How to Make Math Animal Crafts With Paper Plates
Learn how to make a fun paper plate farm animal math craft! In this hands-on activity, your child will create animals with different numbers of legs to practice comparing quantities.
Learning Goals
This activity will help your child:
- Count to tell how many are in a group
- Compare groups of objects to determine which has more
- Count, compare and talk about quantity
Materials
- Paper plates (or other round objects like lids, paper bowls or pom poms)
- Construction paper and/or pipe cleaners
- Markers or crayons
- Glue
- Index cards
- Googly eyes (optional)
Step-by-Step Instructions
1. Make a spider!
- Did you know spiders have eight legs and eight eyes? Use a paper plate for the spider’s body. Color it purple with crayons or markers.
- Cut out eight construction paper strips for the legs or use eight pipe cleaners. Glue the legs to the sides of the paper plate.
- Cut out a small circle for the head and draw eight eyes on it (or you can use googly eyes). Attach the spider’s head to the paper plate body with glue.
- Bonus! Punch a hole on the paper plate and tie a string to hang your spider from its web!
2. Make a pig!
- Use a paper plate colored pink for the pig’s body.
- For the legs, cut four hearts out of construction paper. Glue two legs to the bottom front of the paper plate and two legs to the bottom back of the paper plate.
- Cut two triangles out of construction paper for the ears and glue them to the top of the paper plate.
- Cut a round pig snout out of construction paper and draw on two ovals for the nostrils. Glue it onto the paper plate.
- Draw two eyes or add googly eyes.
- Bonus! Twirl a pipe cleaner, punch a hole on the side of the plate, and insert the pipe cleaner to make a tail!
3. Make a chick!
- Use a paper plate colored yellow for the chick’s body.
- For the wings, cut two semicircles out of construction paper and glue one on each side of the paper plate.
- For the legs, cut two legs out of construction paper. Glue them to the bottom of the plate.
- For the beak, cut a diamond shape out of construction paper and fold it in half to make a triangle. Glue one half to the center of the paper plate.
- Draw two eyes or add googly eyes.
4. Count, compare and talk about quantity. Compare the animals’ legs and order them from most to least legs. Ask your child questions like, "How many legs does the spider have? How many legs does the pig have? Which animal has the most legs? Which animal has more legs than the pig? Which animals have fewer legs than the spider? How many legs are there altogether?"
Keep the Conversation Going
- Make index cards with the numbers 8, 4 and 2. Match the animal to the number of legs. What other animals have two, four and eight legs?
- Compare items around your house. Are there more bowls or plates? Are there more shirts or shoes? Are there more adults or kids? Encourage your child to line up the objects to count them and compare them. Use terms like more, less, greater than, less than and equal to.
Book Suggestion
"Eggs and Legs/Huevos y Patas" by Michael Dahl, Illustrated by Todd Ouren (Ages 3-8)
Children will practice counting by twos in this fun bilingual children’s book.
Corresponding Standards
Common Core State Standards Kindergarten
- CCSS.MATH.CONTENT.K.CC.C.6: Identify whether the number of objects in one group is greater than, less than, or equal to the number of objects in another group, e.g., by using matching and counting strategies.
California Preschool Learning Foundations
Number Sense
- 2.1 Compare, by counting or matching, two groups of up to five objects and communicate "more," "same as," or "fewer" (or "less").
Head Start Early Learning Outcomes Framework
- Goal P-MATH 3. Child understands the relationship between numbers and quantities.
- Goal P-MATH 4. Child compares numbers.
