Paper Plate Tambourine for St Patrick's Day - Red Ted Art

Well. we do love a good St Patrick’s Day Craft for Preschool. If you are looking for some gorgeous St Patrick’s Day Shamrocks and St Patrick’s Day Rainbows to make with toddlers, you may want to give this simple DIY Musical Instrument ago: A Paper Plate Tambourine for St Patrick’s Day! These Paper Plate Tambourines are fabulous DIY Shaker Toys and make a great simple and super cute St Patrick’s Day Craft for 2 and 3yrs olds. We do love a fantastic Preschool St Patrick’s Day Craft. I welcome back another lovely Toddler Craft contribution from Jennifer.

Paper Plate Tambourine for St Patrick’s Day

One of my daughter’s favorite crafts that we made for Valentine’s Day was our Stained Glass Heart Tambourines, so I knew that she’d want to make another version for St. Patrick’s Day.

I decided to double down and suggest two fun St Patrick’s Day designs for our tambourines: a Green Sparkly version with a “Shamrock window” and a cute Rainbow and Clouds version, too. (Isn’t every little kid obsessed with glitter and rainbows? It definitely seems that way in my house!)

Both are super cute and easy for kids to do. The window on the Shamrock Tambourine needs some adult assistance, so if you want an exclusively kid-made tambourine, opt for our rainbow version instead!

Rather than use perler beads (as we did for our Heart Tambourine) I thought it would be fun to add gold coins to make the rattling sound in these tambourines. You catch a glimmer of them when playing and it adds just a bit more magic to this craft.

Also, because the coins are larger than beads, you could have children “lace” the paper plates together rather than glue them if you wanted to add another dimension to this craft. (But I’d probably still add a bit of glue to be safe.)

Preschool Paper Plate Tambourines – Materials:

You can really have fun with your design.. either make your Tambourines complete green.. or completely rainbow.. or have them “reversible” – a lovely green shamrock on one side and a rainbow on the other. We give you instructions for making 2 Paper Plate Tambourines today!

4 paper plates (two paper plates per St Patrick’s Day Tambourine)
Glue (hot glue or clear school glue – hot glue is simply quicker, but normal PVA glue is just fine too)
Green glitter paint
Acrylic or tempera paint in all rainbow colors
Paintbrushes
Scissors
Gold coin scatter (optional – you can of course use beans, beads or anything else you can think of!)
Plastic recyclable (ie, berry container)
Shamrock template (or draw your own)

How to make your Shamrock Paper Plate Tambourines

Paint the underside of two of the paper plates with green sparkly paint and let dry.

Meanwhile, paint a rainbow pattern on the underside of half of one or two of the remaining plates. (Double sided is best, but do what you have patience for.) Leave the other half of the plate blank for “clouds.”

Let the paint dry completely as you prepare the plastic recyclable for the “window” into the Green Tambourine.

Cut out the shamrock template provided and cut a slightly larger piece of plastic to cover the hole you will be cutting in the paper plate. Ensure the plastic is clean.

When the plates are dry, trace and cut the shamrock shape out of one or both green sparkly plates.

Glue the piece of plastic to cover the shape – you may need to place something on top to hold it as it dries.