This dilapidated little ornament, the green and red construction paper aged to tan and muddy red, still goes up every year to remind me of all the Christmas Ornament craft projects from my teaching career. This one a was created in my classroom in the eighties. For it you cut a piece of green construction paper in Japanese Lantern style.
Here are some similar online instructions.
The difference in my wreaths and this one are
1. I prefer a much smaller ornament size wreath
2. I crease each loop for a neater, flatter appearance
3. I always used tape rather than a stapler.
I wish I still had my Halley's Comet ornament. I challenged my students in 1986 to commemorate Halley's appearance - the only one I'll get to see -- by creating an ornament. The one I made was a wreath with the comet shooting through the center of it. The comet head was a small styrofoam ball with a stiff paper"tail" attached. "Year of the Comet - 1986" was inscribed on the tail.
Of course new ideas for ornaments came up regularly. One year we made "Stained Glass" cookie ornaments. Mrs. Packer helped us bake them in the school kitchen. We arranged cookie dough (I think it was store-bought dough with appropriate holes filled with crushed Life Savers and baked 'em. This was one of many classroom projects I only tried the once.
Here's the food network's version.
Once digital camera's made their appearance we made photo ornaments each year - star-shaped of course. I hope it doesn't seem too egotistic, but I thought a memento ornament with a photo of each kid with their handsome and brilliant fourth grade teacher would be valued. (Ha!)
Later Note:
Abby Chesnut was a wonderful little girl who was my fourth-grade student at Armuchee Elementary School in 2002-2003. 18 Chrismases later her mom still has Abby's construction paper wreath and sent this photographic evidence. We reproduced photos of the kids and their parents and teacher from "Meet the Teacher" night and pasted those in the center of the wreaths.
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