An Election Sign

Following my blog post on teaching children about the election in a non-partisan way, I thought that I would share a project we've been working on.  We have been on the hunt for election signs...searching out the car windows and finding them while biking around the neighborhood.  We count them, talk about what color they are, what the names of the candidates are, guess at who might have put them out.  Today we decided to make our OWN election sign for our front yard.  Rather than back a particular candidate, we made a sign reminding people to vote on Tuesday.  The Election happens to fall on Matias' birthday this year- so he is particularly excited to have NOVEMBER 6th on the sign.

Here are the steps:

Gather red, white, blue and yellow paint, some sort of sign (weather-proof it you plan to put it outside) and acrylic sealer.

Print off an American flag from Google Images and trace it onto the wood with a pencil (push hard).

Paint the sign white, including the flag, except for the blue star portion.

Using blue painter's tape, section off the stripes and paint in the red and blue.  Add 50 yellow dots for stars. 

Paint your message on the sign- I wrote it in pencil and Matias painted over it.

We used a hair dryer to dry the paint as we went along so we didn't have to wait.  Spray the sign with acrylic sealer, let it dry and display it proudly.