Let children get creative with this fun horse’s mane craft, combining colouring, fine motor skills and hands-on construction.
Students begin by colouring the large horse picture and can choose how they would like their horse to look. Once the horse is coloured, the teacher can provide a selection of colourful pipe cleaners for the children to create a bright, fun mane.
How to Use

1. Print on cardstock paper for a strong and durable craft.
2. Allow students to colour the horse.
3. Give students colourful pipe cleaners to create the horse’s mane.
4. Feed each pipe cleaner through a hole in the mane area.
5. Bend the pipe cleaner over at the back to keep it securely in place.
6. Continue adding different colours until the horse has a colourful, creative mane.
   Learning Benefits
   This activity is particularly useful for developing fine motor skills, hand strength, hand-eye coordination and concentration. Bending and manipulating pipe cleaners also gives children valuable opportunities to practise controlling their fingers and hands.
   It can also support colour recognition, creativity and decision-making as children choose which colours to use for their horse’s mane.
   For ESL learners, teachers can practise simple vocabulary such as:
   horse • mane • hair • brown • red • blue • green • pink • yellow
   Children can also practise simple sentences:
   “My horse has a blue mane.”
   “I have a pink pipe cleaner.”
   “I am making a colourful mane.”
   Great for
   This craft works especially well for farm animal lessons, horse-themed units, fine motor centres, early years classrooms, ESL lessons or creative classroom activities.
   Children can make their horses completely different from one another by choosing their own combination of colours, making this a lovely activity for displaying their work in the classroom.

Credits & Copyright
© 2026 Sonyja Murphy. All rights reserved.
This educational resource was created by Sonyja Murphy.
Illustrations in this resource were created with the assistance of AI (ChatGPT by OpenAI) and have been edited and arranged as part of this original educational work.