Showing posts with label Chinese New Year. Show all posts

Chinese New Year Rice Sensory Play

Chinese New Year Sensory Play #chinesenewyear #CNYsensoryplay #sensoryplay #preschool #earlyyears #learningthroughplay

Did you see our recent Chinese New Year inspired Sensory Play we shared last week? If you follow us on Instagram you would have seen the activity coming together on my Instastories. I love sharing celebrations and culture with the children! Chinese New Year is always quite a refreshing celebration to cover. It's after Christmas, we've said goodbye to the January blues and bam the Chinese New Year/Lunar New Year/ Spring Festival brings joy to the classroom. As part of this topic we have also shared Symmetrical Dragon Paintings, Chinese Lanterns using old art work, China Tuff Tray and Paper Roll Dragons!

Learning Through Play

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Baby Chinese New Year Older Preschool Seasonal Sensory Play Toddler Winter Young

Chinese New Year Sensory Spaghetti

Chinese New Year is almost upon us! Have you been doing any arts,crafts or activities with the children to teach them all about it?

If you follow us over on Instagram you will have seen this activity in action, along with Symmetrical Dragon Paintings, Chinese Lanterns using old art work, China Tuff Tray and Paper Roll Dragons! I wanted to set up some sensory play inspired by Chinese New Year too. My children really enjoy sensory bins/trays so I try to do as many as I can. Today this set up greeted Neve as she arrived home from school.

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Chinese New Year Cultural Evergreen Older Preschool Seasonal Sue Baxter Tuff Tray Tuff Tray Activities Winter Young

China Tuff Tray

With the year well underway now you may start thinking of ways to incorporate any festivals/celebrations within the children's learning. You may have been setting up some Valentines Play ideas along with Chinese New Year/The Lunar Year. We have made some Toilet Roll Dragons, Painted Dragons for Toddlers and Chinese Lanterns.

Today I am very excited to share with you a fantastic way to teach the children a little more about China, through a Tuff Tray and a map. It links in perfectly with the upcoming Chinese New Year and is great to support British Values within your settings!

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Art and Crafts Chinese New Year Older Preschool Seasonal Toddler Winter Young

Toilet Roll Dragon Craft

Chinese New Year is fast approaching again. We have made some super cute fire breathing dragons made from recycled toilet rolls! An extremely easy craft, needing little materials and the end result is not only colourful and effective - it's LOTS of fun!

We have enjoyed crafting for Chinese New Year in previous years too. We made Chinese Lanterns by recycling the paintings my daughter (toddler at the time) had done freely at her easel. We also made some 2D Dragons using the butterfly technique. They looked fabulous all together in a display - and is a craft accessible to the youngest of children!

To make a Toiler Roll Dragon you will need:

Toilet Rolls

PVA Glue

Paint

Paint Brush

Pom Poms

Googly Eyes

Tissue Paper

Begin by painting your dragons. I found that they dried really quickly as the toilet rolls absorbed the paint. I didn't find it made the colours less vibrant which was a bonus as my Preschooler was keen to move on to the next step.

Attach the googly eyes using your glue to the Pom Poms. They can be a little temperamental. We found that adding a good blob of glue helped hold them in place.

Add glue to the inside of your toilet roll and stick inside the colourful strands of tissue paper. You can cut them as large or as fine as you like. You could even look at doing a mixture of both and allowing the children to explore (once dried) which they prefer.

We only stuck the tissue paper one side of the toiler roll. We did this because the strands at the bottom will only hang and wouldn't blow out effectively. The side you glue your paper to is the TOP. This is where you will need to add the pom poms. 2 larger ones with the googly eyes attached towards the back and two smaller ones for the dragons nose.

Again it can be fiddly getting them to stick down, but adding a good blog of glue should do the trick.

Leave them to dry and then even more fun can begin!

You will need to show the children how to angle their blowing to make the fire breathing dragons look even more effective.

Aswel as being the perfect craft for Chinese New Year, you could also do this craft to accompany various stories with Dragons such as Room on the Broom, Puff the Magic Dragon, How to Catch a Dragon etc.

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Art and Crafts Chinese New Year Older Preschool Seasonal Toddler Young

Chinese Lanterns

We have created some beautiful Chinese Lanterns using my 2 years olds art work.
Little N is always doing something messy and creative. She loves painting, sticking and drawing. I love seeing her getting completely absorbed in her messy play!

With Chinese New Year upon us and my daughters art work piling up high I decided to combine the two and create some colourful decorations.

Note: Post contains Amazon Affiliate Links.

You will need:
- Dried paintings
- Sequins (UK/US)
- Glitter (UK/US)
- Scissors (UK/US)
- Glue spreaders (UK/US)
- PVA Glue (UK/US)
- Glue Stick (UK/US)
- Ribbon (UK/US)

Step 1
Begin by decorating the dried paintings using glue, sequins and glitter.
You can use either PVA glue or prit stick.

Little N did this for around 40 minutes. She loved squeezing the PVA glue onto her paper and pushing sequins down into the oozy, white glue. PVA is great for younger children as they can see the glue, so know where to stick. Little N gets puzzled when using the glue sticks and quickly looses interest.

Step 2
Once the paintings are decorated and you have allowed enough time for the glue to completely dry, fold the paper in half (landscape).

Step 3
Take your scissors and cut slits into the paper, taking care not to cut down to the edges. Cut the slits around 1cm apart.
Tip: If you have any accidents and your slits are made too far, use sellotape to stick it back together.

Step 4
Open out your paper now and holding your lantern landscape glue the ends together.

Step 5
Attach a handle to the top of your lantern. We used gold ribbon.

......and there we have it. In 5 simple steps you can create some beautiful lanterns, perfect decorations for the Chinese New Year, using your little ones art work.

These lanterns also make great decorations for parties and out in the garden during the Summer months.

Chinese New Year Dragon Art for Toddlers

Chinese New Year is here and as always we are excited to include this celebration in our play adventures. Little N loves painting so today we set about doing some very simple Chinese New Year Dragon Painting, perfect for preschool children!

You will need:

Step 1

Fold your A4 sheet of paper in half, begin by painting one half of the paper. Little N has access to paintbrushes and sponges but she wanted to use her fingertips instead.

Step 2

Once the paper is looking beautiful and colorful, fold the paper in half and press the paint onto the other half of the paper. This will make your art work symmetrical and makes your Dragons face/body.

Step 3

Once your painting is fully dry, use the PVA glue to add your Dragons eyes.

Step 4

Finish off your Dragon Art by adding some curling ribbon.

We really enjoyed creating these Dragons. It was a perfect activity for Little N who is currently 2 years and 2 months old.

This Dragon art can be done year in year out with young children too to celebrate Chinese New Year. I love how bright and colorful they are, and the fact they've not been created by using printables. It was a free play painting session.

Why is the Chinese Dragon used to celebrate Chinese New Year?

Chinese Dragons are a symbol of China and they are believed to bring good luck to people. You may have seen the famous dragon dances, performed during Chinese New Year celebrations - it is thought that the longer the dragon used in the dance, the more luck it will bring. A team of dancers work together to move the Dragon using poles that are fixed to the 'body'.

Here is a great video showing people getting ready to celebrate Chinese New Year during a festival: