Cup Creations
Scoop, pour, and build with cups of all shapes and sizes.
The Cup Creations activity is especially good for children to develop persistence and practice finding multiple solutions to a challenge.
- Audience
- Caregiver
- Subject
- STEAM
- Age
- ElementaryKindergartenPre-KPreschool
- Languages
- Brazilian PortugueseEnglishHaitian CreoleSimplified ChineseSpanishVietnamese
- Materials
- At least 15 Paper or Plastic Cups, Assorted Materials (yogurt containers, toilet paper tubes, egg cartons), Paper, Pencil
Tinkering is about exploring and problem solving using materials and tools. Tinkering often starts with simple questions, like “What can I do with this?” or “How does this work?”
The Cup Creations activity is especially good for children to develop persistence and practice finding multiple solutions to a challenge.
Getting Ready
Gather your materials. Plastic or paper cups are good to play with, but some hard plastics can be sharp if they crack. Choose softer plastic cups for building.
Things to Try
- Challenge your child to use the cups to build a tower or structure. Each time the structure falls, ask what they might try differently next time. Let them try and try again.
- Encourage your child to build a pyramid with at least 5 cups at the bottom. Then make it bigger and higher. Use as many cups as you have. Invite them to try taking a cup out from the middle without the whole thing falling. They’ll need very steady hands!
- Mix it up! Add other building materials to the cups from your recycling bin. Invite your child to build a tower (or anything they’d like) using the cups, yogurt containers, toilet paper tubes, and whatever else you have. This is harder because the materials might not all fit together easily.
- Write down a few building challenges for your child on small pieces of paper. Ideas might include: build a structure using all the materials, build the tallest tower you can, or build a bridge. Crumple up the pieces of paper and have your child pick a mystery challenge. Read it together and invite them to start building!
“Hmm. How many cups are you stacking?”
“If you put three more cups on top, what will happen? ”
“I can see that’s not quite working. What else could you try?”
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