Save your extra wrapping paper!

Preschool teachers are well known for saving everything, so it should come as no surprise that I’m telling you to save your left over wrapping paper.  There are so many things that you can use it for in the classroom, here are a few ideas:

• Create artwork on top of the wrapping paper design. Most wrapping paper is shiny, so it would be interesting to see how paint, crayons, and glue react to this surface. It would also be interesting to see if the children cover the design, or if they incorporate it into their art. 
• Cut wrapping paper into smaller pieces and use it for collages. I always had collage materials available, and wrapping paper is an easy, economical way to incorporate colored pieces that children can use as mosaics, or in many cases just to soak up all that glue. 
• Staple a stack of white paper between two pieces of wrapping paper to create little books.  There is something about a tiny notebook that children cannot resist.  A stack of these in the writing center would be a great way to energize this area of the classroom. 
• Cut it up! I was always looking for something to use for cutting practice.  wrapping paper is perfect for beginning cutters because it’s so thin. Children who have better scissor skills can cut out the pictures from the wrapping paper.
• Laminate a few pieces and create a search and find.  Does any of your wrapping paper have small pictures, words, or letters? Laminate pieces of these designs and create a card to go with each, asking if children can find specific characters, images, or letters.
• Make math counters. Cut out images from your wrapping paper and laminate so that you can use them for counters. Wrapping paper is perfect for this because the designs repeat themselves, so there are plenty of similar images to use.