This is an easy art project that works those fine motor skills. All you need is some glue and an excess of yarn or string. If your child is old enough, allow him to cut the string himself. That step allows them to have more ownership over the process and final product.
You can use string, yarn, twine, ribbons -- whatever you have on hand. If you want to be really frugal, keep ribbons that come on gift-wrapped packages and save them for this project.
If your child can use scissors, let them cut up pieces - or if they have trouble, offer pre-cut sections in a variety of lengths. After cutting up the string, kids can squirt out glue in lines, swirls, shapes or blobs. (Let them use as much as they want! Glue is cheap.) They can press the string along the glue lines.... or whatever they want, really.
Some kids (not mine, for some reason) might like to use the string or yarn to make pictures... but I wouldn't encourage or suggest it, just let them explore.
sunnymama says
I like this idea a lot! I also your suggestion to just let them explore 🙂
Jenny says
CJ loves to cut, and she loves glue, so I may have to give this a try. It's always interesting to give her free reign with glue- the last time I tried that, she lost interest in sticking anything onto the glue, and ended up pretending it was frosting.
kathy says
We did an adaptation of this with VBS. We used balloons sprayed with pan spray, put them in a bowl and then dipped long strands of yarn into glue and covered half of the balloon. Let the balloon dry over night. Then we popped the balloons the next day. And the kids took home a yarn bowl.
Erica says
Great idea!