Pom poms are a great activity for teaching children about having patience and sticking with a project until it is done. It is a repetitive process making the pom poms, but it is easy, requires little materials and you get a great result.

To begin, find some thick card (like a cardboard box) and cut two circles the same size. Cut another smaller circle out of the centre (same size again for both circles). Don’t make the middle circle too big as it will take longer to complete the pom pom. Once finished, you should now have a donut shape.

Cut a long length of wool and start winding it around the donut. Either use the same colour wool for the entire project for a single coloured pom pom or change colours as your work for different patterns. Continue until the inner hole is filled. Take a scissors and being to cut around the edge. The scissors should run between the two pieces of cardboard. Once you have cut all the way around, use another length of wool and run it between the two cardboard circles. If you would like the pom pom to be on a string, keep this length of wool long. Tie it off with a sturdy knot – if this comes apart, your pom pom will fall apart, so make sure it is strong. Now remove the two pieces of card. Usually your pom pom then requires a gentle haircut and fluffing.

Either leave as it, or decorate. We added goggle eyes to bring ours alive.