Night Moon Paper Plate {Tutorial} Plus {Review}

January 2, 2018January 27, 2021 acraftyarab Arab Book, Book Tutorial, Islamic resource

We made this night moon paper plate after I received the book Night of the Moon by Hena Khan from her publisher, Chronicle books, I got so excited because it helps explain the moon phases. We have done several moon crafts in our studio to help learn the difference between the Gregorian and Hijri calendars.

Happy 2018! Let’s celebrate the new year by reviewing a book to kick off Multicultural Children’s Book Day on January 27th.

To see the phases showcased in this book, throughout the month of Ramadan, was fantastic. Especially as we learn them through the eyes of Yasmeen, a young Pakistani-American girl.

When Yasmeen is shown the crescent moon, her mom explains “it means a new month is beginning” for Ramadan. Yasmeen then sees the moon in its different phases, as the month progresses, ending with Eid. We are also exposed to Chaand Raat, a popular cultural tradition from South Asia, also called Night of the Moon celebration.

The book illustrations are beautiful, often casting the words in arabesque windows that complement the windows Yasmeen looks out of, while gazing at the moon.

We used two paper plates to also create a “window” to showcase our moon phases. Now as we are reading the book, we can change out our moons to match the story.

Supplies

Paper dessert plates – 2
Foam glue dots
Glue
Cardstock
Black paint
Foam brush
Color markers
Sharpie
Xacto
Circle punch
Craft sticks

We used the moons in the corners of the book cover to decide how many circles we needed to cut out total: 8, two for each side.

To create the different phases of the moon, we put the circles back in the punch and offset the cuts. Thinner moons means putting almost the whole circle back into the punch.

While our thicker moons needed to be cut slightly larger.

We used the left over cardstock to create a mosque template to outline on the top paper plate.

Once it was outlined, we used the xacto to cut around the roof and the inner circle of the plate. We used our markers to decorate the mosque, just like in the book.

We also used the markers to outline all eight moons.

We pulled out our black paint next. We painted the plate, around the mosque, and both sides of our craft sticks.

We also painted our second plate, that will be our background.

By now, our craft sticks were dry and we were able to add our moons to the ends. We matched the two sides to each other, and making sure the outlines were facing out.

After we had finished our four craft sticks, we turned our attention back to the plates. We added foam stickers around the outside of the black, plain plate. We didn’t place any at the bottom, where the mosque will goes, so that we can move the moon across the night sky with our stick.