Upcycled Snowball Factory STEAM Play

This is such a cute idea! Grab some cardboard boxes, tubes and other materials to make an upcycled snowball factory.

With the printables from Barley & Birch this is an easy project to pull together, or you can use unprinted cardboard and have kids decorate it the way they think a snowball factory might look.

I know my daughter would have spent a ton of time putting this together and playing with it when she was younger, and I’d still play with it! This would be fun to set up in a classroom, too, and let kids decorate and play with the penguins or other animals who live around the factory.

Get all the details and printables from Barley & Birch.

[Photo: Barley & Birch.]

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Summer Reading Printables and Tips for Parents

Holidays are a great time to pull in some themed STEM projects. Even kids who aren’t usually into science can get excited about making a reindeer fly or making a Christmas tree out of 3D shapes. Check out these fun Christmas STEM activities to try in your classroom or at home.

Speaking of making reindeer fly, there are lots of different takes on this engineering challenge. In the instructions from The Educator’s Spin on it, kids make a reindeer from recycled materials, then use a string to make it “fly.” You can also do this with a balloon, like in this version from Team Cartwright.

And that Christmas tree project? That one is from Steamsational, and it calls for making a bunch of 3D triangles you then assemble into a tree. The post includes all the tips you’ll need and a printable template for making the triangles.

Another cute idea from Steamsational is making Santa’s sleigh out of an egg carton. Give kids design challenges such as that Santa must stay in the sleigh, it should be able to move and pull weight. It’s so fun to see what kids come up with.

Science Sparks has a printable book full of Christmas-themed experiments with templates kids can cut out and use to make spinning sleighs, shadow puppets, a paper tube to test how much weight it can hold and more. These activities are really low prep beyond the printing, so they’re great when you need to fill a little time at home or at school.

If you have Legos and jingle bells you can make a simple engineering challenge by having kids build mazes that the bells can roll through. Get the details from Innovation Kids Lab. (And check out this fun book of Lego Christmas ornaments!)

Of course you can also put a Christmas spin on classic STEM activities, like making a baking soda volcano in a plastic or glass ball ornament (Little Bins for Little Hands), red and green magic milk (Fun Learning for Kids), Borax crystal ornaments (Go Science Kids) and more!

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