Moneysaving art workshop ideas/suggestions please.

kisto

Hi all, I've not ventured over to this forum for a while!

My dd's teacher has asked me if I'd liked to host a workshop at the schools art festival at the beginning of July. Although I am quite arty/crafty I have never done anything like this before.

I was wondering if anyone has any ideas for something I could make - that would be easy to demonstrate to groups of 10 primary aged children? The kids will need to find it fairly easy to make too. The school only has a small budget but they will pay for anything I need (within reason)!

My current thoughts are:

- Recycled magazine envelopes as I have posted in this thread URL="http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showpost.html?p=9626387&postcount=319"]clicky[/URL.
All I'll need is a stack of old magazines and some glue or double sided sticky tape for this. I already have the templates. I don't know whether this would appeal to young children?


or



- Cotton string & bead bracelets/keyrings - they look like this:

I would need some cotton string or rats tail, beads and keyrings to make this, so materials might cost a bit. I know that kids can do this as both my two kids can make them. It uses similar knots to 'scoobies' which were the latest craze a few years ago.

Or perhaps I could do both?

Or has anyone got any other ideas / websites that could inspire me?

I know another parent will be running a beading workshop.

Thanks in advance.

Volvic

Kisto - sorry I have no idea but was wondering...do you sell these bracelets? I would love some..

Nenen

I think your cotton string bracelets look fab and would go down really well! :j:j
You are obviously good at manipulating/knotting string so, if you want another idea that can be easily adapted depending upon the age of the children.... how about teaching them how to make Native American dreamcatchers? The story behind dreamcatchers is so appealing to children and you can be as authentic and/or creative as you want! I've made them using the traditional willow rings covered in leather/suede with sinew for the webbing but you can make them equally well with cheap bangles for the rings, ribbon to cover the bangle and strong thread/thin string for the webbing. The 1st weblink below even shows you how to make them with paper plates and old bits of wool!

If you put out a plea to parents for beads from old broken jewelery and/or visit charity shops you will get lots of interesting things the children will love to sort through. The school can buy bags of brightly coloured feathers very cheaply through their educational supplies or alternatively, ask your local butcher for some pheasant feathers, which look very authentic! I must admit I once saw a dead pheasant in the road and took it home and plucked it.... gave me enough feathers for several years worth of dreamcatchers! (Sorry if that's TMI!)

Here are some sites with instructions at various levels of difficulty:

1)Very little children (approx 4-7 yrs) can make them like this:
http://accommodation.lboro.ac.uk/e-induction.php

2) slightly older children (approx 7-9 years) can do this:
http://www.enchantedlearning.com/crafts/Dreamcatcher.shtml

3) The oldest children (and adults) can do this:
http://www.crystalinks.com/dreamcatcher.html

Have fun! :T:T:T

kisto

Volvic wrote: »

Kisto - sorry I have no idea but was wondering...do you sell these bracelets? I would love some..

Hi Volvic,

I have sold the bracelets at school fairs and my daughter took a handful in for a fundraising charity event, but I haven't really considered selling them elsewhere.

---

Thanks for your lovely reply Nenen,

I love your suggestion for dreamcatchers and appreciate the effort you have gone into with the links etc. Unfortunately there may be a conflict of interest as one of the lessons the children do during their forest school session is to make dream catchers. I help out at the forest school and the chidren do really enjoy the session. They also have a session making native american head-dresses out of things they find in the forest (although I'm not sure how many Indian chiefs had pine cones or oak leaves on their headress) :rotfl:

mumoftwo

The bracelets are lovely, would appeal to children. Lidl had lots of cotton thread on sale a few weeks back, they call it crochet thread I think.

What about cards? Again with the pictures from magazines. I was asked by DD's teacher to show the kids how to make simple Christmas cards and most schools have lots of different card and glue, glitter and other materials already, I took in my punches and fancy scissors and showed them some basic layering. They also had foam. They kids made lots of cards and then sold them for the school fund.

qwiksave

Hi Kisto, :hello: I didn't get round to starting the scrapbook thread as I wasn't sure how to theme it, but I see others have got scrapbook threads going on here...

Regarding this art workshop, have you not been given a theme? My children at primary school do an arts week but they are given a theme like 'Africa' or 'Underwater' or the like...

Underwater is quite a good theme atually and you could think of a few ideas for that - if you like it, I'll find out some of the ones my kids school did for you...

Lillibet_2

I'm going to go agains the majority & say the magazine evenlopes are fab, not only are they easy for primary aged children to manage but they carry the recycling message much louder than the bracelets. Also, the envelopes are the sort of thing which are easy to remember & come back to you months/years later.

Maybe you could make greeting cards to go in the envelopes with magazine collages? I am currently helping my near 3YO make our Xmas cards using cut out shapes from Xmas gift wrap which are turning out much better than I expected!

Good luck whatever you decide;)

sethsgran

Kisto they are fantastic bracelets/key chains. Do you have a pattern or are they self taught?

rsdiscos

https://www.familyfun.go.com
The home page always has easy seasonal crafts but look along the top and search for other ideas.
It is an american site but is great!!

kisto

Thanks for all the replies. :j

sethsgran wrote: »

Kisto they are fantastic bracelets/key chains. Do you have a pattern or are they self taught?

Hiya,

It is self taught as I learned long before the internet existed! I unpicked a bracelet I'd bought and then copied the knotting. As you get confident with the knotting you can experiment with adding beads or other elements.

I've since learned that it is called a "flat knot" in chinese knotting and that there are plenty of instructions available online

Simple diagram
- http://webpages.charter.net/yvonnechang/knots/FlatKnot.htm

Video
- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WChtbPM0DTk (instructions actually start at about 1:30)

These are cute - and I may well do these at the workshop:
http://www.co.middlesex.nj.us/culturalheritage/chineseknotting/flat.html

The keyrings in my photo I posted in my OP are done with a round knot that I learned from my kids when they did scoobies. There are some basic diagram instructions for that here:

http://www.yoarra.nl/eng/technieken-rond.php (plus plenty of other knotting techniques on the site too).

Have fun! Happy knotting!

savvy

Hi Kisto, I think that the scoobie craze may look a bit old IYSWIM (although I DO like your bracelets ) and as you know I'm a mega fan of the envelopes so I'm going with that!

As someone said, it sends a great message for recycling, and I think would really appeal to girls AND boys if you used comics instead of grown up mags. To keep costs down, could you ask parents to bring in old comics?? That way you'd already have the kids faves comics And then all you'd have to supply is the templates (different shapes/sizes to keep them interested) glue and perhaps sticky address labels which schools usually have anyway. You could also teach them how to do gift tags to match etc