This Stained Glass Happy Birthday World craft was simple and sweet and helped us review that Rosh Hashanah celebrates the birthday of the world! There’s an open-ended process art piece to this craft that allows the kids some extra creativity and flexibility while still connecting it to the recognized symbol of the world, an image of the earth. And if your kids love the feel of tissue paper—or even the sensory addiction of sticky paper—this craft is perfect for them!
What You’ll Need
- Construction paper
- Scissors (or cricut)
- Contact paper
- Blue and green tissue paper
- Dot paints
- Tape
Putting It Together
- Cut a circle outline out of paper. I used my cricut to cut the rings but scissors would work great too!
- Cut two squares of contact paper slightly larger than your circle.
- Cut blue and green tissue paper into squares.
- Cut a triangle out of paper.
- Lay one contact paper square on the table.
- Place the circle ring on top.
- Invite your child to stick green and blue tissue paper to the sticky paper.
- Once finished, place the other square of sticky paper on top, sealing in the stained glass earth. Cut off the excess contact paper around the earth.
- Invite your kiddo to make a birthday hat by using for paints to decorate the paper triangle; tape onto the top of your earth.
- Attach to a window with tape and enjoy seeing your beautiful Stained Glass Happy Birthday World!
Finished & Loving It!
My kids love making suncatchers and stained glass crafts. They are easy and have a fun sensory element with the soft tissue paper. My kids also like touching the sticky paper. There’s definitely opportunities for sensory feedback by touching and poking and working with this type of paper.
In addition to a fun sensory craft, the end result is also so beautiful! The sun shines through the tissue paper and the kids love looking at it on our sliding door. They also really enjoy watching me place the second piece of contact paper on top and sealing everything. A little bit of magic for them to witness!
This craft was so simple but helped guide our discussion about how Rosh Hashanah is about celebrating the birthday of our world. The earth symbol reminds us of our world and the birthday hat of its birthday (of course). As my kindergartener placed each piece of tissue paper he called out “Now I’m adding the water! Now I’m adding land!” He actually called out specific towns, which I thought was so adorable (video on Instagram ;-)). I love how he really understood that this craft was supposed to represent something larger and tangible, like our world.
There are many sweet Rosh Hashanah books that connect this theme of the world’s birthday to Rosh Hashanah. Talking about our world’s creation and celebrating it is a very special part of this holiday season. Yom Hudelet World!
We have a whole page dedicated to the High Holidays, our High Holidays Hub. Check it out! It includes some of the High Holidays activities we do this year, as well as the activities we’ve done in previous years.
And don’t forget our Rosh Hashanah Montessori-Style 3 Part Cards, our Yom Kippur Montessori-Style 3 Part Cards, or the High Holidays Montessori-Style 3 Part Card Bundle, all a wonderful way to introduce High Holidays! And, now we also have all 13 Jewish holidays bundled together in A Year of Jewish Holidays 3 Part Cards.
The following sites are amazing resources for learning more about this holiday:
Chag Sameach!!
*This post may contain affiliate links, which means I may receive a small commission, at no cost to you, if you make a purchase through a link!*
