Create a Constalation

Last week at our Activity Table we had the coolest project for the kids to do. I can't take credit for the idea - that credit goes to one of my co-workers - but the idea worked out so well that I have to share it.

We decided to have the kids create constellations using black construction paper, foil star stickers, and metallic crayons. We copied diagrams of a few constellations (Orion, Hercules, Cassiopeia, and Cygnus) from a book to help them learn a bit about our night sky. Kids could then use the star stickers to copy one of these constellations onto the black paper. The metallic crayons could then be used to connect the stars and draw out the full image that the stars created.


We asked the kids to try to copy constellations that they would really find up in the sky, but several kids got creative and designed their own constellations. We hung pictures of ladybugs, ice cream cones, dragons, cars, and more!


I loved this project for a lot of reasons, but one of my favorite parts of the project was being able to use these metallic crayons. Have you seen these before? We ordered several boxes of Crayola Metallic FX Crayons out of an art supply catalog and they are super fun to color with. The metallic finish really helps you to imagine that these created constellations are shining up in the night sky. The black paper really shows off the crayons' sheen, and it was very nice to actually be able use our black construction paper for a project!

Just as with the dream drawings activity that I posted about a few weeks ago, kids who completed this activity and showed their picture to the librarian at the desk earned an extra raffle ticket for the big prize drawings. Many kids wanted to take their completed constellations home, but we kept about half of the finished projects to hang in the library.