🕎 Hanukkah projects
Menorahs, dreidels and star decorations made from card, clay and junk. Hanukkah crafts for children to make and use over the eight nights of the festival.
🕎 Hanukkah runs from 4 December 2026 to 12 December 2026. Get making!
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Projects
Spin-Tastic Card Dreidel
Children fold a card cube into a dreidel, the four-sided spinning top played with at Hanukkah, and mark it with the Hebrew letters nun, gimel, hei and shin, which stand for 'a great miracle happened there'. They test and adjust the spindle to discover that a top spins longest when its weight is balanced exactly around the centre.
Dreidel Maths Challenge
Children play the traditional dreidel game with counters and keep a tally of 100 spins to test whether each letter really comes up about a quarter of the time. They learn about probability, fractions and fair tests, and the rules of the game: nun means nothing, gimel take everything, hei take half and shin put one in.
Blue-and-Silver Star Garland
Young children make a sparkly garland of blue and silver stars in the colours often used to decorate homes at Hanukkah. They practise cutting, threading and making repeating colour patterns, an important early maths skill.
Oil-and-Water Mystery Jar
Children find out that oil and water refuse to mix and that oil always floats on top because it is less dense, then use washing-up liquid to break the oil into tiny droplets. It links to the Hanukkah story of the small jar of olive oil that lit the Temple lamp for eight days, and explains why the Hanukkah foods fried in oil are so special.
Jam-Filled Sufganiyot Muffins
Children bake sugar-dusted, jam-filled muffins inspired by sufganiyot, the doughnuts eaten at Hanukkah (especially in Israel) that are traditionally fried in oil to remember the Temple oil. They practise weighing and mixing, learn how baking powder makes the batter rise, and pipe jam into the centre like real doughnut makers.