Countdown to the End of School Craft - Paper Chain

I can hardly believe my son will be graduating PreSchool very soon. So we can all easily visualize how many days are left before he's out of school for summer, we made a simple countdown to the end of school craft, a paper chain.

This project incorporates lots of skill builders, like measuring and marking with a ruler, cutting and writing practice, calendar skills, and building a paper chain.

First, we pulled out two sheets of construction paper. My son picked green and blue. They don't need to be new sheets of paper, our sheets had already been used for drawing and painting projects.

Next we used a ruler and measured two inch strips that we marked with a pencil. Each sheet of construction paper makes 6 strips. My son used his scissors to cut the strips and then arranged them on a pile in a pattern of green - blue - green - blue until all the strips were organized.

We used our school calendar to count how many days are left until the end of school. He wrote the month and day on each strip of paper for each day we are counting down. On the last day of school I added a note, "Last Day of School! HELLO SUMMER!"

We used the strips of paper to make a paper chain with tape and hung it in our kitchen for a visual reminder of how few days we have left of school this year. This was a fun craft to create, but my favorite part is watching my son excitedly remove a link from the paper chain each day, read the date, and count how many days are left of PreSchool.