Are you looking for creative methods to teach your children about upcycling? There’s no need to get rid of everything. With one of these eco-friendly Earth Day activities, kids may learn how to reuse or upcycle items that would otherwise be discarded.
Create seed bombs out of wildflowers.
Seed bombs are a simple way to give back to Mother Nature. In a food processor, combine used construction paper scraps, water, and wildflower seeds, then mold them into mini muffins. Allow drying before tossing into the ground. The paper will ultimately degrade, and the seeds will grow as the seed bombs are exposed to the sun and rain.
Make a wreath out of nature.
Collect uncommon plants, blossoms, fruits, and other organic stuff on a walk in the woods with your kids. To make the wreath shapes, braid pieces of old t-shirts together to form a circle. Then secure organic elements in the crevices with a clear piece of string or hot glue. Tie a string around the top of your garland to hang it.
Create a bug hotel.
Make a nice hideaway for all of the creepy crawlies. Cut a two-liter plastic bottle in half and stuff it with sticks, pine cones, bark, or any other natural material to make two cylinders. Make sure the organic material is tightly packed. After that, tie a piece of string or thread around the cylinders and hang your insect hotel from a tree branch or a fence.
Make a quilt.
Textiles account for nearly 16 million tons of municipal solid garbage each year. Make a comfortable quilt with your kids to teach them how to repurpose discarded materials that would otherwise wind up in the landfill
Make moss balls.
Celebrate our wonderful world with all these gentle mossy balls on Earth Day. Kids who love having their palms dirty will love this activity. To make an Earth-shaped ball, crush pre-soaked sphagnum moss into a ball shape, wrap it firmly in azure thread or pieces of recycled t-shirts, layer more mosses and thread, and so on. Put in a sunny window after finishing with a yarn loop. To keep your moss ball healthy, spritz it with moisture every couple of days.
Construct a hanging garden.
Large plastic bottles are transformed into lovely hanging plants in this green-living and green-thumb project. This is a fantastic technique for creating a lovely hanging garden.
Make flower art out of rubbish.
The only materials required for this reprocessed activity and lesson are scraps of paper. The addition of measurement and math is a plus.
“Grow” a tree out of egg cartons.
Keep your egg cartons! Making a recycled egg carton tree is an easy project requiring only a few items.
Make your adaptable seating.
Upcycling tires into comfortable chairs for your reading nook is one of our favorite Earth Day crafts.
Make a bracelet with a pop-top closure.
Thanks to some ribbon ninja work, aluminum beverage pop caps have become wearable jewelry. Put this movie on your whiteboard to give your students all the details, and then get them to work on their projects.
Chime the wind.
Gather sticks, weeds, and pickable blooms on a nature walk, then bring the findings indoors to be displayed on recycled jar lids. Your children can make this unexpectedly gorgeous recycled wind chime with wax paper and string.
Customize paper bags.
Brown paper bags can be used as eco-canvases for artwork or to decorate refrigerators for Earth Day. You’ll get bonus points if you can find handled bags because the handles double as built-in art hangers.
Use pebbles to curate art.
Allow pupils to collect small stones and pebbles outside. After that, they should arrange the rocks in a creative arrangement. Get creative and experiment with as many different designs as possible! Leave the rocks where you found them when you’re finished.
Make new crayons with the use of old ones.
This isn’t just any old crayon that’s been repurposed. It’s a lovely earth-toned crayon! Using a muffin tray, you may create these with your kids. All you have to do now is sort among the appropriate hues.
Utilize upcycled things to do puzzles.
STEM and recycling are a great match! This Hello, Wonderful idea is a fun way to get kids to construct mazes or something else entirely.
Keep the birds fed.
Bring in the new season with this simple crowd-pleaser: a huge plastic bottle bird feeder. This brief video will show students how to begin building their feeders.
Use old cans for organization.
Tin cans are inexpensive and simple to obtain, and they can aid in the organization of your goods. Allow your kids to get involved by helping to decorate the cans. They’ll be in charge of it, pushing them to arrange their supplies better.
Use paper-mâché to make pots.
Using brightly colored paper pieces, decorate the bottom of beverage bottles or repurposed food containers. These paper mâché planters are entirely made of recyclable materials, except for the glue.
Make chair fidgets out of old tees.
Make chair fidgets using old T-shirts to give them a new lease on life. This is made with a simple braid technique, and your children will enjoy assisting you.
Settle in a recycling bin made of aluminum cans.
Children can collaborate to build an aluminum-can recycling facility. Watch the video above for step-by-step instructions on using Recycle Rally to make recycling enjoyable and rewarding for your students.
Make fairy dwellings.
Aren’t these the most adorable Earth Day crafts you’ve seen before? Ordinary plastic bottles are transformed into fairy homes using paint, cutters, adhesive, and real or fake greenery.
Make a large scaled upcycled art wall.
This is a fantastic recycled wall work of art. Blogger Art Bar’s motivation is fantastic. Set it up on a board backing and allow kids to add to it, paint on it, and create with it during free time throughout the day.
Make your games.
Bottle caps can be used in a game of tic-tac-toe. They can also be used to make checkers. This would be an excellent activity for a maker space. Give your children a few reused items and challenge them to build games with them!
Transform old magazines into artistic pieces.
We like how this recycled magazine cut-paper art project can be adapted for elementary students or used to motivate high school students to make more complicated art.
Build beautiful terrariums.
A bottle is transformed into a museum-worthy terrarium and a home for an environmental science project. For flourishing plastic bottle terrariums, include activated charcoal and moss.
Set up an automatic planter that waters itself.
With this hands-on construction on a self-watering planter, your classroom lessons on plant life, photosynthesis, and water saving will be boosted. What is the foundation? As seen in this video from Recycle Rally, a good ol’ big plastic bottle.
Make flowers out of cut water bottles.
Water bottle flowers made from upcycled bottles are a simple craft that can be made from your recycling bin with a little paint.
Give a hoot about these newspaper owls.
They find their spirit animal when old newspapers are repurposed into newspaper owls. To bring them to life, you need markers, watercolors, and pieces of paper.
Make a plastic bottle recycling can.
Water bottles, as well as your children, come together to create this water bottle recycling center. This project achieves a win-win situation by combining teamwork and environmental stewardship.
Get creative with cardboard.
Cardboard is one of the simplest and least expensive materials available. Gather a large quantity and challenge your children to create amazing works of art. You never know what they’ll think of next.
