Gingerbread House Template for Kids
Plain walls, a plain roof and a size small hands can manage. Or size the house to fit graham crackers, and skip the dough.
Keep it simple
For a first house, resist doors and windows: every cut-out is a weak spot. Leave the walls plain, build the box, add the roof, and put the effort into the candy.
Graham cracker houses
Crackers are already baked, flat and the same thickness. The cracker option sizes the house so that nothing is bigger than a half-sheet. Thick royal icing is the glue; let each wall set for a few minutes while you hold it, then work on the next.
A kid-friendly order of work
- Print and cut the paper pieces. Lay them on dough or crackers.
- A grown-up bakes and cools the pieces.
- Kids pipe icing along the base and the wall edges and stand the walls up.
- Add the roof and leave it to dry before decorating.
Questions
What is the easiest gingerbread house for kids?
The Classic gable house: four plain walls and two roof panels. No doors or windows cut out, no extras. It goes together with icing in about ten minutes.
How does the graham cracker option work?
It sets a house whose walls and roof panels each fit on one graham cracker half-sheet (about 2½ × 5 inches). Hold a cracker against the printed piece, snap along it with a serrated knife, and glue with icing.
What size dough house is good for little hands?
Around 4 to 5 inches wide and 4 inches to the peak, with dough rolled to ¼ inch. Smaller pieces break; bigger ones get heavy.
Who cuts out the pieces?
A grown-up should cut dough and use the oven. Kids can trace the paper pieces onto dough with a blunt tool, and handle the icing and candy.
Does the template allow for the thickness of the dough?
Yes. Enter the thickness you roll to. The front and back walls stand outside the side walls, so each side wall is shortened by two thicknesses; the roof panels are sized to the sloped gable edges. The house you describe is the outside size you get.