The combination of packing to move (we move into our new home in 2 weeks!!!) and preparation for a busy holiday season means that we have moved to being a disposable, paper plate loving family. Dishwashing with our preschoolers is not as feasible as it has been in the past. Hefty must have known the phase of life we are in right now as they sent a big box of their super styling Waverly paper supplies to our house. Not only are paper plates great for eating, but also for learning and playing. Here are bunch of different ways we have been having fun with our new disposable toys (aka plates).
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Build and learn with a paper plate clock. We made ours with paper plates, pipe cleaners and post-it note numbers. Take a pen and poke a hole in the middle of the plate. Bend the pipe cleaner in half and stuff it through the hole part of the way and secure it. Then use the post-its to have your child practice putting numbers in order. They are easy to remove and reinforce learning!
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Other Fun Ideas of things you can do to learn and play with paper plates:
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Fun masks. Cut a paper plate in half and decorate with feathers, glitter, sequins, whatever! Attach ties to the sides and have lots of pretending fun.
Make giant letter cards – play frog and leap from lily pad to lily pad or play letter hopscotch with the plates.
Make Emotion Faces. Make a crazy face with crazy hair, or a sad face, even a wacky one! My kids love art and craft projects.
Make a pretend pizza using scraps of construction paper as your “pizza” ingredients.
Frisbie. Staple several plates together to make sure you have enough weigh to throw them. For extra “pizazz” add a few ribbons to the sides. Have fun throwing and twirling.
Tamborine. Staple two plates together with a few dried beans or beads inside. Viola – a fun musical instrument!
Play Stop and Go. Use a paper plate to create a stop sign. One child holds the sign while the others run around (or crawl if you don’t want them breaking anything). When the sign says “stop”, stop.
Cut into “Wheels” to create a Word Wheel that you can turn to read new words.
Create either a paper plate frog, a bird or a watermelon. There are tons of creative ways you can fold and decorate paper plates!
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Have you had fun with paper plates? Do you do anything besides eating with them? I’d love to hear about it!
About Rachel
What a pretty paper plate clock!
When my kids were younger, we made new years countdown clocks with punches at the numbers with curling ribbon. The kids listed their top 12 memories of the year : ) It’s so cute to go back and see what they were thinking back then!
Great post! Bookmarked for later use!
I never thought to use paper plates for frisbees. My children will get a kick out of this.
You must be so busy! Moving isn’t always fun but it does stretch your creativity where the children are concerned doesn’t it?
We used to always draw a face on the plate, then use a hole punch to cut a tiny hole in the mouth. We’d take a yellow piece of yarn, thread it through, and then tie knots on the ends. When we pulled the yarn, it looked like the face was eating spaghetti. As kids, we thought it was so funny.
I just bought a bunch of those Hefty plates for a party I’m hosting! Now I have to resist your crafts so I can actually use them for the party. LOL But if we have any leftover, I”ll be headed to your site for some inspiration. great ideas!
Not sure that I have any creative ideas for fun things to do with paper plates, but I do have a suggestion since your family has upped its disposable products use. Consider using biodegradable disposable dishware. Not only can these products be composted which reduces the waste in our landfills, but unlike their petroleum-based counterparts which are toxic, biodegradable dishware is made for plant materials and is toxic-free.