This panda bear craft came about because my son wanted to make a puppet to have a puppet show, and I wanted to do a panda bear craft because we’d never done one and I get requests quite often. I love using shortcuts like cupcake liners if I have them on hand, but you can just use white paper, too. Puppets make great preschool crafts because their usefulness extends past their creation and spark my favorite type of play – pretend play!
How to make a panda craft
- Gather your materials. You will need a paper bag, some white cupcake liners or paper, black paper, black marker, googly eyes, glue, and scissors.
- Start by having your child color the paper bag, a little, a lot it won’t make a difference to the result. I have been trying to fit more pen/pencil/marker time for my son because we are working on his tripod grip, and I am not a fan of sitting down and forcing a skill at this age. However, if I can use a fraction of art time to practice, it’s a bonus!
- They cut out a nose( which I forgot and had to do after I took this picture), 2 ears, and 2 eye patches for the panda using black paper.
- Next, glue a cupcake liner on the main part of the bag for the panda’s belly.
- Glue the 2nd liner on the folded bottom ( now the top) for the face.
- Time for more glue – for the eyes.
- Add the eyes. You can see crafts are so useful for things like fine motor skills not just killing time with your kids!
- Add the ears and nose too!
- Let dry and play.
Books
Dinner at the Panda Palace by Stephanie Calmenson is a great book. I grabbed it only because of the title, but I found a gem. My son and I both loved it and had a blast reading it. The story is about a restaurant and the people, or animals, that enter the restaurant in ever-enlarging groups. The text is rhyming and well-written. My son loved counting each group that came in, figuring out after a few that each group was one animal larger. It was a great opportunity to practice one-to-one correspondence as he counted on each page. There was also a great message about there always being room for one more when all the chairs were taken, and a mouse came knocking, wondering if he could eat too!
Panda Bear, Panda Bear, What Do You See?by Eric Carle is a sequel to the much loved Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See? . What I appreciate about this book isn’t just the vibrant illustrations or the repetitive text that encourages children to recite it with the reader. It’s that the book is a great intro to endangered animals. The book introduces readers to animals like the giant panda, bald eagle, and giant sea turtle, which are all endangered. When my son was little he liked the repetition, colors and rhythm the test provides, now that he is older reading this book sparks talks about taking care of the earth and all her inhabitants.
JDaniel4's Mom says
This is so cute! Your son did a great job!
Jane says
This is so adorable. I’ll have to give it a try today. Thanks!
Jen says
Cute! I need to go purchase a tub of googly eyes so I’ll have them on hand for stuff like this 🙂
Maya says
This is adorable Al! We created a paper bag lion last week 🙂
http://blog.memetales.com/2010/09/friendship-theme-craft-lion-with-paper-bag/
Melissa K says
Just thought I would let you know that this was accidently placed in paper crowns instead of pandas
admin says
Thanks for noticing!
Denise Erdman says
This is hooking to look great… I think I’ll use some coffee filters though… what do you think? I’ll be using a size #4 bag for preschoolers, but a #2 for toddlers – maybe they would be better off with the cc liners…