MEDIEVAL CASTLE

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Suggested books and videos:

Castle, by David Macaulay

Video: Castles for Kids: What is a Castle? Medieval History for Children: https://youtu.be/AesgRREuCQI

The Very Last Castle, by Travis Jonker and pictures by Mark Pett - Read aloud: https://youtu.be/4d2ECZ_Osso

Creating with recycled materials found in your home is

always a great way for children to learn not just creativity

but about recycling, re-using and taking care of our

beautiful planet Earth, our home. With this project you

will also learn about castles and history.

Materials:

Small brown corrugated box

Empty paper towel rolls (four)

Empty toilet paper rolls (two)

Clear tape

White paper

Pencil and black marker (maybe a red

marker as well)

Paint (red, brown, white)

Scissors

A container with water

Watercolor brush

Paper plate (to mix the paint in)

Elmer’s Glue

Baking cups and/or Styrofoam egg carton (any color)

Toothpicks (four)

Grade: 3 - 5

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Instructions:

With the clear tape, tape the box closed on all sides.

On the side of the box that will become the front of

the castle (not any side that’s been taped), draw a

large castle gate (see photo on right).

With red paint, paint the inside of the gate in red. If

you don’t have red paint you can use red marker, but

it may not come out so bright.

With a black marker, outline the castle gate and then

draw some “bars” from top to bottom and others

from one side to the other. These will be the “bars” of

the gate.

NOTE: The front castle gate consisted of an outer

“barred” front gate that could be left open to allow air

and light in, and a strong inner wood gate behind it to

close off the entry entirely.

MEDIEVAL CASTLE

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Instructions:

On a piece of white paper, measure with the ruler 1”

from each long side of the paper and make a small mark.

Using the marks as guidelines, raw a straight line from

one side of the paper to the other.

Above the straight line, draw the “battlement” wall. Fol-

low the design as closely as possible to the drawing

shown on the right. One section is wide, the next sec-

tion should be thinner, and continue….wide, thin, wide,

thin until you get to the end of the paper.

Cut the bottom straight line of the “battlement wall” that

you’ve drawn.

Now carefully cut the top of the battlement wall, wide

section then inside the thin section. Continue cutting to

the end.

The photo on the right shows the battlement wall that

was cut (on the bottom). The top portion of paper is just

waste and you can throw it away.

MEDIEVAL CASTLE

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Instructions:

Take the battlement wall you just cut and use it

as a template to draw two more battlement

walls.

The photo on the right shows three battlement

walls that I drew using the template. You may

only need three battlement wall strips; it all

depends on the size of the box you are using.

Now we will mix some light brown

paint by mixing brown with white paint

(see photos on left)

With the light brown paint, paint all the battle-

ment walls. Paint one side first and then let dry

completely. If you desire to paint both sides of

each wall, paint the backs of the walls once the

fronts you just painted are dry.

MEDIEVAL CASTLE

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Instructions:

Apply Elmer’s glue all along the top edge of the box;

front, both sides and back.

Once the blue has been applied all around, glue the

painted (and dried) battlement walls all along the top

edge of the box.

Your main castle box should look like this one on the

right.

MEDIEVAL CASTLE

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Instructions:

Get the two SMALL toilet paper rolls. Apply Elmer’s

glue all around the very top of each of the smaller

toilet paper rolls.

Glue the battlement wall all along the very top each

roll. You should now have two gatehouses with

battlement walls on top.

NOTE: These small rolls will become the two gatehouses

that a castle had on each side of it’s gate. I had previous-

ly drawn the windows on the roll, but don’t draw the

windows just yet.

Apply glue to each side of the castle gate as shown in

the photo on the right.

Attach the two gatehouses to

each side of the gate over the

glue you already applied. Let

dry completely.

MEDIEVAL CASTLE

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Instructions:

Now pick up the four paper towel rolls.

NOTE: Even though photo on right shows that I drew the

windows, do not draw the windows just yet.

Apply Elmer’s glue to each side of the box; one long

strip of glue along one edge and another along the

other edge on one side and the same on the other

side (NOT in the front of the box where you already

have the gatehouses).

Glue one of the paper roll “towers” on each side of

the box. Photo below shows how it has to look when

finished gluing.

MEDIEVAL CASTLE

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Instructions:

Cut off two sections from the Styrofoam egg carton

(preferably the corner ends) as shown on the right.

NOTE: If you don’t have Styrofoam egg cartons, you can

use the paper baking cups. Or, if you don’t have the

baking cups, use the egg carton. You can also use a

combination like I did; baking cups in the front towers

and eggshell carton tips on the back towers.

Add some glue to the inside edge of each baking cup

and/or cut-out eggshell piece.

Attach one top to each tower.

At this stage, your castle should look like the photo

on the right.

On the white paper, draw some small triangle and/or

rectangular shapes. These will be the flags for the

tops of the tall towers.

Color and decorate the flags any color you want. You

can use markers or paint to do this.

Once dry (if you used paint), cut the flag shapes.

MEDIEVAL CASTLE

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This art lesson plan is made possible with support from Prime Time Palm Beach County, Inc., which receives significant funding for its overall

operations from the Children’s Services Council of Palm Beach County.

Haydee Ullfig is a Teaching Artist with Center for Creative Education in West Palm Beach, Florida.

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Instructions:

After cutting each flag, glue onto the tips of tooth-

picks. I used the decorative toothpicks only because

those were the only ones I had. You can use simple

toothpicks also.

Now you have four flags ready. Stick one flag to

each top of a tower. Make sure they are facing the

same way. The wind only blows them one way.

NOTE: I decided the windows would look better done

separately and the glued on, not drawn directly on to

the towers.

With the pencil draw window shapes as shown in

the photo on the right. Outline with a black marker.

Paint the inside with red paint or color with red

marker. With the black marker draw the bars in the

windows.

Cut each window.

Glue one window to the front of each tower.

MEDIEVAL CASTLE

Photo on the left shows the completed castle.

(I set up the castle on a black cardboard I had

and with cut out a front road out of grey paper).