Toddler Craft Ideas: Convert Toilet Rolls into Toys

Toilet paper rolls are common household items. Instead of throwing them away, use them as craft materials for your toddler! Read on as we put together some simple craft ideas for you to try out with your toddler, and give these toilet rolls a new lease of life.

Toilet paper rolls can be repurposed and given a new life.

Maracas

Maracas are percussion instruments created by placing beans, pebbles or similar objects into hollow containers. As both you and your toddler embark on creating your very own maracas, explain that percussion instruments are used to create a rhythm or maintain a beat. Show them some videos of maracas performances to enable them to visualise how maracas look like.

To make your own maracas, first, seal one end of a toilet paper roll with paper and some glue around the sides before placing a handful of green or red beans into the container. Afterwards, seal the other end with paper and glue again, and there you have it! Your very own maracas!

Your toddler can personalise his or her maracas with crayons, embellishments or some paint. When it is all completed, put on some music and shake the maracas along to the beat!

This activity encourages your toddler to express his or her creativity through art and music.

Binoculars

Line two toilet paper rolls side by side and secures them together using double-sided tape or glue. You can prepare some stickers for your child to decorate their binoculars with before embarking on a scavenger hunt in the neighbourhood.

Though these paper binoculars don’t have lenses, they aren’t purely just for show. As your toddler stares through the binoculars, it narrows their field of vision and helps them focus on faraway objects.

Consider indulging them in play-pretend by becoming adventurers for an afternoon. Take them outdoors with their handmade binoculars. You can reinforce learning by researching the species of birds and critters spotted along the trip.

Create these cute cardboard monsters with some craft paper and toilet rolls!

Cardboard Characters

The materials required for this project are glue (stick glue is great for little hands with a minimal mess), some coloured paper and toilet rolls. Choose a base colour and wrap it around the roll, add some circles for eyes and paper at the top for hair. Your toddler can practise his or her cutting skills whilst grooming the character’s “hair”.

In order to enhance the activity and make it more memorable, model the characters after a storybook that your toddler is familiar. Encourage your toddler to name the characters that he or she has created too!

You won’t be able to tell the time with these watches!

Watches

Guide your toddler to snip a toilet paper roll into four pieces width-wise with child-safe scissors before pasting a drawn-on clock face of paper on each of the four loops. Toddlers have small wrists which fit perfectly into toilet paper rolls. Play-pretend watches are excellent for teaching them how to read analogue watches and clocks. Use this opportunity to teach them how to differentiate between the minute and hour hands.

Exclusively reusing recyclable material for craftwork as opposed to buying new materials from the stores not only saves the environment but pushes you and your child to think of alternative uses for everyday objects.

Leave us a comment to show us your toilet paper roll craft!

Baby’s First Sensory Bin: 10 Household Items that Offers Endless Fun

Babies are intuitively curious.

By engaging their senses and offering them with an opportunity to explore, babies learn to make sense of their world.
The importance of sensory play in early childhood acts as a springboard to nurture a baby’s development in a multitude of ways.
Besides offering store-bought toys, how about creating your baby’s first sensory bin with common household items?

What is a sensory bin?

A sensory bin consists of a container with a mix of fillers that offers tactile experience. There’s no right or wrong way to present a sensory bin. As with children, remember safety should always come first – parents should pick items that are safe and suitable for their child.

Go ahead, and let your child lead the play!

For young babies, it is essential to select items that are not choking hazards, and are generally child-friendly. If your child loves putting things in her mouth, be sure to keep sharp objects or tiny items out of the sensory bin.
Sensory bins are versatile and can accommodate ‘dry’ or ‘wet’ play. Add water into the bin and get ready for some splashing fun! There’s always an opportunity to explore the sensory bin during bath times, or in the bathroom for that added water fun.

Benefits of a sensory bin

“envisioned a child’s knowledge as composed of schemas, basic units of knowledge used to organize past experiences and serve as a basis for understanding new ones.
— Jean Piaget, French Psychologist

This sensory play method allows parents to switch around with different fillers every single time! Best of all, the items are not expensive, complicated and do not require batteries. In fact, it’s about upcycling what you already have without buying more.

According to French Psychologist, Jean Piaget, he “envisioned a child’s knowledge as composed of schemas, basic units of knowledge used to organize past experiences and serve as a basis for understanding new ones.”

Learning with simple items that are readily available at home makes it a spontaneous opportunity for your child to observe how these things are also used on a regular day too!

Through this hands-on exploration, here’s what a sensory bin offers young children:

Engage their senses: Multi-sensorial points are simultaneously triggered. Feeling the textured sides of a sponge, looking and listening to the sound when shaking a bottle of water, touching pasta and throwing them into a container, are just some ways your little learner is picking up notes!
Develop practical life skills: Oh that mess! Don’t worry, your child is learning about cause-and-effect. Baby learns to pick up each pasta after the container was overturned, sharpening his fine motor skills as he discovers about pinching clothes pegs, attempts to scoop toilet roll and pasta with the ladle. It’s all about daring to try, baby, and that’s how we hope to nurture our children to be adapt to situations and keep going.
Build cognitive development: Problem-solving skills, reasoning and logic are just some of those areas that your child is working on as he explores the myriad of items in his new sensory bin! Encourage him, if he decides to put all the clothes peg into the resealable bag, or puts pasta into the empty supplement container to turn it into a shaker.
Enhance language and communication skills: As parents involve themselves while children are exploring, this leads to asking questions, exposure to new vocabulary, conversations and more! If baby decides to do a taste test with the sponge, you could even ask him if it was yummy – and go on to explain that sponges are not for eating. Thought process in the works!
Nurture emotional development: Independent play allows child to focus on a task, contributing to self-discovery. Playing with other children offers them with an opportunity to pick up social skills, by learning to cooperate and play together (or fight over!) with items from the sensory bin.
Strengthen social skills and bonds: Through parent-child interaction, or exploring the sensory bin with another child, this presents a new environment to learn about sharing and taking turns. There might be some tears, but it’s entirely expected!

Putting together baby’s first sensory bin

We put together a list of 10 common household items that are affordable, and yet promise to pique baby’s curiosity!

You will need a container to hold these items. Do ensure it is cleaned before offering baby.

Putting together baby’s first sensory bin

- New sponges
- Resealable bag or small plastic bag
- Empty supplement container
- Toilet roll
- Pasta
- Clothes peg
- Shredded paper and envelopes
- Ladle and spoons
- Snack holder
- Water bottles

A little warning though – be prepared for flying pasta, ladles, clothes pegs, toilet rolls… just about anything within baby’s sight! Well, that is pretty expected and all in a day of sensorial fun to observe mummy and daddy’s reactions too!

How can parents be involved during the sensory bin exploration?

Parents can choose to be facilitators or play together with your child at various stages of play. Babies are naturally curious, and exploration allows them to discover new things through experience. You would be surprised how they make sense of these newly discovered items that their little fingers are getting hold of!

Sensory bins offer a variety of adventures within the indoors, and are great for rainy days, or when the child needs to stay home. But that’s no reason why they should be denied of excitement in an unconventional way, as we work towards raising world-ready children who are ready to take on new experiences! Are you and your baby ready for the invitation to play?