If you are professionally engaged with children or just spend a lot of time with kids, you constantly need to look for new entertainment for fidgets. A great idea is to create a puppet theater with your own hands in a kindergarten or at home. There are a lot of ways to implement such an idea, while the guys can participate not only in the organization of performances, but also in the creation of characters. Choose your favorite options and use them in your work or family vacation.
DIY puppet theater in kindergarten
Of the many interesting entertainments, this is one of the most useful, as it allows you to immediately develop a large number of skills and abilities, stimulates the development of imagination, creative thinking, speech, the ability to logically build a narrative, etc. If you invite children to create their own favorite characters themselves , the process will be even more fun.
You can organize a theater using a screen or on a table. As for dolls, they are also performed in different ways. From the point of view of design, they are as follows:
- on sticks;
- on solid bases, for example, on wooden or cardboard;
- made in the form of mittens;
- put on fingers.
According to the manufacturing technology, different options are also offered:
- stitched;
- crocheted;
- glued from paper or cardboard;
- also use plasticine, papier-mâché technique and any combined methods.
As you can see, there is a choice. Assume that it’s easier for you to make, or where you can attract children, or simply from your favorite needlework techniques and available materials.
Materials and Tools
To make a puppet theater with your own hands in a kindergarten or at home, you will have to make the following:
- screen;
- characters of the presentation;
- Scenery.
To create all this, you can choose one material or different, combining fabric, cardboard, paper and knitted details. In any case, the list will be approximately as follows:
- cardboard;
- paper;
- pencil;
- ruler;
- glue;
- the cloth;
- yarn;
- decorative elements;
- paints and brush.
Of course, everything will depend on which creation method you prefer.
How to make a screen for a puppet theater
If you show a presentation on a table and use heroes who are depicted in full growth and have a solid base to stand on a horizontal surface, you do not need a screen. If you want to create an atmosphere of a true professional performance, it’s worthwhile to make this theatrical attribute. A screen can be like this:
- desktop;
- outdoor;
- hanging from fabric.
The latter option is the easiest to manufacture. To do this, just pull a flap of beautiful material, in the middle of which a window is cut for presentation. You can hang such a screen in the doorway or between any two supports. Decorations are easy to attach with clothespins, which are best decorated with flowers or anything else.
Floor and table designs differ only in size. Otherwise, they can be identical both in appearance and in the material used. Most often, such a screen is made in the form of a folding or prefabricated system of three faces, a facade and side parts. As a basis use wood, cardboard or plastic. The form may resemble a house or any suitable object. Outside, a screen for a puppet theater is usually pasted over with a cloth, and curtains are hung in the window. You can offer children to paint the facade or perform an application. Any of the options is quite simple.
Paper Theater
This is the easiest to process and affordable material. When you decide on the choice of a fairy tale, it will be clear what kind of decoration characters will be required. The easiest way to make a puppet theater out of paper is to find suitable images of the corresponding characters on the Internet, print color pictures, cut and attach them to any base. You can use sticks, for example, felt-tip pens or wooden cubes, in which to perform a groove, where to fix paper heroes with glue, sealant or other material. To give strength to the characters, it is better to stick them on cardboard. It will be harder to cut, but they will last clearly longer.
If you know how to draw, you can create the necessary characters completely independently or entrust the coloring of ready-made outline templates (drawn or printed) to children.
Scenery can be created in exactly the same way. If you want more creativity, use any technique and paper processing method: from ordinary applications to origami and quilling.
Beautiful cartoon characters
Do you want to learn how to make a puppet theater using unnecessary scraps and a needle and thread? It is as easy as working with paper. The easiest way to create heroes is from fleece or felt. These materials do not require edge treatment, elements can be sewn along the front side, and some decor can even be glued (for example, eyes, noses, etc.)
If you are a great specialist in needlework and you have enough time to create masterpieces, sew heroes for the theater in the form of voluminous dolls or soft toys. Such characters will be not only magnificent participants in the children's performance, but also an excellent decoration of the interior.
As you can see, it’s not difficult to make a puppet theater with your own hands in a kindergarten or at home. Choose your favorite method, fairy tale for presentation and start creating magic for children and with them.