Craft your way through Chinese New Year with this fun selection of Chinese new years crafts for kids, including easy crafts for toddlers, educational activities to learn about Chinese New Year, and lots more.
We have even put together a list of Chinese zodiac animal crafts for each year of the chinese zodiac. This coming year is going to be the year of the rabbit!
Chinese New Year Crafts for Kids
For the following 20 Chinese new year crafts and activities, you can use these ideas any year, all the way from year of the rat down to year of the pig.
Then below, we have listed 12 more for the specific years.
Chinese New Year Crafts and Activities for Kids
Check out these fun craft ideas and educational activities to enjoy with kids as part of the Chinese New Year celebrations (aka Spring Festival)
Make your own chinese lanterns craft with red paper plates and gold decorations.
This simple craft activity is easy for toddler's little hands and a fun way to celebrate the lantern festival, which marks the end of the Chinese New Yearcelebrations on the 15th day of the new lunar year.
Hang your red paper lanterns up in the window as a decoration.
Make some noise and celebrate with this simple DIY shaker or Chinese drum, made using paper plates and craft sticks.
This chinese new year drum craft will be great to create your own Chinese new year parade at home or in nursery.
Red envelopes (aka Hong Bao) are given during Chinese new year, containing money. These are a gift for good fortune in the Chinese culture.
Learn how to make your own DIY red envelopes, this is a great idea for older, school aged kids to have a go at making.
These cardboard lanterns are an easy craft for all ages to make using recycled materials that we all have around the house - toilet paper rolls! And they are lots of fun to paint and decorate in the lucky colors of red and gold.
Make your own paper dolls with traditional Chinese dress using our printable template.
This post also has costumes from many other countries, which you can save for another day!
Make posters and cards, and learn about the Chinese characters with these printable greetings for Chinese New Year, in Mandarin chinese.
You can also encourage kids to try their own Chinese calligraphy by copying the strokes using a paintbrush and water on construction paper.
Kids of all ages will have a lot of fun making, and tasting, some delicious Chinese recipes for chinese new year.
Make your own full sized cardboard chinese market for Lunar new year, like this one made by Betty from Chalk Academy - how cool!
This set of free printable chinese new year activites includes a dragon to color in and make a chinese dragon puppet, fun mazes, i spy pages and more.
Color your own fun and vibrant Chinese new year pictures with this set of free printable color by number CNY coloring pages, with so many different images to chose from.
You can use these images as a free template to make all kinds of crafts, from filling in the spaces with colored scrunched tissue or making your own suncatcher.
Kids will have so much fun enjoying story time with this selection of picture books and stories for the lunar new year.
There are also some great non fiction books listed to help kids understand more about the origins and traditions of this special time of year in asian cultures.
Chinese New Year is based on the lunar calendar, so understand more about moon phases and the lunar cycle with this easy tutorial that you can use to create your own moon phase decoration.
This fun fan craft is a great activity for little ones.
Use tissue paper to decorate a cherry blossoms design onto these simple paper folding fans, for a fun and easy craft that even toddlers can make.
If you prefer process art activities, you can incorporate the chinese new year theme by including lots of red and gold - the colors of good luck for the celebration of chinese new year - and letting the kids explore, like we did for this paint absorption activity.
Make your own paper fortune cookies with this simple idea from Red Ted Art
This thumbprint zodiac animals craft from fun handprint art is a detailed and engaging way for kids to learn about the concept of the Chinese zodiac and the 12 animals that represent each year, in rotation.
Learning about the chinese lunar calendar is so much fun!
Keep it edible with this fun chinese new year lanterns craft from Danya Banya, which is made from little cheeses!
We can't forget the chinese dragon crafts!
Make your own chinese new year paper chain dragons using the printable template from Pink Stripey Socks for a fun chinese new year craft.
Kids love fun dragon crafts at Chinese New Year. Use cupcake liners to create this awesome dragon craft from I Heart Crafty Things.
This chinese new year dragon craft will instantly bring to mind the festive chinese dragon dance, similar to the lion dance.
Or, you could recycle some left over packaging from the kitchen and make your own adorable dragon craft out of egg cartons.
Crafts for each of the Chinese Zodiac Animals
Each year of the Chinese calendar is allocated to a particular animal, on a 12 year rotation as part of the Chinese Zodiac.
As last year was year of the tiger, this means this year in 2023 we will be welcoming the Year of the Rabbit.
Here’s the full list of Chinese zodiac animals with a simple craft to go alongside each one.
- Year of the Rat
- Year of the Ox
- Year of the Tiger
- Year of the Rabbit
- Year of the Dragon
- Year of the Snake
- Year of the Horse
- Year of the Goat / Sheep
- Year of the Monkey
- Year of the Rooster
- Year of the Dog
- Year of the Pig
Chinese Zodiac Animal Crafts
A craft for every animal of the Chinese zodiac
Make this paper cutting craft for Year of the Rat.
Make a paper folding Ox bookmark for year of the Ox
Make this simple cardboard tubes tiger craft for year of the tiger
Or check out these fun facts about tigers
Make your own simple line drawing for year of the rabbit
Make your own chinese dragon masks with this free printable from messy little monster for yesr of the dragon.
This colorful snake craft is perfect for year of the snake!
Use the free printable to make these horse marionettes for the year of the horse.
Year of the goat is also known as year of the sheep, so make this fluffy paper plate sheep craft using cotton wool
Make your own colorful monkey mask for the year of the monkey
This handprint rooster craft with free printable template is perfect for the year of the rooster.
Make your own cute collection of paper plate pups for year of the dog.
Try out this fun pig craft to round off the collection of 12 chinese zodiac animals with the year of the pig.
Buy Chinese New Year Craft Kits
Running low on time, check out some of these chinese new year craft kits, and craft supplies from Baker Ross (affiliate links)
We love the foam stickers and the stampers!
Buy all of these and more here at Baker Ross.
Share
Please go ahead and share this blog post with friends, gamily and colleagues so that more parents, teachers and care givers can benefit from all of these Chinese new Year craft ideas or why not pin to your Chinese new year Pinterest board.
Thanks so much!
Happy Chinese New Year! Gong xi fa cai! Xin Nian Kuai Le!
Anna Marikar, mum of four and seasoned blogger, has spent over a decade sharing her parenting journey and passion for kid-friendly crafts and free printables.
Her easy-to-follow craft ideas and practical parenting advice have transformed In The Playroom into a cherished resource for parents.
What a fantastic collection of Chinese New Year crafts for kids! I love the variety of activities you’ve shared, from paper lanterns and shakers to red envelopes and paper dolls. The crafts for each Chinese zodiac animal are especially creative and engaging. Thank you for putting together such a comprehensive list. I can’t wait to try these with my children!