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Melty Bead Snowflakes

  • Math
  • Young Adult
  • Grades 1-3

Use Melty Beads, specially made pegboards and an iron to create fused designs, such as the winter snowflakes seen here!

Materials

  • Melty Beads Ultimate Kit
  • Iron **May require adult assistance

Instructions

To create these designs, lay Melty Beads onto the pegboard shapes shown or create your own designs. Making snowflakes is a great time to talk about symmetry in nature.

To melt, follow the instructions included in your package, or read about the Basics of Melty Beads here!

 

 

Octagan Pegboard

 

Tip: For symmetrical patterns, start at the center and branch out.

 

Octagan Pegboard

 

Tip: Even though snowflakes are mostly depicted in white, you can continue the “cool” theme and stick to “cool” colors on the color wheel, such as shades of blue and purple.

 

Circular Pegboard

 

Tip: Pair this craft with a discussion on geometry and practice identifying shapes!

 

Circular Pegboard

 

Tip: For this design, we first created an outline around the pegboard before filling in the inside.

 

Octagon Pegboard

 

Tip: mix shapes, like circles and arrows into your snowflake shapes.

 

Square Pegboard

 

Tip: pair this craft with a discussion on symmetry

 


Teacher's Corner

Practice shapes and patterns while creating snowflakes that never melt away!  

Lesson Objectives

  • Count On It: Shapes are named according to the number of sides they have — for example, the prefix ‘tri’ means three, so a triangle has three sides, while ‘octo’ means eight, so an octagon has eight sides! Once your students create complete shapes on their pegboards, ask them how many sides their snowflakes have.
  • Pegboard Patterns: Melty beads come in all kinds of colors! Challenge your students to design fun patterns with the beads, like stripes, zig-zags, or alternating colors. Who can create the most intricate pattern?    

Follow-up Discussion

Geometry is a type of mathematics that deals with shapes and figures, much like the snowflakes your class created. Explore more shapes, then ask your students to find examples in the classroom, on the playground, or at home. Where can they spot at oval, hexagon, or diamond?