Puppets for Storytelling: Making Stick Puppets

In my storytelling sessions, I love doing read aloud from well chosen picture books and illustrated story books. I also do participative telling from the oral tradition.

Since storytelling is also a visual art, I make use of flashcards/kamishibai, cultural artifacts like gangsa, rainmaker, malong and tubao. I use puppets as well. These various devices and tools keep the storytelling encounter exciting. It drives boredom away. Props and puppets aid in extending the imaginative power a notch further leading young listeners to a clearer understanding and enjoyment of the story.

Here's a simple step by step procedure in making a stick puppet. The needed materials are as follows: bond papers, patterns or cut outs, coloring materials, scissors, adhesive tape, chopsticks or barbecue sticks.

 a. Draw on a clean sheet of paper the chosen animal, plant or object, person or thing for puppet making.

b. Free downloadable or reproducible art or graphics may also be used. For this purpose, I used a set of animal patterns from the book Best of Dr. Jean Puppets and Storytime.

c. Color the patterns using crayons, oil pastel/craypas, markers or color pencils.

d. Cut the patterns. Be careful! Very young children may need assistance or a blunt pair of scissors when cutting.

e. Get some chopsticks. Paste or stick the cut animal patterns on the chopstick using adhesive tape.

That's it! Ready for story time!

I use these puppets for the folk story, Father Rat Finds a Midwife from Tales From the 7,000 Isles: Filipino Folk Stories (de Las Casas and Gagatiga, 2011). Click the link for a story script that can be used for a puppet show.

Have fun!