Paper Christmas Tree

Wobbly Paper Christmas Trees

The final instalment of our five days of Christmas brings you these adorable paper Christmas Trees.
Brief Description: Using a simple paper rolling technique you will learn how to make this adorable Christmas tree decoration

Keywords: wrap, roll, coil, cone, spiral, motion, Christmas, tree, sparkle, Glitter, Winter, festival, celebration

Materials Needed: Paper, Pritt Stick, a ruler, embellishments, scissors

Instructions:

• Select the paper you are going to use to make your tree. This can be coloured paper, paper that has been prepared by the children i.e. drawn, marbled etc, wrapping paper, news paper etc

• Place a ruler at the corner of the pieces of paper, carefully flip the ruler over so that you are rolling the paper tightly around the ruler.

Make sure you have an equilateral triangle at the corner of the paper before you start rolling

• Make sure you pull the ruler our slightly if using a 30cm ruler or you will wrap the ruler in the paper making the task difficult.

• When you have rolled all the paper add a dab of glue on the top corner, fold down to secure. Remove the ruler from the paper.

Make sure you add plenty of glue in the corner to ensure the  paper does not unfold

• This will produce a thin rolled piece of paper that you will use to make your tree and base unit.

Once you have rolled you paper run the ruler over the top to flatten the paper

• Make 10 green rolls of paper and 10 red rolls of paper

• When you have got all ten pieces you need to coil them together to make a large spiral shape. Start off with one strip and roll into a spiral as tightly as you can, secure the end with a piece of glue.

Once again add lots of glue each time you add a new strip of paper, this will give you a stringer structure

• Continue to add the remaining nine strips of paper until you have a coil. It is important to keep this coil as tight as possible.

Your coil needs to be nice and tight but not too tight that you cannot move the sections

• Lay a piece of green paper on the desk in a landscape position. Very carefully roll this as tightly as you can to form a straw like shape. Secure the edge with some glue. This will make the pole for the tree to rest on.

Roll a piece of A4 paper to make your stand for your wobbly tree

• Repeat the process of making a coil as shown above using the green strips, but this time add the central pole (the strawlike tube from point 9) and wrap the red strips around the central pole. Add each strip as above to create a coil. This will form the base and stand for your tree shape.

Wrap red paper around the straw nice and tight as above

Wobbly Christmas tree stand

• Carefully, using your thumbs, push out the centre of your green coil, you should start to form a cone shape. Keep pushing until you create the desired shape.

The coil pushed out to make your wobbly tree

• Once the cone is at the correct size, gently place this onto of the central beam to create your wobbly tree.

The finished trees

• Embellish with glitter, sequins, beads etc

Differentiation:

Key stage 1: Instead of using a ruler, Key Stage 1 pupils could roll the paper with their hands to make the strips for the tree. These can then be stapled together with adults help to create a cone shape, coiling and stapling as described above. Children can then decorate or paint the pieces.

Key Stage 2: Explore what happens if you use 20 strips or more, How big can you make your tree?

Gifted and Talented: Explore what else you can make using this technique, What happens if you put two cone shapes together or inside each other? What happens if you use a slightly thicker ruler? What happened if you shorten the support beam?  

if you have enjoyed these crafts and would like to find out more about children or adult art classes please contact Lisa Smith at the_laboratory@hotmail.co.uk