by Rachelle de Bretagne

Created on: January 04, 2011

Using cardboard, such as that used on cereal packets for craft purposes helps to make children aware of recycling but also gives them free materials to make little items suitable for winter decoration. Cereal packets make the ideal strength of cardboard for crafts such as this, since they are easy for a child to cut out with child scissors, and stiff enough to hold their shape. Other card items, such as recycled greetings cards are also useful. It doesn't matter that the cards have writing on them, as during the course of making the snowflake, they will be colored appropriately so that none of this will show. The importance of having one side blank enough to draw on is sufficient, as this is used to create the snowflake design.

Cutting out circles

The children will need circles to work with and these can be of varying sizes, but in pairs, so that two are available in the same size for each snowflake made. Parents can cut these out the day before the project so that the accuracy is assured. The rest can be done by children, but when using scissors it is wise to have an adult present. For older children, a craft knife gives precision cut, and elaborate designs can be used rather than the simpler designs used by smaller children.

Folding and marking

The cardboard cut outs are folded in half. Then a slit is cut from the base of the fold to the middle of the circle. This will be used later to slot both pieces of the snowflake together. Fold the card one more time.

Drawing and cutting the design

The design is drawn on the folded card, but all cut outs should be away from the slot that holds the snowflake pieces together. Supervise children in their first attempts as often they cut into the area which forms the slot. Once the design is drawn, the cutting out stage is fun. As the kids are using recycled materials, it won't be too drastic if they make mistakes. Unfold the cut design to reveal the snowflake and make another similar one.

Slotting the snowflake together.

Before this can be done, the whole folded card needs to be straightened out. It won't matter that there are folds as these will not show on the finished snowflake. Place one slot downward and one slot upward to create a three D snowflake.

Finishing off the snowflakes

There are various methods of finishing snowflakes, though the best are sprayed with snow spray, with added sparkle being produced by gluing on a little glitter. This helps to let the light reflect on the snowflake, and if small children are

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