Homeschooling ideas: craft activities for the week ahead

A craft a day keeps the boredom at bay: well, it does in our house at least! So while we're going to do our best to survive another round more traditional homeschooling, we're also adding a f un craft activity to the schedule every day too. Here are five arty ideas to get you started with for next week: googly eyes at the ready, people!

Monday: String painting

There's something surprisingly therapeutic about shmooshing a load of string into paint and then dragging it around a crisp white page. Kids will love this colourful, artistic activity by the TinkerLab. Warning: it's gonna get messy...

Tuesday: Salt dough

There's so much fun to be had with this dough-tally awesome salt dough recipe by BBC Good Food (if you can get hold of some elusive flour!). Once the dough is made, shape it however you like, bake for three hours and then get busy painting your salty masterpieces. We've made a hand print, some stars and a salt dough man so far!

Wednesday: Peg worry dolls

It's no surprise that kids are feeling a little bit anxious right now in these strange and crazy COVID-19 times, so took our mind off stuff by making a wee worry doll recently. The idea is that children tell their worries to these dolls and then place them under their pillow. When they wake the next day, the Guatemalans (where these dolls originated from) believe that the doll will have taken away the worries and replaced them with knowledge. Whether it works or not, it's a fun and easy craft to try: we like these instructions by Creative Child (which are a bit fancier than the ones we made. Ours - pictured above - were whipped up using a peg, some string, felt tips, pipe cleaners and googly eyes!)

Thursday: Fork painting

Don't break out your best silverware for this one, but fork painting makes for a rather lovely craft activity that kids of all ages will enjoy. Pop over to Super Simple for some great, super simple ideas.