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Looking for some inexpensive and fun crafts or activities for your students to learn about Ancient China?
I love crafts. I am a crafting junkie. However, between testing, writing, reading, science, social studies, and math… it can be tough to fit it into the curriculum. We have a fairly strict social studies curriculum at my gifted school I teach at. For social studies, the kids do a lot of analyzing primary source documents and essay writing. Critical thinking and analyzing is a great skill- but where’s the fun Ancient China learning? These crafts help add some spark and fun into the unit!
So turn on some Ancient China music (thanks, YouTube!) and break into some Ancient Chinese fun in your classroom! Here are two of my favorite activities that my students enjoy, and I know your students will as well!
PORCELAIN PLATES
We did this craft last Friday on a whim. We had to test the entire morning, and I w
as in the mood for some fun! While the kids were at lunch, I stopped in the art room and grabbed blue and black tempura paint. I have a boatload of paper plates, so that made it easy as well. One of my fellow teammates had lots of paintbrushes. Ta-da, porcelain painting time! The kids made neat plates and LOVED doing this! Good-old painting is so relaxing. We had a mini lesson on the arts of the Ancient Chinese, put a few examples on the SmartBoard, and the kiddos got to work.
CHINESE LANTERNS
How adorbs are these Chinese lanterns?? I used a template from a teammate, but they are easy to make with normal paper, scissors, and glue! All kids need to do is decorate their lantern. Then, simply fold the paper in half, cut some slits, glue the paper together, and make a handle! If that description is confusing, take a peek at some YouTube videos to watch how they are created. Here is a good one: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CeZKYGmuZn0
