Making bird feeders is a great way to interest kids in natural sciences and keep their hands busy. And winter is the perfect season for this craft since food is more scarce and birds are likely to visit your feeders in high numbers.

In addition to helping teach science, bird watching provides an opportunity to teach reading, writing, and math skills. Provide books so kids can read about the bird species they spot. Have your children practice writing by recording the different birds that visit their feeders in a birding journal. Practice math skills by keeping track of the number of birds that visit each day and adding up the numbers at the end of the week.

This easy project is great for teaching fine motor skills to small children.

You’ll need:

To make a cheerio bird feeder , have the children thread the cheerios onto the pipe cleaners, leaving about an inch of space on each end of the pipe cleaner.

Twist the ends of two pipe cleaners together to make a circle, then lay the third pipe cleaner across the middle of the circle and twist the ends to secure. Tie a string to the place where the pipe cleaners join, and use that to hang the feeder outside.

This simple project is fast and easy for a large or small group of kids.

You’ll need:

Have kids cover the pine cones in peanut butter or vegetable shortening. This part is messy, so have kids wear aprons and cover work surfaces with newspaper or plastic sheets.

Next, have kids roll the pine cones in trays of bird seed. Tie a string around each pine cone and hang outside.

This craft works for a variety of ages, but younger children will need more assistance with getting the suet mixed up.

You’ll need:

Start with the suet, lard, shortening, or peanut butter at room temperature. Lets kids stir in the other ingredients a few cups at a time. This mixture will become very thick, so they may need help mixing up the end product.

Cover work surface with wax paper and roll the mixture out with a rolling pin until it’s about an inch thick (you can go thicker or thinner depending on your cookie cutters). Have children cut shapes out of the mixture and place them on a cookie sheet.

Poke holes in the tops of the cookies using a skewer or thin dowel rod. Freeze the cookies. Once they’re solid, take them out of the freezer and thread a string through the holes. Hang feeders outside and wait for the birds to show up.

The post Simple Crafts: 3 Bird Feeders Crafts For Kids appeared first on Pebblecreek Montessori.