Make your own puppets

Do you want to stage a puppet show with your class? Are you looking for a great project for a youth group in summer camp?
Animaplates puppets are fun to make, easy to manipulate and they allow kids to fully express their creativity.
If the children write their own texts, your puppet project will combine several learning subjects: visual arts, written language, media language and drama. And imagine how motivated they will be to present a show to the other classes of the school or to their parents!

Animaplates in school

Last week, I presented Animaplates to the staff of a daycare centre associated with a school in Quebec. The educators were delighted to see all the possibilities. They had already started using their Animaplates subscription to build fish with the kids.
That school is now testing our new school subscription, which will soon be available to all schools and daycare centres that would like it. If you are interested, contact us using the application form on our web site.
Next week, I am giving puppet making workshops at two schools in the Ottawa area. I am looking forward to see the kids create their puppets and then use them in a sketch.

Budding builders

Wow! Two hectic weeks are behind me now, during which almost a thousand kids and their families built their "dream house" in my workshops at the Canada Science and Technology Museum. The kids loved painting the roof and making the windows and most of all they loved decorating their house with flowers, butterflies and other punched-out shapes.

I am always delighted to see the creativity that an activity like this brings out in children.
A big thank you to my volunteer helpers who did a great job ensuring everything went smoothly!


Here is a small selection from the comments left by the children and their parents. I think this shows that they had as much fun as I did:
(March 12) That was the funnest thing in the building.
(March 13) Highlight of the visit.  Thank you!  Very well organized and friendly helpers
(March 15) Great idea.  My girls had sooo much fun doing their homes. Attie Family
(March 16) Wonderful organization.  Clear instructions and great help! Thank you.  Our finished houses look great! !  Carolyn, Colin, Erin and Kira
This was a great craft, easy and fun.  Thanks.  Bert and Emma

(March 17) A fun activity – even for my three year old!  Thanks!
(March 18) I loved doing this awesome craft!  It was superb!  Thanks!  Juliana
(March 19) I like making the house.  This place is awesome!  Justin

Animaplates village

Not long ago, the Science and Technology Museum asked me if I could give workshops on the theme "architecture". Of course I said yes, and the ideas came flowing into my head right away.  Sometimes I wonder where these ideas come from. People around me were also intrigued: they know I make animals and puppets; they find a chess set a stretch; but houses made with paper plates, that was too much.

Well, it wasn't too much. Of course, going from the spark of an idea to a finished project takes some work but that's a part I find very exciting. To show the houses in context, I even made a scale model of a village complete with roads, pond, bridge and playground.

The workshops will be one hour each, so the projects could not be too complex. In order to make them netvertheless interesting and to allow the children to express their creativity, I am proposing several variants of round houses, of different heights and made with different colours of cardboard. The kids will design and cut their own windows and doors and put cellophane behind the windows if they want (I used to love that as a child).

If you live in the Ottawa-Gatineau area, take your kids to the museum and let them have fun with Animaplates on February 26 and 27 as well as March 5, 6, 12, 13 and 15 to 19. If you are elsewhere, you'll soon be able to organize your own workshop with your kids or with your students because I will be publishing these projects on the Animaplates website.

Children speak through their puppets - the puppets give them a voice

Yesterday I gave a puppet-making workshop in a grade 6 class. The kids loved it.

For teachers, puppets are a marvelous vehicle for combining several teachings in a series of activities that the students don't experience as a lesson. For starters, visual arts and especially three-dimensional constructions involve the brain in a way that is beneficial for other subject matters such as math, science etc. Then, once the puppets are made, the students can write sketches to act out with their puppets. Alternatively, existing stories or fables can be used as a starting point. This approach is in fact an excellent exercise in written and spoken language. I have seen shy students shine as actors in a play because they could speak through their puppet.
You can take this one fun step further and let the students organize a puppet show for the younger classes. This empowers them and it promotes a team spirit in the school.
In another school where I have done a puppet workshop, we filmed the show.  You can see some excerpts (in French) on YouTube.

Paper plate crafts offer endless possibilities

And that's what this blog will be about.
You're going to be surprised. Puppets, piggy banks, birds and all kinds of animals, Christmas ornaments, Easter decorations, even a complete chess set.  Have a look at my website.