Juliet Robertson, director of Creative Star training, got in touch with the Creative Producer from the Handmade Theatre Company, Suzy Gunn after being inspired by their puppets for further use in early years outdoors settings, and asked a few questions...
Some great resources on using Persona Puppets to explore personal, social and cultural identity, from Julia Luckenbill at NAEYC.
This booklet, written with input from Ann Langston for Community Playthings, focuses on room layout and equipment choice for planning child-centred indoor areas, but outdoor space is indispensable. Most of the principles apply outside as well, and often equipment can be moved outdoors.
Make Believe Arts provide a particular approach for SEN children called the Helicopter Approach, which helps develop spoken narrative and language skills for pupils with SEN or EAL. Also, watch a video on Helicopter Stories: Letting Imagination Fly - Based on the Storytelling and Story Acting curriculum of Vivian Gussin Paley.
Get children and their families learning rhymes together and develop their language, reading and speaking skills by doing The Rhyme Challenge.
This fab teaching resource, prepared by the Norwich Puppet Theatre, gives you a fully worked out session to help you and your children tell the story of Diwali with puppets.
This article was written and published by early years theatre practitioner, Peter Wynne-Wilson, in 2009
Farryl Hadari explores how the language of puppetry can be used by teachers and students to enable safe communications, community team work, experiential learnign and self-appreciation.
OK, its not free, but this wonderful book by Tamara Hunt and Nancy Renfro, is only a few pence 2nd hand and has hundreds of cleverly illustrated, easy-to-follow instructions describe puppets that children as well as adults can make and manipulate.
Some tips for shadow puppetry from puppeteer, Zannie Fraser plus some video clips of making shadow puppetry come to life at Norwich Puppet Theatre.
Susan Engel from Bennington College explains how storytelling helps children make and communicate the meaning of who they are.
Shadow puppetry is a great tool for teaching stories, myths and legends from cultures and religions all over the world. Its great as a storytelling tool for stories that children create by themselves or as a group. Heleen Van Rossum shares some of her best ideas for early years educators.
Michael Jones, author of 'Let's get talking' and 'Supporting quiet children' discusses the genius of children in Role-Play.
Videos made and published by Boston Public Schools Early Education Site on Vivian Paley's remarkable approach to storytelling.