Fire Breathing Dragon Craft: Dragons Love Tacos Book Box
Happy August, friends! This month I was asked to collaborate on a fun craft project with some amazingly talented bloggers. Every month Lu from The Mama Workshop and Beth from Days with Grey team up together for a book box activity. And this month they invited me (along with two other creative bloggers) to participate! This month’s book is Dragons Love Tacos. This engaging and silly story is perfect for the preschooler crowd and lends itself to many crafting + learning opportunities. Dragons Love Tacos is a new book to our family, but it has quickly become a favorite of ours!
What is a book box?
A book box is a creative way for your preschooler to retell the story of their favorite book. A book box includes the book itself, along with props to retell a portion of the story. There are several ways this can be accomplished – a simple craft, playtime activity, or even a cooking recipe to help reinforce the key message of the book.
For my book box activity I decided to create a cardboard tube fire breathing dragon craft + color matching activity. This activity retells the portion of the story where we learn the dragon’s favorite toppings for their tacos – tomatoes, lettuce & cheese. After making your cardboard tube dragons, your child can practice color matching by “feeding” the dragons their favorite taco toppings.
Here is everything you’ll need to make this simple fire breathing dragon craft with your preschooler:
Supplies Needed
(3) Cardboard Tubes
(12) Pom Poms – red, yellow & green (2 small & 2 large for each color)
Paint – red, yellow & green
Googly Eyes
Hot Glue Gun or Craft Glue
Tissue Paper
Glue Stick
Scissors
How-To
Have your child paint their cardboard tubes. You can either use toilet paper rolls or a paper towel roll cut in half. They will paint 3 tubes total – red, yellow & green. Set them aside to fully dry.
Next, it’s time to glue on your pom poms. Start by having your child match the correct color of pom poms to the corresponding painted cardboard tube. Then begin gluing the pom poms on the dragon. You may want to take over the gluing, as this works best when a hot glue gun (or strong craft glue) is used. The larger pom poms will be the eyes and the smaller pom poms will be the snout of the dragon. Next attach your googly eyes to the larger pom poms to finish off the dragon’s face.
Once you have the body of the dragon made, have your preschooler cut long strips of tissue paper. You can use any color combination of red, yellow, and/or orange. We used 8 strips of tissue paper for each dragon and glued them on in an alternating pattern with a glue stick. This final step took only a few minutes and was a great way for my 4 year old to participate in making his own dragon!
Once your dragons have been turned into fire breathing dragons, your child will then be able to re-create the end of the story when the dragons accidentally eat their tacos with “Totally Mild Salsa”. Your child will be able to blow into the end of the cardboard tube to make the dragon “breathe fire”. As I’m sure you can tell, this is my son’s favorite part of the story!
Be sure to check out these other awesome activities that pair with Dragons Love Tacos.
Lu from The Mama Workshop created a fun letter recognition + playtime activity. This activity is great for practicing the letter “T” and learning to spell the word “taco”.
Beth from Days with Grey created a “Super Spicy Salsa Jello Wash”. This cleaning bin activity encourages your child to get their hands messy in the “spicy salsa” (Jello) and then wash off their “taco toppings” (plastic play food) in the cleaning bin. This is a great sensory activity for preschoolers!
Devon from U Ready, Teddy? created a “Totally Mild Salsa” slime recipe, which is another fantastic sensory activity! There’s even a super cute printable label, too!
Ashley from Veggies & Virtue created a “Build Your Own Taco Bar”, which encourages your child to build their own taco while trying new toppings.
If you participate in any of the crafts and/or learning activities from our Dragons Love Tacos book box, take a photo and tag us on Instagram! We’d love to see what you’re making at home with your preschooler!
Sumer (@gracegigglesandnaptime)
Lu (@themamaworkshop)
Beth (@dayswithgrey)
Devon (@ureadyteddy)
Ashley (@veggiesandvirtue)
xo,
Sumer
7 Comments
Cara
I love this idea of having props with your book, it sounds like fun.
Laura
What a fun idea! My boys would love to make those!
Brenda
This is one of the cutest toilet paper roll crafts! I love how you also incorporated the learning aspect. This is one of our favorite books, and I definitely think we need to do this craft!
Megan | LoveFamilyHealth
How fun is this! My Daughter loves books and I think she would love this activity! Thank you for sharing!
Vicki @ Babies to Bookworms
These look like so much fun! I have some paper towel rolls that I was saving for a project, and I guess I know what we will be doing now!
Lexi
What a cute craft!! We love that book!
Danielle @ A Sprinkle of Joy
What a fun craft!! I love the idea of a book box so much! I’m going to have to do something similar with some of the books I have at home.