Homemade jewelry items are a good craft for older children because they're sometimes too difficult for younger children and require patience and concentration. Beaded bracelets and necklaces require stringing beads together to make colorful designs. This also lets older children express their creativity. Other jewelry ideas include making earrings, rings and ankle bracelets. You can purchase starter materials such as earring backs from craft stores and then decorate with colored string, beads and charms.
While younger children probably don't have the ability to work safely with needles, you can encourage teenagers both to use sewing machines and to hand-stitch. In a classroom setting, hand-stitching will probably be easiest. Easy sewing projects include gift bags and pillows. Before jumping into one of these projects, you might want to practice simple stitches in class on scrap material.
The holidays, when students' minds wander, are a good time to do crafts in the classroom. You can also use the time to make craft gifts for students' family members. Ideas include decorating candles with holiday themes using clip art decals, making and decorating stockings with glitter paint and glue, and making gift tags for the homemade gifts you make and the other gifts the students give throughout the holiday season.
Teenagers can do most craft projects. In the classroom, you'll probably have teens with different abilities. Teens that are especially crafty can try knitting and crocheting, while you can help teenagers who struggle with crafting with simpler projects like painting picture frames as gifts. A good craft for the classroom is making cards for parents for Mother's Day and Father's Day. Remember that many of these projects can get messy, so ask students to bring in extra clothing.