Passover is the anniversary of the Jewish nations miraculous exodus from Egyptian slavery more than 3,000 years ago. If you celebrate Passover then you’ll already know about the plague of frogs, which was the second plague sent by God to the Egyptians to try to force the hand of Pharaoh.

These amusing frog crafts are a great way to keep your children occupied during the school shut down and also teach them this important story. There’s a fun song that they can sing to accompany their plague re-enactment, called ‘The Frog Song’, by Shirley Cohen, the lyrics and recorded versions of this song can be found online.

For non-Jewish children, our frogs are still fun to make and there are of course lots of other great children’s frog songs too on-line, that can help with learning and coordination, such as: ‘Five Little Speckled Frogs’ and ‘The Little Green Frog’… So, get crafting and have a happy, hoppy time!

Felt Finger Puppet

These finger puppets are simple to make and are enjoyable for small children to use – so why not make one for each finger? They are also a good way to introduce older children to simple sewing techniques.

Safety Note: Please ensure that crafting children are supervised at all times by an adult.
Skill level: Beginner. For children aged 2 years - 5 years.

You will need:

• Felt Finger Puppet Templates [download here]
• Scraps of felt in the following colours: dark green (main body and head), light green (contrast tummy), yellow (eyes) and black (pupils)
• Matching sewing threads
• Hand sewing needle
• Pins
• Scissors

To make:

Download, print and cut out the finger puppet templates. Pin templates to felt pieces and cut the shapes out, making sure to cut two body pieces. Remove pins and templates.

Using blanket stitch sew the tummy onto one main body piece.

Sew yellow eyes onto the head with blanket stitch and attach small dots of black felt with a few stitches, for pupils.

Pin the head onto the front body piece, making sure that the gap between the eyes meets the top of the main body.

Using a blanket stitch, carefully attach the head to the body making sure to just catch the fabric of the head. DO NOT pass the needle completely through the fabric as this will show up on the right side of the finished puppet.

Pin the body pieces together and blanket stitch around the edges.

Finally, sew the mouth shape in backstitch and add two tiny stitches for nostrils. Your finger puppet is now ready for some fun!

Paper Finger Puppet

If you are not a sewer, then these amusing ‘ring-style’ finger puppets are simple to create from coloured paper. They really are speedy to make, so you can quickly create a plague for the whole family.

Skill level: Beginner

You will need:

• Head and eye templates from the Felt Finger Puppet templates [download here]
• Scraps of paper or thin card in the following colours: white, green (head) and yellow (eyes)
• Scissors
• Glue stick or double-sided sticky tape
• Pencil
• Googly eyes or black felt pen
• Black pen

To make:

Download, print and cut out the head and eyes from the felt finger puppet templates. From green card or paper cut out one head, from yellow paper cut two eyes and from thin white card cut a rectangle approximately 10mm wide x 50mm long.

Roll the rectangle of white card around a pencil to make a tube.

Carefully place tube onto the child’s finger and fix to size, with a piece of double-sided sticky tape.

Glue the eyes onto the frog’s face and add the googly eyes or draw black pupils on with a pen; glue eyes in place. Add two dots for nostrils and a line for a mouth.

To finish, glue or use double-sided sticky tape to fasten one side of the tube to the frog’s head. Now repeat steps 1 to 5 to make as many frogs as you want for your plague!

Origami Singing Frog

This singing frog is based on a form of origami used to make a children’s fortune telling game. Two of the sides of the shape are then stuck together to form a mouth that children can move with their hand to make him sing along to songs.

You will need:

• A4 sheet of green paper
• Scraps of paper in the following colours: orange (mouth), yellow (tongue and eyes)
• Googly eyes or black felt pen
• Glue stick
• Scissors
• Clothes peg to hold in place
• Penny coin

To make:

First, you need to make a square of green paper, to do this, lay the A4 piece of paper in landscape orientation and fold the right-hand bottom corner up to meet the top edge, forming a triangular corner.

Cut away the excess paper along the side of the triangle and discard this section; open out the triangle into a square.

Turn the square around so that it looks like a diamond and then fold it in half to make another triangle. Crease the paper flat along the lower folded edge. In Origami this is called the diaper fold.

Open the paper back into a diamond (a) and turn paper around, so it now sits like a square. Fold the square in half from top to bottom (b). In Origami this is called the book fold.

Unfold, turn the square through 90 degrees and repeat the fold with the opposite straight side. Open out the paper flat, your square should now have folds forming a star pattern, as shown.

Fold the bottom point in to meet the centre, repeat with all four points to form a small square.

Turn the square over (a) and fold the bottom point in to meet the middle (b), repeat with all four points (c).

Fold the square in half and insert fingers under the flaps.

Using a glue stick, glue two sides together inside of the shape at the bottom and two sides at the top. Hold each in place with a peg until they are dry and firmly stuck.

From orange paper, cut a small square to fit inside the mouth and glue in place (a). Cut a contrast tongue in yellow and glue in place (b).

Draw around a penny coin to make two eyes, and cut out. Add googly eyes to the centres or draw black pupils with a pen. Glue the two eyes to the top of the head (a) and draw two dots for nostrils (b). Your singing frog is now ready to join in all your songs (c).

Credit: Design by Ruth Ryan, Director of Stanhope House Day Nursery, Leicester