How to Make a Puffin's Beak in Kindergarten

Puffins have very distinctive beaks.

Puffins use their colorful beaks to catch and store fish, carrying up to 10 fish at a time back to their nest. They also use their beaks to dig burrows. Over the winter, the bright colors of a puffin's beak fade, but in spring the brighter orange shades return, ready to attract a mate. Puffins' beaks grow larger as they grow older. Make puffin beaks for kindergarten children to wear while they sing songs about puffins and listen to puffin stories.

Things You'll Need

• Small paper plate
• Scissors
• Pencil
• Acrylic craft paint
• Paint brush
• Split brass fasteners
• Thin elastic
• Construction paper
• White craft glue

Instructions

1. Cut the paper plate into four quarters. Give two quarters to each child to make each puffin beak.

2. Draw lines in pencil on each quarter for the children to use as a guide when painting the beaks. Puffin beaks are divided into bands of color. Draw a straight line from the center of the right-angled corner to the outside curved edge, dividing the quarter into two segments. Draw two curved parallel lines across the middle part of each segment. Have the lines about half an inch apart, arcing from the edges of the beak sections towards the central line.

3. Have the children use acrylic craft paint to color the beaks with black, orange and red. The pointed-end areas are red, the narrow curved bands are orange, and the area toward the curved part of each section is black.

4. Fold each quadrant along the central line. Lay the two quadrants with the pointed ends together to form a beak shape. Overlap the two curved corners at each side and join them with a split brass fastener in each, folding the fasteners out flat inside the beak.

5. Secure a length of thin elastic to each side, tying it around the head of the split fastener. Make sure it is long enough to reach comfortably around the child's head.

6. Have the child cut fish shapes from construction paper and glue them to the inside edge of the puffin's beak with white craft glue.

Tips & Warnings

• Make sure that the child can breathe comfortably with the beak mask in place. If necessary, cut an air hole in the underside of the beak.