Enjoy with everyday materials! Fun ideas for making oden
Oden, a popular winter craft! Why not try a fun project with children using colorful construction paper, felt, and yarn? With paper daikon radish, felt mochi pouches, and konnyaku knitted from yarn, you can create a warm, cozy world of oden using a variety of materials.
It’s a classic winter activity that everyone can enjoy together, whether at home, daycare, or kindergarten.
Let your imagination run wild and create your very own original oden! Note: Because the children’s creations are treated as works of art, the term used in the text is “制作 (seisaku)” rather than “製作 (seisaku).”
Have fun with familiar materials! Enjoyable Oden Craft Ideas (1–10)
A wall display of oden that even two-year-olds can enjoy!
Stick this on the wall and it’s sure to make you hungry! First, cut out the shapes of a pot and soup from construction paper and glue them in place.
Next, cut out your favorite oden ingredients from construction paper.
If teachers at kindergartens or nurseries, or parents/guardians, pre-draw the shapes of various oden ingredients on the paper, children will only need to do the cutting.
Once the ingredients are cut out, arrange and paste them however you like inside the pot you made at the start—that’s it! Paste lots of your favorite ingredients and complete your very own original oden pot.
Easy way to make oden
https://www.tiktok.com/@hoikusi1/video/7333363523050917122Let’s add oden ingredients to a paper pot filled with soup! For children old enough to use scissors, draw only guide lines on construction paper and have them cut out the ingredient shapes themselves.
Then they can glue the pieces onto the soup and draw patterns or details.
For younger children who can’t use scissors yet, prepare the ingredient parts in advance and stick double-sided tape on the back so they can enjoy placing them like stickers.
In addition to classics like daikon radish, konnyaku, eggs, and mochi pouches, it’s also fun to think about what other ingredients to include.
Everyone’s favorite! Oden delivery
https://www.instagram.com/reel/DD4K5lSzyY5/We’re going to put odeng (Japanese hot pot) ingredients made from origami into a pot made from construction paper.
First, fold gray origami paper into a triangle and stick on a round sticker to make konnyaku.
Next, fold white origami paper into a triangle, stuff some crumpled tissue or similar inside, and glue the edges to make hanpen.
Fold the corners of yellow origami inward to round them, draw the pattern, and you’ve got daikon.
With light orange origami, keep the white side facing up, fold it into a long narrow strip, and stick on a round sticker colored brown to make chikuwa-bu.
For the egg, layer white and yellow construction paper cut into circles.
Paste the finished ingredients into the pot, draw steam, add a noren curtain, and you’re done!
Fun in winter! Let’s play Oden shop
https://www.tiktok.com/@taisougakuen_osaka_ikuno/video/7199952165304077570Here’s a humorous craft idea where children transform into oden shop owners.
The oden ingredients are made by cutting and pasting construction paper and drawing patterns with pens.
Stick those into a paper pot you’ve made.
Glue the pot near the bottom of a large backing sheet, and above it, attach photos of the children with twisted headbands and their arms folded.
Finally, hang a noren curtain at the top of the backing sheet to finish! The children also write the characters on the noren, and each one gives the shop its own unique vibe.
Oden that can also become a wall!
https://www.tiktok.com/@chuwakosan.hoiku/video/7171736034940620033Here’s a craft project for making oden that even toddlers can do, and it can also be used for wall displays! First, let’s make the oden shop.
Cut colored construction paper into a face shape, then draw or glue on the oden shopkeeper’s facial features.
For very young children, prepare the face parts in advance.
Apply glue to the head area and stick on yarn hair piece by piece.
It’ll be fun to have yarn in various colors.
Next, let’s make the oden ingredients.
Stamp the konnyaku pattern using a cotton swab, make lots of your favorite ingredients, and then glue them onto colored construction paper of your choice to finish!
Make oden together with adults! From 0-year-old children
https://www.instagram.com/reel/DE12lDRptaU/This is a craft activity where you stick oden ingredients made from construction paper onto a paper plate.
Depending on age, children can enjoy mainly sticking on pre-made pieces, or they can cut construction paper with scissors, draw patterns, and make the ingredients themselves.
The examples shown here include konnyaku, mochi-filled pouches, and kelp rolls.
There are many other classic oden ingredients too, so it would be fun to freely create them with construction paper.
It’s an idea that excites viewers as well, as they can see what kind of oden each child has made.
Kids can play with it! Felt Oden
https://www.tiktok.com/@nuinui._.p/video/7464574693660544274How about this for your child’s pretend play? If you stuff yellow felt with cotton and tie it with white felt, you get a kinchaku-style rice cake pouch.
Stuff cotton into a triangle made from gray felt to make konnyaku.
You can also make chikuwa by rolling light orange felt into a tube and attaching small brown felt pieces, and make daikon by shaping beige felt into a tire shape and stuffing it with cotton.
Since these use soft materials, it’s a safe and highly recommended idea for small children to play with!