Leprechaun Trap Ideas for St. Patrick’s Day

February 13, 2023 by Sarah White Leave a Comment

Building a leprechaun trap is a fun and easy STEM activity for kids in early elementary school. You can do this at home or in the classroom.

What is a leprechaun trap?

The idea is that you build some kind of contraption that includes a box or a basket that could hold a leprechaun, then you add some kind of bait under the trap like gold coins, chocolate, drawings of rainbows, etc.

You leave it out overnight before St. Patrick’s Day, and the next day the trap will be sprung. The leprechaun got away but they may have left treats, or done a little mischief in the room (or both!).

One year in my daughter’s class the leprechaun left washable paint footprints all over!

If you need some inspiration for building your own leprechaun traps, there are so many great ideas online. The key elements, as laid out in this post from The Best Ideas for Kids, include:

Bait
A ladder if needed to climb into the trap
Decorations including shamrocks and rainbows
Something to trap the leprechaun in like a box, bottle or hat

That post has some cute and really easy ideas that would be great for younger kids. If you want something more elaborate, check out the ideas at Happiness is Homemade (I particularly love the Lego leprechaun house, which wouldn’t even have to be a trap).

Artsy Mama has a great upcycled leprechaun trap made from things in the recycling bin.

Lolly Jane has another fun roundup of leprechaun trap crafts. One of my favorites is this top hat trap from The Suburban Soapbox, which is mostly made out of poster board and construction paper, so it’s a pretty low-budget option that is still really cute.

Have you ever made a leprechaun trap? I’d love to hear about the design you made and what happened when the trap was sprung!

Have you read?

Pumpkin Worksheets for Kids

This time of year is a great time for pulling out all the apple and pumpkin themed worksheets to add a little seasonal fun to your learning. Let’s take a look at some fun pumpkin themed worksheets for the classroom or homeschool.

If you want some pumpkin printables that are actually about pumpkins, check out the pumpkin life cycle worksheets from 24 Hour Family that include parts of a pumpkin, life cycle, vocabulary, shape and counting activities. Rock Your Homeschool also has a cute printable and foldable life cycle worksheet for the life cycle of a pumpkin that kids can color and put together.

Inspire the Mom has ideas for a pumpkin unit study as well as printables (free with email signup) that include parts of the pumpkin, letter recognition, lesson plans and more. The blog post also includes more ideas for things like pretend play and centers, as well as books and videos with a pumpkin theme you can include in your study.

Do some pumpkin themed color by number with these printable coloring pages from The Artisan Life. Or try your hand at pumpkin I-spy with this printable from The Best Ideas for Kids.

Work on shape recognition and matching with this color, cut and paste activity from Free 4 Classrooms. And get some cutting practice with a pumpkin twist with these worksheets from Simple Everyday Mom.

These last two have a bunch of different fall themed worksheets to choose from, some of which include pumpkins. Willa Bean and Co. has a pumpkin themed alphabet set that includes pumpkins with the letters inside them and sets of upper and lower case letters on seeds you can use for matching.

And Worksheeto has a bunch of fall themed phonics worksheets, including pumpkin sight words with fall themed words and pumpkin letter matching.

For more pumpkin learning fun, see our pumpkin printables for kids and pumpkin STEM activities lists.

What is a leprechaun trap?

Have you read?

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