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Do you think you could flap as fast as a hummingbird? Pay homage to one of nature’s coolest flyers with this easy hummingbird puppet! Whether you're more interested in art, biology, or puppeteering, this activity is sure to please.

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Gather your materials.

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Cut out the shape of a hummingbird body.

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Cut out wings, tail feathers, and belly feathers.

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Glue paper bird parts together.

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Cut a small split in a thin straw and cut a long split in a thicker star.

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Slot the thin straw on the hummingbird’s belly, under its wings, and tape each side.

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Slide the thick straw over the thin straw and push all the way up to the split.

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Tape each side of the split thick straw on a wing.

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Push the bottom of the thin straw up to flap the wings.

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Hummingbird Puppet

Hummingbirds are the only birds that can fly backward, upside down, and hover completely still in midair. Their trick comes down to a unique shoulder joint that lets their wings rotate in a full figure-eight motion. Instead of just flapping up and down like other birds, a hummingbird sweeps its wings back and forth, generating lift on both the forward and backward strokes! To stay airborne, their tiny wings beat up to 80 times per second, moving so fast that they create a high-pitched humming sound. All that constant flapping requires massive energy, which is why hummingbirds sip nectar almost continuously to keep their high-speed engines running.

Glue Stick

Scissors

Tape

colored paper

Straws (thick and thin)

Hummingbird Puppet

homemade craft

household craft

playdate activities

family activity

toy design

By building simple levers out of paper, brads, and paper clips, you can create a whole flock of mechanical flapping birds!

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Print out the flying bird toy&nbsp;<a href="https://s3-us-west-1.amazonaws.com/images.kiwicrate.com/printables/KiwiCrate_FlyingBirdToy.pdf">template here</a>.Your paper color will be the base color of your bird!

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Cut out the template along the black lines. Use a hole punch to punch out the circles.

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Fold the two flaps back along the orange lines.

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Overlap the two top tabs so the blue area is covered. Secure it with a piece of tape.

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Grab a wing and align the hole closer to the center of the wing to the holes on the body flap. Use a brad to attach the wing in place. Repeat on the other side.

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Loop some string through the holes on the wing tips. Then, tie the string. Make sure not to over tighten the loop or the wings may tear!

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Add a face to your bird! We cut out and glued on some eyes, a beak and feet. When we did this project with our kid testers, they created some aliens and little monsters. Get creative and see what creature you create!

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Add a paper clip on each wing tip. This will bring the wing back down after each flap.

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Place a string through the top two holes and tie. 

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It's time to start flying! Hold onto the top loop and gently pull down on the bottom string. If your wings are having trouble dropping back down, check to make sure your brads are not too tight and that your paperclips are still in place.

colored cardstock

brads

string

Glue

paper clips

hole punch

Flying Bird Toy

recycled

recycled craft materials

reused craft materials

Earth Day crafts

Owls are all the craze these days, so my daughter thought it would be fun to create owl puppets using brown paper bags. This is something that your child will sure have a "hoot" making. 

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She created a beak by cutting a large triangle, then she glued it.  

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Then we cut out 2  large circles for the eyes and then a slightly smaller circle to be glued in the larger circle. We then used a black marker to make the pupils.

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Then we cut and glued an oval for the belly

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Next, we cut out the wings and glued them to the back of the bag.

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Simple as that. She sure had a hoot making and playing with this owl!

brown paper lunch bag

construction paper

scissors

glue stick

colored pencils

Brown Paper Bag Owl Puppet

tree

nature crafts

This bird feeder was a lot of fun for my two little ones to make. Seeing the birds fly down and grab their lunch off the pine cones made for an exciting morning in our house.

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When we have done this in the past I made the mistake of giving the kids the entire jar of sun butter. (What I got back was a jar of sun butter mixed with bird seed.) This time I gave them a scoop in a small bowl to use.

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They started out by spreading the butter all over the pine cone and into the crevices. 

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Next each child added a little bit of bird seed to their paper bag. I advise a bag per child because this is usually the highlight of the project to most kids!

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The pine cones covered in sun butter went right into the bag.

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Shake, shake, shake!! You can see why it is a favorite step for my kids.

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When we opened the bags we pulled out our beautiful bird feeder. I tied some strong yarn around the top and hung it from a tree in the yard. We watched as many little birds visited our bird feeders. It was fun to see them balance on the moving pine cones.

pine cones

peanut butter (or sun butter)

bird seed

paper bag

yarn

Pinecone Bird Feeder

learning activity

at-home learning

learning game

craft

useful craft project

alphabet

Tweet Tweet! Feed the baby bird his worms as you practice letters and letter sounds. 

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To make the baby bird, cut a circle and two triangles out of construction paper. 

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Cut out worm shapes from construction paper and write a letter on each worm. I wrote capital and lowercase letter on each worm. 

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Tape the bird to the top of your tissue box, leaving a small opening in the bird's mouth. (Optional: cut a hole in the bottom of the box, so you can get the letters out later. Otherwise, you'll have to take the bird off to start the game over.)

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I told Natalie, "This baby bird is so hungry and needs you to feed him some worms. Say the letter (or letter sound) on each worm before you feed it to him." Because she loves babies and animals she was excited to jump in and give it a try. 

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She loved feeding the baby bird so much that she did it three times in a row. What a great game for working with letters! 

tissue box

Construction Paper

marker

Baby Bird Alphabet Game

ornaments

Christmas

Christmas tree

This winter, our family wanted to create festive gifts for our feathered friends. Using a simple recipe, we created these holiday shaped bird seed ornaments to hang from our trees outside. My kids loved welcoming our neighborhood birds to stop by for a quick treat!

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Mix a packet of gelatin with Â¼ cup of warm water in a bowl. Stir it until the gelatin powder is dissolved. Allow it to cool and stir in the birdseed until it is all mixed together.

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Cut your straws to be about 1â�� in length. Only one cut piece of straw is needed for each ornament.

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Cover your work surface with wax paper. Place your cookie cutters down and begin filling them with the bird seed mixture. As you fill the cookie cutter, hold a piece of straw at the top of the ornament. Fill the seed mixture around, but not inside, the straw. Let the ornaments dry overnight.

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Gently push the ornaments from the cookie cutters and thread the hole with ribbon. Go outside to find a tree and hang up your new bird seed ornament!

bird seed (3/4 cup)

warm water (1/4 cup)

wax paper

gelatin (one packet)

cookie cutters

ribbon

straws

bowl

spoon

Bird Seed Ornament

painting

pretend play

summer crafts

indoor project

These crazy bird puppets are outrageous and silly...and the more you use your imagination, the more personality your puppet will have!

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My children and I love these crazy birds.  Trevelyn goes for serious, and Maddie goes for everything she can get her hands on!  I love that there is no wrong way to do it!

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You'll use two and a half paper plates.  For the third plate, cut a paper plate in half then trim off about 0.5" from your cut edge. Fold the two uncut plates in half and crease them;  fold them so that the "bowl" is facing outward, not inward.

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Next, we chose our paint colors... I was thinking that they'd each want two or maybe three colors... Madeleine was committed to using more like eight!
Paint the underside of two paper plates; the third (half) plate, you can either paint or leave as is. 

21 at-home bird projects for kids

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