Salaric

At the Scouts’ Centenary camp there were these little plywood animal shapes with little magnets in the back of them. This activity was really aimed at Cub- and Beaver-aged children, so primary school age but again it appealed to the older age groups too!

I found that I had to paint one to show one group how to paint them. :/

We used water-based washable poster paints so it was important to tell the children beforehand that they had to start with their base colour and let each layer dry, otherwise it would smudge and mix the colours.

The other thing I found is that the paintbrushes children are expected to paint with are really hard to use!

One of my Scouts made this card at the District Centenary Camp, where I found myself stationed in the craft tent. Said scout was feeling a bit off colour so was helping me do crafts. The card itself came from a pack with the window already cut into it. The Scout then cut out the shapes she wanted and glued them onto the back of the window and on the card behind the window to give a lovely 3D effect.

She was aiming at it being a jungle and glued on flowers and bits she found lurking around. She also drew on the brown monkey and the green snake and some of the vegitation. She stuck a foam snail in the corner and then used some foam letters she found to write ‘The Jungle’ on it.

As this particular Scout is only ten, I thought this card was absolutely fantastic! 🙂

It has also given me a few ideas to try with my own card making.

On Centenary Camp one of my Scouts decorated this lovely picture frame. Basically the frames came ready to decorate though they are made out what appears to be thick brown card and brown matt parcel tape with a course brown twine as the hanger.

The man who was running this stall turned up with lots of gems including flowers and butterflies with sticky backs which the kids could just stick straight on to their chosen frames! He also had foam shapes and little fluffy pom-poms. My Scout also used a fine liner pen to draw on the butterflies’ trail as the picture within the frame!

The frames themselves came in a variety of shapes such as circles, squares and hearts!

Again this was an easy but effective activity and the children flocked to it!

At our Scouts Centenary Camp I found myself in the craft tent were they had a fantastic badge maker!

It arrived with lots of shiny metal badges and clear discs to be pressed onto the top. It came with the press and a circle cutter so I was impressed (ie instead of having to try and cut printed circles out with saftey scissors you just put this short sort of cylinder down on the paper and whizz the handle around which I presume moves a blade along the inside, creating a perfect circle).

You give the circles of paper to the kids who decorate it, I used colouring pens and pencils. The design then gets sandwiched between the badge back and the clear plastic disc and then put in the machine. The guy then pushed the handle down and one nice shiny badge came out 🙂

One of my scouts made this shrink keyring. I’ve seen these in the Hindles catalogue but had never seen them in action before – I was quite impressed and the kids loved it!

Equipment:

*Oven

*Split ring keyrings

*Hole punch

*Goggly eyes

*Saftey Scissors

*Colouring Pencils

*Special shrinking plastic

For the younger children we just used pre-made designs which the children coloured in, such as butterflies, snails, bees and other creepy crawlies! For the older children we just had blank sheets which they could draw their own designs on.

It is important that only colouring pencils are used and not felt-tip pens as it is put in the oven for a while.

Once the design is coloured in you cut it out and hole punch it, then you put it in the oven for a minute – I don’t know at what temperature but hopefully that is on the packet!

The plastic shrinks down and thickens, retaining and concentrating the colours. You then attach the keyrings and if you want, glue on the goggly eyes 🙂

This was fun and even I had a go, though I forgot to hole punch mine so it couldn’t be made into a keyring sadly. 🙁