Every year I do a themed summer craft program for school aged kids. It is easy to plan and usually pretty well attended. This year we had 15 kids join us which was pretty good considering the program fell the day before the 4th of July holiday.
The majority of crafts I choose this year were either variations on crafts we've done before or things I found searching Pinterest. The space theme provides a wide variety of potential ideas. I hope these suggestions come in handy for all the librarians and parents trying to keep kids busy this summer!
Moon Painting
I printed out a template of the moon and had the kids use balls of aluminum foil to paint them with. For extra fun I made sure to have glittery and glow in the dark paints. You could also switch things up by using templates of the moon at various phases or even just paper plates. Unfortunately I didn't get a picture of the final product.
DVD UFOs
This was a great chance to use up some DVD's that my library was discarding. All the kids had to do was color with marker on the shiny side of two discs and add stickers as desired. I used a glue gun to glue the DVD's together and add a cup on top. It was my first time breaking out the glue gun and it actually worked very smoothly.
Pool Noodle Aliens
This was probably the most engaging and favorite craft of the kids. I provided the stickers, pool noodle pieces and pipe cleaners and the kids were able to create whatever aliens they wanted to. The comparisons that were made to Forky from Toy Story 4 made it feel especially timely too.
Space Magnets
These magnet sets were purchased through Oriental Trading. I wanted to end the program with a fairly simple craft that the kids could do on their own and this one worked very well.
In addition to these crafts I also provided some coloring pages for the kids to work on at the library or take home. Almost all the kids filled the hour with the initial crafts and just took the coloring sheets home.
Hope these ideas are helpful and that your summer is going well!
In addition to these crafts I also provided some coloring pages for the kids to work on at the library or take home. Almost all the kids filled the hour with the initial crafts and just took the coloring sheets home.
Hope these ideas are helpful and that your summer is going well!