DLTK's Holiday Crafts for Kids
Paper Plate Wreath

This is one of the most familiar Christmas wreaths for those with toddlers and preschoolers.  It's great all the way up to early grade school where you can focus on patterning along with the craft.  Add a photo of the child to the center to make a great keepsake for mom or grandma!

This version of our paper plate wreath is meant for younger children.  We also have a version intended for older children.

Materials:

• paper plate,
• glue,
• scissors,
• 1 to 2 inch squares of tissue paper in Christmas colors (greens and red)
• 12 inch length of ribbon.

Skills to practice:

• Patterning:  Have them complete their wreath using a pattern.  For toddler and PreK, you can provide them with the pattern.  For older children you can allow them to plan out their own pattern.
• Estimating/judging measurements:  encourage the children to glue their pieces of tissue paper an equal distance away from each other.
• Math:  Provide the children with directions at the beginning of the project.
  • For preK and kindergarten directions can be:  "Use 6 of each color."  Let the children count out the sets of 6.
  • For Gr 1 and Gr 2 directions can be:  "Use 18 pieces all together.  12 of the pieces must be a shade of green.  The rest should be red.".

Instructions:

• Cut the tissue paper into 1 to 2 inch squares.  You can see in the photo that we used light green, dark green and red.  This can be done by adults prior to crafting.
• Cut the center out of the paper plate to leave a round "donut" shape.  This will form the base of the wreath.  Again, this can be done prior to craft time.
• Scrunch the pieces of tissue paper into balls.  You can do this on the end of a pencil to make more of a flower shape or you can just make a ball with your fingers.
• Glue around the paper plate to make the wreath.
• Tie a bow with the length of ribbon and glue it to the top of the wreath.

Printable version of these instructions