DIY Tambourine Craft

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Want to make a recycled tambourine? We’ve got you covered with our plate tambourine craft from years ago. We used recycled clear plates for a colorful tambourine that the kids loved!

We made these clear DIY tambourines as a baby sensory toy that was a big hit with all of the kids. The clear plastic plates made sensory play fun with a visual and auditory aspect.  Using recycled materials in craft and play is one of our favorite ways to create! We also recommend making a bottle xylophone for more colorful and beautiful music!


Clear tambourines for music and baby sensory play
 

Recycled Tambourine Craft

 
How to make DIY recycled tambourines for music and toddler sensory play…
 
You’ll need just a few items to make a plate tambourine:
  1. Clear recycled plates 
  2. Hot glue
  3. Items to add inside the tambourines. Ideas include dry beans, dry corn, dry split peas, dry rice, or cut up pieces of straws.
 
 
This is an easy DIY project that kids of all ages will love.  Use recycled clear plastic plates, a hot glue gun, and filler.  We used red beans and cut straws to fill our tambourines.  
 
I wanted bright and bold colors for our clear tambourines.  Other fillers might include: dried split peas, chick peas, black beans, or beads.

 

 
Fill one of the plates with the beans.  Little Sister loved helping with this part.

 

 
She helped me by cutting colorful straws into small pieces.  She loved watching the bits of straws shoot across the table as she snipped each one.  What a great scissor activity for preschoolers!

 

 
These brightly colored straws make great tambourine filler.

 

 
 
Use the hot glue gun to spread glue along the whole edge of the lip of one plate.  Be sure to put the hot glue on the plate that is filled with filler.  Then place the empty plate on top of the hot glue.  Don’t try to flip the full plate onto the empty plate.  You’ll end up with spilled beans and hot glue burns.  Don’t ask how I know this 😉
 
Firmly press the whole outside edges together until the glue hardens.

 

 
Baby loves these clear tambourines for shaking sensory play!
 
 

Other DIY instruments that we loved include:

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