Hi ...welcome to P&S...please do share your puppet
pictures. We would love to hear more from you.

I also do workshops...next one is planned for
18th & 19th sept for adults on sock puppet
making.

Cheers
Bhanu

Happy to quickly share one of my workshops! We did balloon marionettes. We used smallish balloons in various colors and shapes, added cardboard "feet" to make them steadier, and glued/taped eyes, ears, noses, etc. (whatever creativity allowed). A piece of yarn, tied to the top of the balloon, works as a string, and a pencil makes a terrific controller.

As the instructor, I had secretly made two identical marionettes, and left the color/shape balloons I had used out of the mix so my students didn't have access to them.

We then performed a short skit using our new marionettes. I began with my two identical puppets. They played and interacted. One by one, my students brought their marionettes into the "scene," improvising interaction with my puppets by requesting to join my game, play with my characters, whatever. My puppets told them they weren't welcome because they were different (too blue, too round, eyes too big, whatever) and the students went off to play in another part of the stage. As each student interacted, my puppets turned them away and they joined the ever growing group off to the side.

Eventually, my identical puppets noticed that the large, diverse group of balloon puppets over to the side was having much more fun, and was much more colorful, interesting, and welcoming than two identical puppets were. They cautiously creeped over and asked the group if THEY could join in THAT game. They were instantly welcomed and all of the balloon marionettes, no matter what color or shape, played together happily.

Of course, we then sat down and discussed diversity and how boring the world would be if we were all identical. The students got to take their puppets home with them.

I had an opportunity to travel around Europe a bit, and mentioned that I had taught this workshop during my student teaching time in college. I ended up doing it in Holland and Germany while visiting classrooms there! It takes almost no prep, is easy for nearly any age to do, and even works with older kids.

Do you have pictures of your balloon marionettes?  Those sound interesting! What a great idea to discuss differences!

Yes we would Love to see pictures of these marionettes  Thank you for sharing.

Billy d.

I don't think I took any but I'll look (did the tour in the old days, when we all had to walk 20 miles uphill barefoot in the snow to take our film to the photomat to be developed). If not, I'll whip a puppet up quickly when I get home and take a pic with one of those new fangled digital camera thingies all you younguns keep going on about!

Hey welcome Clippopuppet so glad that you sumbled....what a great workshop ideas....I do them as well for schools and love the experience.....I have a library one coming up with librarians coming from many different parts of the districts to learn about bringing puppetry back to the school system.

Can't wait to hear more stories......

Daryl H