Diwali paper plate crafts for toddlers

Happy Diwali! Diwali is of course the Festival of Lights, which is mainly celebrated by Hindus, Sikhs and Jains – and in today’s multi-cultural society it’s important to understand the beliefs and celebrations of different religions.

It’s nice for children when they are learning about different events to do some crafts to mark the occasion, so I decided to do something with my daughter. At her nursery last year she came home with some Diwali pictures she had made; I don’t know what they did this year as we sometimes don’t get her artwork until after the event (pictures are displayed on walls for instance) so chose to make paper plate lanterns at home.

This is a very simple idea and one you can adapt according to the age of the child and whatever you have in the house. All you need are paper plates – or circles cut out of card!

We chose to use crayons to colour our paper plates in bright colours; you could also use paints, or decorate them with stickers, cut out coloured shapes or torn pieces of tissue paper. My daughter is only two so we stuck to the basics but you could make these very detailed and ornate!

I folded each one in half so they would stand up, and added a flame shape cut out of cardboard (glued on to the back of each plate), which we had also coloured in. We stood them on our windowsill – we live at the end of a cul-de-sac so I don’t think many people will see them, but my daughter seemed quite pleased with her handiwork!