Chomping Cardboard Dragon STEAM Craft for Kids

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Unleash creativity and learning with this chomping cardboard dragon craft! A fun STEAM activity that blends art, engineering, and imagination for kids of all ages.

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STEAM activities are fun on their own but when you’re enjoying dragon-themed STEM activities, your kids are definitely in for a treat. This chomping cardboard dragon STEAM craft is a fun way to combine arts and crafts with STEAM concepts and lessons.

In this activity, kids will learn about simple machines, mechanics, engineering, and so much more, all while having fun! And of course they will end the activity with a brand new toy they made all on their own. It’s a win-win!

Feel free to enjoy this fun cardboard dragon craft for kids as part of your Chinese New Year celebrations (Chinese dragon anyone?), as part of your homeschool lessons, or as an after school science experiment. Either way, you can’t go wrong!

Free Printable STEM Project Instructions

Do you want to make the chomping cardboard dragon anytime, anywhere?

Download the free printable STEM project instructions!

Click here to download the PDF STEM project instructions.

About the Chomping Cardboard Dragon Craft for Kids

Your students are going to make their own dragon grabber using basic levers, cardboard, and brads. There is no better way for kids to understand how levers work than through real-life experience which is why this is a great STEAM activity!

They will also experience how tools can help humans by taking on some of the workload. Instead of a human bending over to the floor to pick up a sock, they can use their dragon lever tool to pick up the sock without bending over.

An added bonus might just be a cleaner floor when your kids are done playing with their dragon lever. 

We have included several ideas for variations on this basic project so kids can use their own creative and artistic skills to make their dragon.

While you might think this dragon STEM craft is best suited for elementary aged students, feel free to include your preschoolers, your middle schoolers, and your high schoolers as well. If you scroll to the bottom section of this article, there are ideas for taking the learning further so even tweens and teens will get exactly what they need out of this learning activity.

Materials Needed for a DIY Chomping Cardboard Dragon

This easy kids craft is fairly simple and a whole lot of fun. Most of the materials for this papercraft are common household items.

However, you will need a few items that most households do not already have on hand (such as brads) so be sure you plan ahead if you want to make a chomping dragon.

• Cardboard (from a cardboard box perhaps)
• Scissors
• Brads
• Markers, paint, or construction paper
• Googly eyes (optional)
• Ruler
• Black Marker
• Sharp Pencil
• Optional (if you’re willing to get a little creative and come up with your own dragon template) paper plates, cardboard tubes (think toilet paper roll or paper towel roll), popsicle sticks (AKA craft sticks), tissue paper, pipe cleaners, etc. This is your STEM challenge so feel free to get step outside the lines.

DIY Chomping Cardboard Dragon Tutorial

Begin by finding some sturdy cardboard (from a used cardboard box from Amazon perhaps) and gathering the rest of your supplies.

• Measure 6 cardboard strips and mark lines to cut with a black marker. These strips should be about 1/2 in wide and 3-6 inches long at minimum.

• Draw a large rectangle for the head. This rectangle should be about the size of 2 of your strips.
• Draw the teeth down the middle of the cardboard head. Cut your rectangle in half.

• Cut the six strips.

• Cut along the tooth lines. 

• Paint or color your dragon. (Or you could cut and glue on colored construction paper or tissue paper).
• After the paint has dried, add an eye. You can draw your own eye with a marker or glue on a googly eye.
• Glue the head pieces to two of the cardboard strips. 

• Poke holes for the brads. We used a sharp pencil with scrap cardboard placed underneath.
• You will need to poke a hole in the middle of each cardboard strip, and at the front and back of each strip. (You won’t need a hole on the back edge of two of the strips, since that will be the handle end of the dragon.)

• Crisscross the cardboard strips, as shown in the picture.

• Insert brads.

• Chomp away!
• Optional – use your extra pieces (popsicle sticks, craft sticks, pipe cleaners, etc) to add some extra spice to your dragon)!

The Learning Behind This STEAM Activity (i.e. Simple Machines)

Go over the following information to turn this fun dragon kids craft into a full on dragon STEM learning activity. Add these to your homeschooling lesson plans or have an educational family discussion.

A lever is a simple machine. Simple Machines modify motion and the amount of force (or work) needed to perform a task.

A lever consists of three parts:

Fulcrum – The point where a lever pivots.

Load – Object (usually heavy)

Effort – The work you do, or the amount of force that must be applied to move the load.

This dragon is a basic example of a lever that you can play with. Our dragon uses several levers, working together. The fulcrum points are the brads. The load is whatever you pick up with your dragons head.

(Of course, our little is cardboard so we can’t pick up heavy things, but he might enjoy eating the dirty socks off the floor.) 

The effort used to operate this lever comes from your arms and hands moving the two levers at the tail end of the dragon back and forth.

A wheelbarrow is another example of a lever.  The wheel of the wheelbarrow is the fulcrum.

The load is the area that you fill up. And the effort is applied to the handles, by a person. (A wheelbarrow also has two other simple machines, a wheel, and an inclined plane.) 

Simple machines make our lives easier by reducing the amount of effort needed from humans to perform a task. 

More STEM Resources for Kids (Including A Free Printable)

If you liked this activity, you are going to love the STEM Made Easy Digital Subscription. Each monthly project guide includes 5 STEM projects along with instructions for how to make them fun and engaging for kids ages 3-19. You can learn more here.

Or read more about the books in this article on homeschool STEM curriculum.

Want a free project sample? Sign up to get a complete project guide sent to you so you can see exactly what’s inside each of the STEM Made Easy Digital Subscription.

I’ve also got this ultimate list of STEAM and STEM activities for kids of all ages if you want to take a look.