Tongue Depressor Kazoo

Make your own New Year's Eve noisemakers.
This activity uses low cost items- just ask your doctor or dentist for a few tongue depressors when you visit. You can also buy tongue depressors from medical supply companies- 100 for about $5.00. Or buy oversized craft sticks at your local craft supply store. If you are lucky, they might even come in a variety of colors.
This activity also provides great sensory feedback to the mouth...great for speech development.

You will need: scissors, ruler, straw, 1 large and 2 small rubber bands, 2 tongue depressors. 

Cut straw into 2 approximately 2 inch pieces. 

Place large rubber band around 1 of the tongue depressors. Slip one piece of straw under the stretched rubber band.

Place the other straw piece on top of the rubber band.

Place the second tongue depressor on top.

Secure a small rubber band to each end until it is on securely. We wrapped ours around 3 times.

View from the top.

View from the bottom. 

You can also make a kazoo using mostly the same materials but substituting strips of scrap paper wrapped with tape for straws.

For this version you will need: scissors, tape, scrap paper, 2 tongue depressors, 1 large and 2 small rubber bands. 

Cut a strip of paper roughly 3/4 of an inch wide. 

Cut each strip into roughly 2 1/2 inch long strips. 

Wrap each strip around a tongue depressor, taping to cover the entire strip of paper. 

Wrap the large rubber band along the length of the tongue depressor with the wrapped paper strips. 

Stack the rubber band wrapped tongue depressor onto the plain tongue depressor. 

Wrap a small rubber band around the ends of the tongue depressor "sandwich" so they are taut. 

We wrapped our small bands around 3 times. 

View from top.

View from bottom.

This is a very forgiving project. Thickness of paper, length of paper and tape and thickness of rubber bands are all flexible. Experiment with what you have on hand!

Have a Happy New Year!