Potato stamp wrapping paper

By some estimates, the UK uses 227,000 miles of wrapping paper each year! Conventional wrapping paper is often non-recyclable and made with plastic, giving it a shiny or crunchy feel. This activity is going to help you to reduce the amount of plastic that you use by creating some beautiful personalised plastic free wrapping paper.

Ages 4+

(adult supervision)

30 minutes

Part of:

Common Seas Ocean Plastics Academy

How to do it How to do it
What you'll need What you'll need
Find out more Find out more

Overview

We may not always be able to celebrate in person with our loved ones, but that doesn’t mean we cannot wrap gifts to send or store up for the end of lockdown with a personalised touch.

In this activity, you will be shaping a potato into a stamp using a paper clip. You will dip your unique potato stamp shape into paint and press against the brown paper to make a decorative gift wrapping paper.

Find out how this activity helps to reduce your plastic waste output and review how it first with the 6 Rs in the Find out more section.

Activity steps

Draw an image you would like on a scrap piece of paper. Make sure the image is no larger than the width of the potato you will be using.
Cut a potato in half (you might need adult help with this).
Place the image on top of the cut part of the potato. You can use an elastic band to hold the paper in place.
Unfold a paper clip to form a pointed end. Following the lines of your image, push the pointed end through the paper and into the potato.
You should now have an outline of your image on the potato.
Using the other end of the paper clip scrape out the parts of the potato that you do not want to be covered in paint.
Finally, you should have your potato print stamp.
Tape your scrap or brown paper to a table.
Dip the potato into the paint and firmly press the potato on to your scrap or brown paper.
Think about combining stamps to make more complex patterns. You could also use a range of colours and overlap your pattern but do remember to let the paint dry on each round, otherwise, you could end up with a brown blur.
We’d love to see what creative ideas you came up with – we wonder if anyone made a sea creature pattern! You can inspire us and others by sharing a picture of your craft – don’t forget to tag @commonseas and use the hashtag #SeaChampions. Thank you!

Further ideas

You can extend learning on craft and reusing plastics, with a full lesson as part of Ocean Plastics Cross-Curricular | Ages 5-7, What can I do?. Or try a whole design unit on design and plastics with Ocean Plastics Design and Technology | Ages 11-14.

Safety guidance

Adults should supervise or carry out any cutting activities for younger children.
If you are posting work on social media, this should be done via a parent, guardian or school account for children under the age of 13. Children over the age of 13 should still be supervised by an adult. Check out the Thinkuknow website for more guidance on online safety.

Home crafts that make use of natural materials or items destined for landfill such as waste paper help to reduce the amount of plastic pollution. Being at home during school closures can provide that extra time to rediscover the joy of crafts, saving both money and the planet.

Plastic 6 Rs diagram — Diagram showing the 6Rs of the waste hierarchy

Waste hierarchy definitions

Recycle: take an existing product that has become waste and reprocess the material to use in a new product. For example, putting a plastic milk bottle into your recycling bin, so that it can be turned into a new milk bottle.

Reuse: take an existing product that could become waste and use the item or parts of it for the same or another purpose, without processing it. For example, reusing a plastic shopping bag for multiple shopping trips.

Reduce: minimise the amount of energy and materials used to make a product. For example, reducing the amount of plastic packaging for a food item.

Refuse: not using or buying a product if you do not need it or you do not think it is sustainable. For example, refusing single-use coffee cups and using your own cup, or asking not to have a straw for your drink.

Repair: when a product breaks or stops working properly, choosing to try to fix it, rather than throwing it away. For example, many electronics items can be repaired reducing waste and saving money.

Redesign: often called rethink, this involves redesigning a product to make it more environmentally friendly or finding a new and different use for an item that might be thrown away. For example, turning a plastic bottle into a bird feeder.

So, in the long term we need to change how we relate to plastic through the 6 Rs: recycle, reuse, reduce, repair, refuse, and redesign.

This activity is just one idea of how you can contribute to reducing the amount of plastic we use.

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