How To Make Clothespin Airplane for Amelia Earhart

This week the children have been learning about Amelia Earhart, her tenacity, dedication, and spirit. I love sharing bibliographies with young children, especially those that show strong belief, perseverance, and pursuance of one’s dream.  Regardless of the ending, Amelia Earhart lived her life doing what she loved. So, we decided to make an aircraft similar to the Fokker aircraft.

This craft helped the children stretch their imagination, play with the airplanes, and fly it around the daycare in various aviator voices.  Some of the questions that came from this lesson:

• How could that small plane fly?
• Where did she sit?
• Where is the engine?
• Where to put the gas?
• Why did she not have enough gas for the flight?

For this craft, I used wood glue, lots of wooden craft sticks,  pom poms and foam.  (See the links below for purchase options).  Please note this post contains affiliates.

Step 1  Glue some sticks together using the wood glue. Two sticks go on top and bottom.  To secure the position of the wood..hold down for less than a minute. 

Step 2  After pressing down for less than a minute.  Place that to the side and repeat steps for the others.

Place all on a surface to dry.  I allowed these to dry for two days. These were placed on a metal surface to avoid sticking on a paper or table.  Foil paper should work too.

Step 3  After they are dried, get the pom poms and foam.  Cut foam into small strips for the tail area..the stabilizer and the pom poms used for the elevator.

Step 4 Get ready to glue the pom poms and foam onto the airplane.  We used clear tacky glue for this area. I love tacky glue and use in most of our crafts. After gluing the pom poms hold down for less than a minute to remain intact.Repeat the process for all airplanes.  When finished let dry overnight.  The next day the children’s imagination soared, and they had many plays.  Although the craft was finished, it was missing their personal touch – I made most of them.  I love when children can own their craft, so to personalize them I wanted them to paint theirs.  Each child had two airplanes to paint.  See how they turned out on our next post. 

A simple yet effective way to teach young minds.  Children love to play and having fun with lesson plans help their knowledge, exploration, and discoveries.  Miss Sue:)

Here are some of the products used in this craft.  These are here for your convenience and ease of purchase.Please  note this post contains Affiliates.