Lesson Plan:
Cutting Up with Paper
Paper, a Chinese Invention
Description
A hand-eye coordination activity. Teachers describe how paper was invented in China
and the many uses people found for it over the years. Younger students replicate a
Chinese cutout, a festive paper product still seen all over the Chinese world today.
Objectives/Skills

Hand-eye coordination

Listening comprehension

Chronological thinking
Assessment
Paper cut outs
Questions
Why is paper important historically? And today?
Procedure
1.
Describe the paper's history and the many important roles it played:
Did you know that paper was invented in China more than 2,000 years ago? The Chinese
wrote on paper almost 1,000 years before Europeans did.
The earliest paper was thick and strong, made from the bark of the mulberry tree. It wasn't
much good for writing on, but it was good for lots of other things. The Chinese made
clothes, blankets, and even shoes out of the heavy paper. Soldiers wore paper armor. The
generals said paper was better than metal because it didn't rust when the soldiers got
rained on.
The Chinese found more uses for their innovation. They made playing cards and paper
money by stamping pictures and words onto paper (the first printing!). Paper money was
called "flying money" because it was so light compared with metal coins that it could blow
away in the wind. They spread oil on paper and made waterproof umbrellas. They glued it
to the walls and invented wallpaper. The Chinese even made toilet paper!
Shortly after inventing paper, the people in northern China began cutting the paper into
beautiful designs. Today, the Chinese use paper cuttings for celebrations, festivals, and
home decoration. Often, paper cuttings are used to bring luck. Lucky paper cuttings are
made on red paper. To the Chinese, red is a lucky color.
2.
First practice, using the pattern that is linked below. Then try one on your own. Trace the
fish pattern (below) on scrap paper. Trace all around the fish, and the inside shapes, too.
3.
Cut out the fish with scissors. Make sure you cut only on the lines. This scrap paper fish
is called a stencil.
4.
Put your stencil on the red construction paper. With your pencil, trace around the stencil.
Don't forget to trace the inside shapes.
5.
Cut along the lines with your scissors. Hang up your fish for good luck!
6.
Now, try one on your own. Make a stencil by drawing a design on scrap paper. Draw an
outside shape and some inside shapes. (Just make sure that none of the inside lines go all
the way through the design. That's the tricky part.)
Extension
Students may write or describe the history of paper in China, and how their cut-outs
relate to the historical overview they heard earlier.
Copyright 1997. Author: Anne Austin , Holly Hutto.
http://www.askasia.org/teachers/lessons/plan.php?no=35&era=&grade=&geo=