A field of paper poppies

I have an image in my head - the local soccer field covered in red paper poppies - made and planted by students in our community.

I approached my son's school, and the paper poppies were quickly accepted

I made a poppy, then a template, and finally an instruction sheet for the teachers:

Materials:

• Two red construction paper squares about 10cm x 10cm with petal pattern
• One black construction paper square 2.5cm x 2.5cm
• scissors
• glue
• tape
• skewer

Step 1: Cut out the petal pattern. One stays in a full piece, one is cut into four petals

Step 2: Take the attached petals. Make three accordion folds in one direction, three in the opposite direction

Step 3: Fold each petal with three accordion folds

Step 4: Glue individual petals to the solid petal, staggering them (not lined up)

Step 5: cut out a circle from the black paper & glue black circle to center of poppy

Step 7: Tape wooden skewer to back of poppy.

If you decide to forgo the accordion fold, you will still have a nice flower:

Bonus: Have students write a fallen Canadian soldier's name on the back of the poppy. Canada At War records the names of 63,322 Canadian soldiers who died in World War I, alone. In order to plant enough poppies to honor every soldier, in a school with 300 students, each child would need to make 211 poppies.