Kids Greek Mythology Craft: Pandora’s Box Shoebox Craft

Learn how to make this super fun shoebox craft based off the Greek myth of Pandora’s box! Making this Greek mythology inspired shoebox craft will be super fun and super easy! You’ll get to make your very own Greek pottery inspired shoebox to store all your trinkets and treasures in, and learn about the Greek myth of Pandora’s box.

This easy Pandora’s box shoebox craft is great for kids in elementary school or older, and can be done at home or in the classroom. Kids will learn how to use their motor skills, exercise their creativity, all while learning about Greek mythology.

Find out more about the Greek myth of Pandora’s box at the end of this article!

Easy pandora’s box shoebox craft

Do you want to make your own greek mythology inspired shoebox craft? Here’s a fun guide on how to make it!

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Supplies needed to make your own pandora’s box

how to make your own pandora’s box shoebox craft

Step one

Gather all your supplies together and prepare your workspace for the craft.

Step two

Using your white paint, paint all the sides (except the bottom) and lid of your box white. You may need a couple of layers of white paint if your box is darker. My box is pretty dark, so I’ll need three or more layers.

Step three

After you’ve painted on your layers of white paint and let it dry, grab your orange paint and paint all the sides (except the bottom) and lid of the box orange. Let the paint dry.

Step four

Taking a pencil, carefully sketch on some patterns inspired by Greek black-figure and red-figure pottery. Here are a few examples of the designs I decided to do! Feel free to get creative and make something unique!

Here is a link to some examples of this style of Greek pottery: The Met: Athenian Vase Painting: Black- and Red-Figure Techniques

Step five

Once you are finished sketching your design, take some black paint and a fine bristle paint brush and carefully paint over your designs.

Its ok if you mess up, painting on a small scale can be difficult! If you’ve made a mistake, wait for the paint to dry and carefully cover it up with some orange paint.

Finished Kids GReek Mythology craft: pandora’s box shoebox craft

Once all the paint has dried and you’re happy with your design, the box is all finished! Doesn’t it look so cool? Tell us what you created in the comments below, we’d love to hear about it!

tips for making your own pandora’s box shoebox craft

• If you mess up on the designs, wait for the paint to dry and clean your small paint brush. Carefully clean up your mistakes with a little bit of the orange paint.
• Use a hair drier to help the paint dry faster.
• Look up references of Ancient Greek pottery designs to add to your box.

my experience with this craft

The idea for this craft came to me one day in my Elementary Latin class. We were reading the latin version of Pandora’s box from 38 Latin Stories 5th edition and I thought that making a shoebox craft based off the myth would be a fun idea! I also thought that this craft could be a sort of successor to my Greek Pottery craft that I had done during the summer.

Making the box itself was relatively easy with little issue. I only had trouble trying to erase the pencil sketches, but I found that painting over them was much easier than trying to erase. I would recommend you do the same if you run into the same issue!

Usually whenever I finish making a craft for a post I never know what to do with the end result! I usually end up giving it to one of my friends or family members, or I just keep the craft along with all the other trinkets I have. However, for this craft I decided to use it as storage! Since February 2023, I have begun to collect cassettes and I found that my converse shoebox would be the perfect place to store them. What did you end up using your Pandora’s box craft for, and/or what did you store inside of it? Let us know!

The myth of pandora’s box for kids

Prometheus and Epimetheus

During the early days of Earth, Zeus, the king of the Olympian gods, wished to populate the Earth with all sorts of plants, animals, and a new idea he had called “man.” In order to do this he asked the Titian brothers Prometheus and Epimetheus to help him in creation. Zeus gave them many gifts and blessings to bestow upon the new Earth. Epimetheus was careless with the blessings and used all of them on nature, leaving nothing to be used to create man. Prometheus scolded his brother for not thinking ahead and then got to work making man. He fashioned them out of clay and brought them to life with the help of Eros, who gave man spirit and personality, and Athena, who gave man a soul.

Prometheus and Epimetheus looked upon their work fondly, proud of what they had created. However, Prometheus felt bad that man had no blessings bestowed upon man! How would he give all the men some sort of great power? He though for a very long time until he got an idea, he could give man the gift of fire! Fire was something that only the Gods could hold, so he had to be careful. If they found out that he was stealing their divine fire, they would be furious!

Prometheus steals olympian fire

One especially dark night, Prometheus snuck up to Mount Olympus and snatched some fire to bring back to man. He carefully hid the fire under his robes and he made his way down Mount Olympus and none of the Gods, sleeping or waking, even knew he was there.

Prometheus gave his gift to all the men on Earth and watched happily as man began to use it to create lights, cook food, and do so many activities. But mans use of fire did not go unnoticed!

One night as Zeus gazed down on the Earth he noticed a bunch of strange lights around the cities and villages of man. Curious, he came down from Mount Olympus and saw that man was using fire! Zeus was filled with fury! He knew that clever Prometheus must have done this, so he quickly ran to Prometheus and captured him.

To punish Prometheus for his crime, Zeus chained him to a cliff deep in the Caucasian Mountains. He summoned a vulture to feast upon Prometheus’s liver which would cause Prometheus much pain and agony. At night the vulture would sleeping, allowing for Prometheus’s liver to regrow, and in the morning the vulture would terrorize him again. The cycle repeated for many many years.

Zeus, although happy Prometheus had been punished, was still unsatisfied. He spoke with the other Olympian Gods and decided that man mush be punished in some way.

the birth of pandora

After much deliberation, the gods decided to make the first woman. Hephaestus, the god of the forge, constructed her body, Aphrodite, the goddess of beauty, gave her beauty and charm, Athena, the goddess of wisdom, gave her skills in cooking, weaving, and the arts, and all the gods gave her many gifts and talents. Finally, she was given the name Pandora, meaning “all-gifted” by Hermes, the god of roads and travel. Before she was sent down to Earth, Pandora was given one more gift. Zeus handed Pandora a large, heavy box and told her that she must never open it, no matter the circumstances.

Hermes led Pandora to Earth and took her to Prometheus and Epimetheus. Hermes explained that Pandora, and the box, were a gift for them! Prometheus immediately knew something was wrong and warned his brother to be careful, but Epimetheus did not heed his warning.

Upon seeing Pandora, Epimetheus fell in love with her and thanked Hermes profusely. Hermes wished the brother well and went back to Olympus. Epimetheus and Pandora decided to get married and lived in a small house, they kept the box in their house.

Pandora and Epimetheus lived together happily for many years, but Pandora could not ignore the box. Every time she looked upon it she felt a need to know just what was inside the box! Though her will was strong and she resisted her curiosity.

What’s in the box?

One day when Pandora was in the house she heard a faint whisper. She searched the house trying to find where it was coming from until she discovered that the box was whispering to her. The box begged her to open it! Pandora tried to ignore the box’s pleas, but its whispers got louder and louder and louder until Pandora couldn’t take it anymore!

She swiftly opened the lid of the box and as she did monstrous horrors of all shapes and sized emerged from the box! The box was not a gift, clever Zeus had hidden all thing evil in the world in the box! Pandora desperately clawed at the horrors coming from the box and closed the lid, but it was too late. All the evil had already escaped!Pandora felt true sadness and remorse for the first time and wept to herself.

As she cried, Pandora heard a faint twinkling sound coming from the box. Through teary eyes, she looked at it and saw a light peaking out under the shut lid. Cautiously opened the box once again, but instead of evil inside she saw hope! She was filled with joy as hope flew out of the box and into the world.

Pandora’s box educational video

Here is a fun and educational video about Pandora’s box by Ted-ED!

MORE HISTORY FUN AND ACTIVITIES FROM KIDS ACTIVITIES BLOG

How did your box turn out? Let us know in the comments!

Sources

2017. Epic Tales: Greek Myths and Tales. “Pandora.” Flame Tree Publishing.

Bierlein, J. F. 1994. Parallel Myths. Random House. 

Department of Greek and Roman Art. 1AD. “Athenian Vase Painting: Black- and Red-Figure Techniques: Essay: The Metropolitan Museum of Art: Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History.” The Met’s Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History. January 1. www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/vase/hd_vase.htm.

Groton, Anne H., James M. May, Richard A. LaFleur, and Frederic M. Wheelock. 2003. Thirty-Eight Latin Stories: Designed to Accompany Wheelock’s Latin: Fifth Revised Edition, 1995. Wauconda, IL: Bolchazy-Carducci. 

Overly Sarcastic Productions. “Miscellaneous Myths: Pandora.” 2017. YouTube. YouTube. September 24. www.youtube.com/watch?v=geaJPQkDXKk.

TED-ed. “The Myth of Pandora’s Box – Iseult Gillespie.” 2019. YouTube. YouTube. January 15. www.youtube.com/watch?v=pMdJxVjZMRI.