10 Easy Puppet-Making Projects for Kids

Kids don't need anything fancy to create their own puppets. Feel free to use plenty of extras including paint, markers, glue, fabric pieces, beads, sequins, buttons and whatever is lying around.

SOCKS. The child needs an old but clean sock. For the most elementary of puppets, he can put his hand inside, poke in the material between thumb and fingers to create the mouth cavity. But you can improve it by making eyes with glued buttons or craft store wiggly eyes above the mouth cavity. and you can cut a plastic container lid of appropriate size in half, hinge the two halves together with tape, then glue the whole thing inside the mouth cavity.

POPSICLE STICK PUPPET. Cut out a photo or cartoon of a character the child likes and glue it to the end of a popsicle stick.

PAPER PLATE PUPPET. Another really simple one. Clip two small circles near but not at the bottom for the child's fingers. Now what does he or she want to create? A turkey? Draw feathers, clip them, and glue them on. A spider? Decorate with construction paper legs and some wiggly eyes.

FINGER PUPPETS. Start with a piece felt of fabric. Place the child's hand on the felt and draw with a pen all the way around his index finger. Now, remove hand and draw another line about half an inch around the first line. Draw a line straight across the bottom. Cut the piece out following the outer line. The child can use this piece to make an identical piece by tracing around it on another piece of felt. Clip this one out too. On one piece, put dabs of glue around the curved part of the piece...not across the straight edge. Put the other piece of felt on top. Let the glue dry completely. You now have a basic finger puppet. Use fabric paint of marker to create a face. The child can glue on beads or buttons, yarn for hair, even fabric arms and legs.

ACCORDION PUPPET. Cut a piece of 8x10" construction paper into six 8" strips. (Simply fold the paper in half, then in half again to create the folds along which you can cut.) Glue three strips end-to-end. Do the same with the other three pieces. Join the two lengths together at the ends to make an "L." Then fold the bottom end all the way over to create a reverse "L", but now with a shorter base. Fold the top length all the way down so it's hanging down. Now, fold the base of the "L" back into an even shorter base. Alternate folding top and base until you end with an accordion-like shape. Glue the last fold to hold the end in place and snip off any excess. Clip another piece of construction paper to create a face and glu it on the front end. With the appropriate paper you can make a dragon or a snake or a worm. Glue a popsickle stick between two folds near the front and the back. Decorate the body with a marker or paints. You can also glue on scraps of paper or cotton balls or put on stickers.

SPOON PUPPET. Paint a wooden spoon a proper skin color, let dry, add faces with marker or paint. Glue on yarn for hair, using bits or braided lengths. Cut a square of fabric about three times as big as the child's hand, Bring the top edge together around the neck of the spoon, opening to the rear. Twist a pipe cleaner or colorful plastic bread tie to hold it in place. A third of the way down the front, clip two holes. Holding the spoon in his hand, the child can poke his finger and thumb out those two holes. Add decorations as you wish.

PAPER BAG PUPPET. You need a small paper bag. Lay it flat on the table, bottom flap up. Decide what kind of animal you want or if you want a person. With construction paper, create a face and clip. Glue it to the flap which will be the top, the bag itself will be the body. However, you can also create a large face using the flap itself, just color for skin tone, then add eyes and nose. The lips should be one on the bottom of the flap, the other on the bag just below. The child puts his hand inside with fingers in the flap, opening and closing fingers to make the flap open and close like a mouth.

CEREAL BOX PUPPET. Draw a straight line across the center of an empty cereal carton or tissue paper box and down the sides. Cut along the line. Fold back the box along the uncut edge so you have two hinged box parts. Cut a couple openings a few inches long across the box not far into the upper box part. The child's hand should fit through these openings, creating a fingerstrap to help manipulate the box. Having decided what you want to create, cover the box with construction paper of appropriate color. Green for a dragon, gray for an elephant. Be careful not to glue the strap. You'll probably want pink paper for the inside of the mouth, an a red piece for a tongue. Add an extra piece to hang over the back to hide your hand as you operate the puppet. Create nose, eyes, hair, glasses, hat, whatever you want. Glue on wiggly eyes, use markers, cut-outs, stickers, cotton balls, yarn, whatever.

FABRIC PUPPETS. Use two pieces of felt of a color appropriate to what the child wants to create, person or animal. Place hand down on the felt, draw a puppet shape around the hand, big enough so it will fit over the hand when done. Clip and use this piece as a pattern to trace and clip an identical second piece. Attach the two with dabs of glue around the edge of one of the pieces. Let dry. Now the puppet will need clothing or an appropriate animal appearance. Here you use marker, buttons, sequins, fabric cut-outs, and so on.

STRING PUPPET. Marionettes are the most sophisticated type of puppet, but we'll go for the simplest. Make a dragon or snake with six toilet tubes using construction paper, glue, and markers. Punch a hole on each side of the head and run a string through in one hole and out the other side, then pull it through until you have equal lengths of string. Now thread the two lengths of loose string through four more toilet paper tubes. Punch two holes in the last tube like you did in the first, run the string through and tie it off between the holes inside the tube. To work the dragon. simply punch a hole in the front tube and one near the middle. Tie a separate piece of string through each with the loose ends tied to a paper towel tube that the child can hold in his hand.