I love Halloween and I love decorating. I was so thrilled that I was back to work as a preschool teacher just in time for the fun holidays :) This bulletin board is super easy and it gets the kids involved in decorating the room for Halloween.
Materials:
- Black Butcher Block Paper
- White Construction Paper
- Glue
- Glitter
- Black Sharpie
- Stapler
- White Butcher Block Paper
- Shaving Cream
- Black Paint
Start by covering the bulletin board with white butcher block paper or sheets of white construction paper if you don't have access to butcher block paper. Next, starting in a corner, draw several diagonal lines with a black sharpie to create the base of the spider web then connect them with swoop shaped lines to finish the web.
To create the small spiders on the web, trace the kids hands back to back on white construction paper. Cut out the kids' hands the day before you are going to paint them. Now that they are cut, let them paint them a mixture of shaving cream, Elmer's glue and black paint. Use one part glue to two parts shaving cream then add in paint to get the black color you desire. I let my kids paint the hands with q-tips but a paint brush will work, too.
To make the large spider, start by cutting two large circles out of black paper. Staple the sides of the spider ever 1/2"or so. Leave the top of the circle un-stapled until you stuff it with scrap paper or anything you can find that is light weight (packing peanuts are great, too). Once he is stuffed, staple the top shut and do the same process for his head, just a smaller circle. Now, cut 8 strips of butcher block paper for the legs; 4 long, 4 short (and two for the fangs if you wish). Roll them up length wise so they are 3 dimensional and set them aside until you are ready to assemble the spider.
Use Elmer's glue to create the spots, or any design you wish, on the spider and dust it with glitter. Allow it to dry before you staple it to the bulletin board. Create the eyes by using white and black circles from the left over paper.
Staple the large portion of the body to the bulletin board and continue with the staples until you are sure he is securely up there. Now attach the head and legs the same way, as well as the kids spider hands!
My kids were so excited when they came in the next day and this spider was there to greet them. Happy Halloween, everyone!
The school I work at is having a Halloween door decorating contest, so of course, my first thought was to get the kids involved! They loved making these Q-tip skeleton hands and the white painted ghosts. The contest begins soon and whoever gets the most votes will win a class set of books and a pizza party! Wish us luck!!!
Materials:
- Yellow & Black Butcher Block Paper (or construction paper)
- Orange, White& Black Construction Paper
- Q-tips
- White Paint
- Green Tissue Paper
- Elmer's Glue
- Black Paint Pen
I made the skeleton hands the day before I assembled the door because they require a good amount of Elmer's glue that needs to dry overnight. Allow the kids to trace their hand on a half sheet of black construction paper, some may need extra help with this, but encourage them to try. Use a pencil on the black construction paper so you can see the outline.
Then, allow the kids to coat the hand, generously, with Elmer's glue. Use Q-tips of various sizes and let the kids assemble the 'bones' on their hand. Pre-cut several Q-tips ahead of time; I kept some whole and cut some into halves and thirds. You can account for about 6-7 Q-tips per child.
To make the ghosts, I just taped large sheets of black butcher block paper to the tables and allowed the kids to use white paint to fill in ghost shapes I drew on the paper. Drawing a ghost shape is easy, it's basically a sheet with waves on the bottom :)
These turned out great and I let the kids sprinkle some ghost shimmer (glitter) onto the wet paint. They really shine on the door and the kids love them. I added the faces once they dried with a black paint pen. I'll let each child bring one home when we take them down, as well as the skeleton hand that I labeled so each child can bring their own home!
As for the rest of the door, I googled an image search for a 'haunted house' and drew the shape onto a black piece of construction paper with a regular pencil. I then cut out the windows and doors and taped it to the door and added a yellow moon shape behind it, also in construction paper. The hill was made the same way.
The yellow butcher paper covers two thirds of the door and the green tissue paper, crinkled up, covers the bottom third. The graves were made out of white construction paper, sharpie and a gray crayon. The pumpkins were drawn with sharpie on an orange piece on construction paper and a green piece or curled gift ribbon was taped behind them.
I added the graves, then the kid's skeleton hands on top of the graves...They took a few pieces of rolled up tape each but they are staying up :)
I hope you enjoyed my Halloween door!!! I'm so excited to see if we win the pizza party, I might just buy pizza for my kids anyway...they helped and they deserve it!
Happy Halloween!
