Earth Day is a day we as a family haven’t acknowledged until now. I don’t know why we hadn’t thought of marking Earth Day with crafts and activities for our kids before. Every April 22nd since 1970 Earth Day has been celebrated. The main aim of Earth day is to raise awareness on the negative impact our actions have on our environment and the earth as a whole and for some it is a day for political action / general participation.
Our aim for Earth day was to get chatting and learning with our children about how we can care for the environment. We wanted our children to discuss topics around caring for our planet, read some educational environmental books and do some fun, creative activities.
There are a number of Earth day crafts and activities that you could do for Earth day and I have compiled a few that we would like to share with you.
Recycled Suncatchers
As a family we teach our children regularly about how we can reduce, re-use and recycle. This activity is a perfect opportunity to chat about recycling and plastic litter while being creative. They are also good for using as a display to share with others.
Simply go through some plastic containers and cut out shapes or alternatively large yoghurt pot lids / food plastic lids work well. We decorated the plastic using Sharpies. Think of some Earth day creations, pick up litter messages, recycling messages and get creating! Then punch a hole using a hole puncher and hang from a twig to make an Earth day sun catcher mobile.
Seed Bombs
What could be more Earth day themed than making some pattered seed bombs to help grow a wild flower corner in a garden or park and attract some bees. This activity was great fun and relatively easy to do.
- We used blue and green construction paper. The littles loved cutting the paper into small bits and spent a good 20 minutes snipping and chatting with me. Kids just love to use scissors and it’s a great way to help fine motor skills for mark making and writing.
- After we had snipped the paper up we then covered it with warm water until all the scraps of paper soaked the liquid up. We then popped it into the blender and blended it to a pulp.
- Take the pulp and put it aside to drain all the excess water out of the paper.
- Take the pulp that is left in the sieve and pop it back into a bowl and mix some wildflower seeds into it.
- Press the pulp into silicone or metal moulds and leave to dry for around 24-48 hours.
- Once dry you can send the seed bombs as gifts or plant in your garden or local area.
Decorating Rocks
This is something that so many local communities are actively involved in. We have our very own local rock Facebook group. Children and adults decorate, hide and find painted/decorated rocks throughout the year. If you don’t have a group near you then simply start one up or just hide some rocks to make someone smile. Doing some Earth day themed rocks is a great way to spread the Earth day message.
Earth Day Playdough
We love a themed play dough! Using blue and green coloured play dough with some loose items that you have in the home is ideal for young children.
You could simply leave the dough to be natural and add in rosemary and lavender for a more natural Earth day look. Alternatively make some homemade dyed play dough using your own homemade dyes.
Here is my basic play dough recipe
Loose items could include blue/green stones, sticks, grass, safe flowers, toy animals and some wooden play dough tools.
Earth Day Scavenger Hunt
We did a simple scavenger hunt, where we chose some colours to paint inside a cardboard egg box. We then went out and found some nature that matched the colours in the egg box. This is an easy activity that incorporates colour learning, paint mixing (and most importantly for Earth day) discussions about vibrant colours of nature.
Earth Day learning
End the fun activities with some snuggle time reading environmental kids books such as help the Hedgehog and Protect the Polar Bear. You can also find out more about Earth Day here.
I hope that you have found some inspiration for making and doing some Earth day crafts and activities with your kids. We would love to hear what crafts you chose to do and how they turned out.
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