Colorful Coffee Filter Crafts for Kids

by Karen & Grace Morris

Let's combine science and art with coffee filter crafts for kids. After the filter dries, your kids can make beautiful butterflies, flowers, and other cute items.

Want to make the crafts another day? Pin for later.

There are four crafts below so you will need at least;

Four coffee filters (one for each craft)
Black washable marker
Eyedropper
Small container with water

Water play can be messy, so have plenty of towels to soak up the excess water.

Place the filter on a large piece of paper. Make lines, dots, or spirals on the coffee filter with the black marker. If you make a large spiral, you could make a snail.

Use the eyedropper to drop water on the lines. You want just enough water so that the ink runs. Too much and the ink will soak through the filter.

This would be a fun activity to do in the springtime. You could even draw your picture and place it out in the rain for a few minutes.

See the different colors? You should see blue and some red. Black is a mixture of red, blue, and yellow. The mixture absorbs most of the light, so we see black.

Try different brands of black markers. Do you see different colors, or are they the same? What happens if you use a permanent marker?

Try other colors of washable markers. Do they change colors when you add water?

Let your filters dry and then make these coffee filter crafts for kids.

Coffee filter Crafts for Kids – What They Can Make

Butterfly

Some butterflies like the Owl Butterfly have spots on their wings that look like eyes. This butterfly, however, looks similar to a Blue Swallowtail.

You will need;

Coffee filter from above
Clothespin
Pipe Cleaner

Fold the filter back and forth to make a fan. Twist the center a time or two. Then clip with the clothespin.

Fold the pipe cleaner in half. Now fold the ends on each side. I did three turns so that it made a small circle on each end of the pipe cleaner.

Place the pipe cleaner under the clip of the clothespin.

You could make several different kinds of butterflies here.

Jellyfish

According to Wikipedia, the Aequorea victoria jellyfish produces green fluorescent protein. People use the protein to make Glofish which you can buy and add to your aquarium.