A Short History Of Sock Puppets

For a few weeks we will be talking about a few variations of the performing arts rather than our usual topic of costumes.  Now for a short history of sock puppets and other variations of hand puppets.  After the end of the puritan times and the return of monarchy, Punch and Judy puppets became commonly linked with hand or glove puppets. Popular culture sock puppets have been widely used in TV shows, the most famous character was Lamb Chop, it was a sock puppet invented by Shari Lewis for ‘Hi Mom’, a WNBC show aired in 1957. Paper bag puppets can be made and enjoyed by kids—from preschool and up. You decide how much time and artistic effort you want to put into your sack puppet project. The simplest way to use your puppets is by sitting on the floor, facing each other. You now have a table stage (you are behind it and you can manipulate your puppets to show above).

Your story can take place anywhere, and your puppets can do anything you can imagine. Elephant Finger Puppets – Make elephant finger puppets that are animated with three of your fingers—two fingers for the legs and another finger for the head. These puppets go with lion, rabbit and sheep puppets in the Three-Finger Puppets craft project. Foam Ball Clown and King Puppets – Create quick and easy hand puppets based on Styrofoam® balls used as the puppet head. Cat and Owl Paper Bag Puppets – Paper bag puppets are great fun and, with just a few cutouts and a bit of drawing, you can make a puppet for just about any animal.

In this project make cat and owl puppets that open and close their eyes as you move the paper bag flap with your hand. Paper Bag Hand Puppets – Make funny, talking hand puppets from simple paper bags, and perform Clever Gretel , a play based on a Brothers Grimm folktale from Germany. Clip Art or Photo Stick Puppets Friday Fun – Nothing is off-limits in this creative puppet project. Craft simple stick puppets from magazine photos, clip art, coloring book cutouts, or other paper images! Animated Stick Puppets – Pep up your puppets by giving them the ability to move! Create acrobat, strongman, clown, and elephant finger puppets for your very own circus.

In the puppet play, The Defeat of Great Glooskap , you’ll see how a baby can defeat a great Algonquin warrior. Fabric Mitt Hand Puppets – Tiny tailors and seamstresses will love creating these easily sewn fabric mitt puppets. While puppets are by no means a requirement for a successful baby story time, they can be an opportunity to introduce a little variety and to capture the attention of little ones whose minds have begun to wander.

Two Little Blackbirds has been adapted many times over, and each adaptation works great with finger puppets and/or stick puppets. It’s especially fun if you can provide each caregiver/baby pairing with a set of puppets either to borrow for story time, or to take home and make. We were surrounded by Superheroes in Spandex and Comic-book Artists in their element, yet there we were with our television puppets from so many childhoods. The puppets (who have aged far less than the rest of us!) could not have been happier! Making puppets at home was an interesting activity, I had learned at a summer camp.

After all, thinking about new ideas for kids to kill time creatively is not really an easy task. Sock puppets, as the name suggests, are basically puppets that are made of socks. Nowadays, you can find some marionettes that have mechanical arms that allows elaborate the puppet to grasp objects. Puppets were first introduced to the world of entertainment thousands of years ago. Today, puppets and puppet shows have come far from their humble beginnings and still continue to be popular.

Though they enjoyed theater, they found supporting the actors financially rather expensive, so that they turned to the use of puppets in plays. They soon discovered that puppets were just as able as actors to elicit positive response from the audience, so they continued to patronize the use of puppets in puppet shows and presentations, and soon stage puppet shows became many people’s favorite past time.

The most common type of hand puppets is the simple hand puppet and the larger hand puppet. The mouth is often included on the simple hand puppets but it is usually there just for design purposes. Aside from providing amusement and fun, puppets nowadays have taken a political turn and are also used in thinly veiled political caricatures and satire. These political puppets are often modeled on known political personalities and are often depicted in the characters’ usual political setting. The puppets bounced and played catch with the balloons until the balloons became their friends.