We had so much fun playing with our indoor snowman that I wanted to incorporate some of the same aspects into our penguin theme. This penguin craft turned out to be great for toddler play, fine motor activities, and learning games. And bonus. We only need a few materials to make it.
GET A FULL WEEK OF PENGUIN THEME ACTIVITIES IN OUR PRESCHOOL PENGUIN LESSON PLANS
Materials
- Baileys Coffee Creamer container (emptied, label removed, washed, and dried)
- Black felt (one sheet)
- Hot glue gun
Directions
Trim the felt so that you have one large square to fit around 2/3 of the bottle, 2 wings, 2 feet, and 2 eyes.
Glue the center of the black felt square to the center of the back of the bottle. Then tack the rest of the square as needed working your way to the front of the bottle.
Then secure the front edges, pulling the felt in to the position that you want it.
Glue the two wings.
Position the feet so that they do not make the container fall over. Then glue them to the bottom of the container.
Glue the eyes to the top of the container.
We debated adding a more “traditional” orange beak, but I wanted the kids to be able to open and close the container so we could use it for a variety of learning activities throughout our theme. We compromised and decided to make him an Adelie penguin whose beak would be black.
Ideas for Play and Learning
Next week we’ll share one of the learning activities we did with this little guy, but in the meantime I thought I’d share a few ideas.
You could:
- make a set of little penguins and use them for penguin bowling
- make a set of little penguins and use them for pretend play
- let toddlers practice opening and closing the penguin mouth
- encourage toddlers to “feed” the penguin black and white pom poms to practice fine motor skills and color recognition
- encourage preschoolers to practice estimating and counting by seeing how many pom poms it would take to fill the penguin
What other play and learning ideas would you try with this penguin craft?
PRINTABLE PENGUIN THEME LESSON PLANS
Save time and get right to the playful learning with our printable lesson plan sets. We have a variety of lesson plan sets that work well as winter themes. Each set includes over 30 playful learning activities related to the theme, and we’ve provided different versions for home preschool families and classroom teachers so all activities are geared directly toward your needs.
Watch this short video to see just a few examples of the types of activities and printables included in this set:
This set currently includes active hands-on learning ideas and the following printables:
- Fish Pattern Cards (in color and b/w)
- Iceberg Shape Mats and Iceberg Penguin Shape Matching Game (in color and b/w)
- If We Were Penguins Class Book Covers and Page Templates
- Penguin Color Matching Mats and Color Fish to Sort (in color and b/w)
- Uppercase Adult Penguin and Lowercase Chick Letter Matching Set (in color and b/w)
- Iceberg Penguin Name Hop Activity with Editable Penguin Name Plates (in color and b/w)
- Build an Iceberg Counting Activity Number Cube (in color and b/w)
- Penguin Ten-Frames Pre-Filled with 1-10 (in color and b/w)
- Blank 10 and 20 Frames (in color and b/w)
- Penguin Numbers 1-20 (in color and b/w)
- Penguin Vocabulary Cards (in color and b/w)
- Penguin Science Journal (in color and b/w)
- Real Penguin Photos
GET YOUR LESSON PLANS
Also available on Teachers Pay Teachers.
More Penguin Fun
Click on the image below to see more of the activities from our penguin theme.
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