Recycled Bottle Animal

Make a silly animals from a recycled plastic bottle

Skill Level: Moderate

Time Needed: 1 and a half hours

Age(s): 5 to 10

Supplies Needed:

Project Rating:

Decide on the animal you would like to create.
Paint a plastic bottle to resemble the animal you chose. Let the paint dry completely.
Decorate your animal with paint, construction paper, and pipe cleaners. Be sure to add legs, ears, wings, and a tail.
Glue two Jiggly Eyes to the plastic bottle. Let the glue dry completely.
Name your animal and display it for others to see!

Teaching Tips:

Have students research the animals they created. Ask each student to write four interesting facts about their animal on a note card. Place students' note cards with their animals, and display them around the room.
Encourage students to think about where their animals live. Have students locate the regions on a classroom map or globe.
Animals typically live in groups or families. Introduce students to some of the collective nouns used for animal groups. Examples include an army of ants, a nest of mice, and a troop of monkeys. Give students a collective noun, and encourage them to guess the correct animal family it belongs to.
Discuss recycling with your students. Talk about the importance of practicing the three Rs—reducing, reusing, and recycling. Ask students to brainstorm ways that they can reduce the amount of trash they produce. Ask students to brainstorm ways that they can reuse things more than once. (This project is a great example of reusing an item in a different way.) Ask students to list all of the items that they recycle in their homes.