Make a cork and leaf boat
Making cork boats is a really fun activity to do and the boats are so quick to make and float really well. Perfect for paddling on a sunny day! You can also reuse some of the elastic bands that get dropped by the postie or the ones that hold together spring onions!
What you will need:
Corks
Elastic bands or twine/string
Toothpicks
A pushpin or drawing pin (optional)
Leaves
What you need to do:
Collect some leaves to use as the sails for your cork boats. The leaves need to be no bigger than the length of your toothpicks.
The simplest way to create the base of the boat is by laying three corks next to each other and securing with two elastic bands. However, you can also use twine or string to tie the corks together but it’s just a little more fiddly.
Poke a toothpick through the top and bottom of a leaf to make a mast for your boat. If you are doing this activity with young children, you may want to snip off the top end of the toothpick so it’s not so pointy.
If you have a push pin or a drawing pin, use this to poke a hole into the cork where you want to attach the mast and then push in the mast. If you don’t have a pin, you’ll just need to be careful, holding the toothpick near the bottom when you poke it into the cork, so that it doesn’t bend and snap.
Your cork boats are now all ready to set sail! Take them out for a sail on a pond or paddling pool or you could even try them in the bath! There was a little bridge leading to a small stream from the pond we were playing in so we raced the boats underneath the bridge to see which one came out first.
My children and their friends made a few different designs of boat by adding on more corks using toothpicks. And despite how precarious the one my youngest made looked, it still floated really well!
Please remember to take the rafts home with you once you have finished sailing them and reuse or recycle your elastic bands!
Author: Denise Hope, home educating mum of two boys