Welcome Banner

I am a minimalist when it comes to decorating my classroom.  I am a firm believer that less is more when it comes to distractions and young children.  I leave my walls bare except for essentials... most of the time.

I do however think that the children will feel more ownership of the classroom if they take a part in the decorating.  With that being said, I decided to make a Welcome Banner for the wall that you see first thing upon entering our room.  Sometime during the first week of school each child will create a self portrait and trace their names.  Each self portrait will be displayed around the banner.

I think it will be perfect for a year long decoration that has a bit of character from each kiddo in the class.

To make the banner is really easy.

Materials:

• piece of recycled cardboard from a cereal box
• pencil
• large printable letters from the Internet
• scissors
• double sided tape
• 3 different coordinating 12 X 12 scrapbook pages
• hole punch
• twine

Directions:

1.  Print the letters for the word WELCOME from the site linked above.

2.  Cut out the letters.

3.  Draw a triangle onto the cardboard large enough to fit the M.  Cut out the triangle.  This will be your tracer.

4.  Lay the tracer onto the back side of a sheet of scrapbook paper.  Trace and cut out the triangle.

5.  Repeat step 4 five more times on your various scrapbook papers.  You should have 6 triangles of three different patterns when you are done.

6.  Lay the triangles out on the floor in an ABC pattern (123123). 

7.  Place the letters onto the triangles and position them like you want them.

8.  Pull one letter off at a time and adhere it to the triangles with double sided tape.

9.  At this point, laminate the triangles for durability and cut out.  Hole punch each top corner of the triangles.  Lace twine through the holes to make your banner.

10.  Hang the banner on the wall.  I am going to hammer a nail through each end of the twine.

Super easy and super cute.