Here is a fun polar bear craft idea – a 3D polar bear portrait surrounded by falling snow. It’s perfect for Winter-themed crafting and looks fabulous hanging on the wall.
The polar bear’s nose pops out of the page giving a three dimensional effect. This is easy to create with some basic folding and the help of our printable template.
Who doesn’t love polar bears? I mean, if I saw one close up in the wild I’d be very afraid, but they are still amazing creatures.
You guys know I like to add a bit of an educational element to our animal crafts. So, before we get started, here are a few interesting polar bear facts to chat to the kids about whilst you make it.
Fascinating polar bear facts for kids:
- Polar bears live only in the frozen Arctic wilderness and can be found in Canada, Alaska, Greenland Russia and Norway
- A polar bear spends 50% of it’s time hunting for food on the ice platforms, their favourite meal being seals which they catch by waiting near their breathing holes for the seals to appear
- Polar bears are the largest living carnivores on earth, weighing in at a massive 680kg for males (1500 pounds) and around 2.5m in length (8.2 feet). The females are about half the size
- The fur on a polar bear looks white but it is actually translucent (clear), and the skin underneath it is black. It is an optical trick of the light reflecting on the hollow core of each hair which makes the fur look white
- They manage to survive the extreme cold temperatures with the help of their thick fur as well as a thick layer of fat underneath their fur. On top of this their skin being black means they absorb the sun’s rays which helps to warm up their bodies.
- At birth, polar bear cubs are just 30cm in length (11.8 inches). Thats similar in size to a guinea pig!
- The biggest threat to polar bears is climate change. Melting ice means there is less hunting ground for the bears and they need to travel further for food, which can potentially result in malnutrition and starvation
Now you can have a polar bear’s portrait hanging on your wall! Lets get started on the 3D polar bear craft…
How to make a 3D polar bear craft
You will need:
- The polar bear template printed onto ordinary white paper – available from both our printable shop and our TPT store
- Card stock in a cool colour (eg any shade of blue) for your background
- Glue stick
- White paint (we’ve used acrylic)
- Cotton bud (Q-tip)
- Print the template onto plain white paper.
- Fold the page featuring the head shape the in half along the dotted line and cut out around the heavy black outline.
- Whilst the head is still folded, fold along the second dotted line at an angle.
- Unfold the head and turn over so that the dotted lines are on the back. Fold the nose so that it pokes forward from the ears.
- Cut out the facial features and shoulder shapes, and glue the eyes, nose and ears onto the head.
- Glue the shoulder shape across the bottom of a sheet of coloured card stock, leaving a small gap between the edges for a border. Place glue onto the ears section of the back of the head (do not place glue on the nose section), and glue so that the nose is poking up.
- Use a cotton bud/Q-tip to dot snowflakes around the Polar Bear’s head.
Now you just need to hang him on the wall!
We have loads more fun Winter-themed printables coming up in the near future (including some adorable paper polar bears), so stay tuned.
More printable animal crafts for kids
- Create a selection of paper plate dinosaurs including the Diplodocus, Triceratops, Spinosaurus and more with our paper plate dinosaurs ebook
- Kids will love making paper chain snakes based on real species of python from the Australian rainforest
- There are 14 different marine animals that can be made from our paper plate ocean animals ebook
- Make an adorable paper plate chick or a geometric mother with baby chicks tucked under her wing
- This bouncy paper fog on a lilypad is one of our most popular crafts
Check out our Winter Printables Collection