pretend food items. The recipe for the "clay" we used came from a magazine (Family Circle? Good Housekeeping?) and I think used flour, salt, a dash of water, and perhaps some cornstarch or baking soda. It was then colored with food dye. We made a hot dog and bun, peas in a pod, an apple. My mother made a lovely ear of corn. I still remember the bright green leaves she molded around yellow ear of corn, kernals made by a checkerboard of toothpick lines.
Years later, the food has long since crumbled away but the happy memories of an afternoon together remain.
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thanks...
Kabin
Konteyner,Prefabrik
mega kabin
Konteyner
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cool ideas
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this is great for a mum with five kids between the ages of 10 and 11/2 years you can imagine the amount of paper waste
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