Kindergarten masks, 1st Grade Lincoln hats

I brought an Aztec mask I did last summer to school and told the story about how a mask lets you become another character and pretend to be something we are not. We had fun with it and made our own masks from paper plates (pre-cut eyes and nose) and different shapes of construction paper. Some were very involved, some were minimalist. 


Each had a story but once someone said he was a vampire the boys especially were on a roll. Many then had a vampire mask. Blessedly they were without teeth and blood! It was a fun and easy project and they really got into the pretend part as soon as the mask was on. 

The first grade has been studying Abraham Lincoln so we did a bit of painting and a bit of construction to make the top hat like Lincoln wore. I found a website with directions to make the hat but decided to alter it a bit. We painted a paper plate black and cut a hole just smaller than the roll of paper for the top part of the hat. We did some cutting and gluing to assemble the hat then completed the painting of the other part of the brim. They could not wait to put them on their heads and be Lincoln look alikes!