Boats Afloat

Being World Maritime Day, today I’ll be making paper boats with the kids. A quick trawl through the net found a fantastic instruction sheet from Wild over Waterways. Being inland, I suppose its not strictly maritime, but any port in a storm.

you will need:
A4 paper
wax crayons
a little tape
a blob of playdough or tack
this sheet
a bath, big bowl, or paddling pool

remember… children and water are a good mix if you keep them safe and supervised

A little experimenting has led me to plump for wax crayons, I found that felt-tipped pens ran in the water, and coloured pencils soggified and sank the boats quicker. Wax crayons seemed to have the effect of waterproofing the paper if applied in great enough quantity giving us a good half hour of floating before sliding into the arms of Davy Jones. Unadorned paper should give you a good ten minutes.

Likewise the addition of a blob of something heavy and sticky give a little balast, as well as somewhere to embed the feet of a Playmobile Pirate.

Enjoy

tag... play for today, 3up, 5up, printable