Easy Tree Craft & Games for Kids with Recycled Yogurt Cups

I have been collecting yogurt cups trying to figure out how to recycle them into something fun and educational. All of the sudden all I…

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I have been collecting yogurt cups trying to figure out how to recycle them into something fun and educational. All of the sudden all I could see was a tree shape when I looked at an empty Yoplait cup (probably because we have been Christmas crafting like crazy). I quickly wrapped them in paper and came up with some games to play during learning time that teach letters (but you could adapt it to teach numbers, shapes…), building & hand-eye-coordination, and gross motor play. 
This post is part of the Creative Preschoolers series. Don’t forget to check out the other posts including in this weeks posts located at the end of this post. Let’s get started 🙂 
Supplies:
Yogurt cups
Green paper
Tape
Scissors
Letter Match
  • Ping pong balls
  • Dry Erase Marker
  • Letters

Tree Bowling

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  • Small toy ball

To put together the trees I folded a green piece of paper into thirds and cut along the fold to make 3 green strips (1 strip needed per yogurt cup). Then I took the center of the green strip and placed it on my yogurt cup and wrapped it around. Finally, I taped the paper together in the back and cut off any extra paper. Repeat until you have 5 or more trees and then you are ready to play! To get crafty, decorate trees with markers, stickers, or washi tape. Ms. Tiger took a break in between our activities to decorate her trees like Christmas trees. 

Letter Match 

Match uppercase and lowercase letters or try shapes, numbers, or colors too. 
Use a dry erase marker to write letters on the ping pong balls, then place matching letters next to the trees. Give child the ping pong balls and have them sort the balls into the matching tree. 2 balls will fit inside each yogurt cup, with a third ball balanced on the top. We worked on 3 letters at a time, with 6 balls total.  
Ms. Tiger is working on learning her lowercase letters, so at first I wrote the uppercase letter on one side of the ball, and the lowercase letter on the other side of the ball so she could learn the lowercase letters independently. Once she seemed comfortable with a set f letters I would remove the uppercase letter and replace it with a lowercase letter. 

Tree Stacking

Stack the trees in different patterns. The yogurt cups work so well for this activity!

Tree Bowling

Use those stacking skills to set up your trees in different patterns and knock them down in a fun round of bowling. We set up our bowling game on the table. 
To see more learning activities follow our Learning Activity Pinterest board: 
Thanks for joining us today!
Love Katie & the Kiddos

5 comments

  1. This is a fun idea!
    Thank you for stopping by the Thoughtful Spot Weekly Blog Hop this week. We hope to see you drop by our neck of the woods next week!

  2. This is so fun! I have seriously been saving up yogurt cups too. Hahaha! My husband keeps wondering why I have a bag full of them and I keep saying, "I swear I'm going to use them!" 🙂

    1. Hi Rachel, That makes me laugh, the things husbands put up with… My husband was wondering why I have a drawer full of toilet paper rolls in our bathroom…lol

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