Decorating with spiders

Decorating with spiders

Builds on: Hand eye coordination, fine motor skills and gross motor skills.  

I love how just decorating the house can  elicit so much laughter from kids. It's as simple as a bag of spiders, a bag of cotton webbing and double sided tape from the dollar store.

What you'll need:

1 bag of cotton webbing

1 bag of 100 black and orange spiders

Double sided tape

2 bowls

What to do:

I like to divide the spiders into two bowls equally and set one aside for later before we do anything. After hanging the webbing on the walls and corners of the house outside I give the kids the double sided tape with one of the bowls of spiders and show them how to put the double sided tape on to the bottom of the spiders. Sit with them and help since working with double sided tape can be frustrating.

Once they've all been taped we take to the front door sticking them everywhere. I of course get the high parts while both Hoots and Roos get the middle and lower parts of the door. It doesn't take long for the kids to start giggling because it always seems that about half of the spiders like to pop off once they've been placed. While the kids continue to place spiders I scoop up the escapees and re-tape them for the kids to try again. The extra stubborn ones get set aside for the next part. 

When all of the spiders from the first bowl have been placed on the door it's time for the webs. I generally will place them about 5-6 feet up depending on throwing strength. I place the bowl of spiders on the floor and tell the kids that they have to get all of the spiders to stick. The plastic spiders legs are just thin enough and the webbing is just fine enough that even a weakly thrown spider can stick if it touches. The fun part is watching the spiders fall back down on the kids when they don't stick.

When you're done you have a spooky decorated house that the kids can be proud of.

Web in the night

Builds on: creativity and fine motor skills

This is an oldy but goody that I remember doing in school as a kid without the cool stickers. Great for Halloween and bug themes; kids really enjoy the spider web reveal in the end and then trying to make their own reveal designs.

What you'll need:

watercolors
a jar of water

paint brushes

white crayon

white paper

foam stickers

What to do:

Use the white crayon to draw a spider web on to the white paper. Because it's white on white it can be hard to see while you're drawing so hold the paper against a window while it's light out to make it easier to see the marks made by the crayon. 

Put everything out on the activity table and tell the kids that there is a something hidden on the paper that can only be seen when they paint the night sky. Let the kids pick their own colors  Once they reveal the first few lines see if they can guess what it is. If they haven't figured out what it is by the time the whole thing is uncovered start giving hints until they finally get it. Halloween paintings get stars, moons and ghost stickers while bug themes painting would get puffy bug stickers once the paint is dry.

 

This is a great activity to have planned for a babysitter on date night or for a quick family activity just before bed.

 

Give your kids creative license over their own work. If this is how they want night to be look, let it happen and build up their confidence by supporting their choice.

Extra resources:

If you're looking for more activities involving spider webs follow the links to some of these great ideas on our favorite blogs. 

The Very Busy Spider by Eric Carole- Bug themed reading

Halloween Orb Spider Web Craft

Itsy Bitsy Spider