DIRECTIONS: Find an odd sock. Read page 1 before you cut anything.
Scissors only, with a grown-up in the room. If a step seems to want a knife, snip or fold instead.
What you need: a sock · card · scissors · a glue stick · markers · poster putty · wool · buttons. Wool and buttons are optional.
A sock has a corner knitted in: the heel. Put the heel over your wrist and it lands where a neck goes.
Flat. Find the heel — it is the only part that is not a tube.
On. Fingers in the toe, thumb underneath, heel on your wrist.
Put the sock on and open and shut the mouth ten times. Now turn it round so the heel is on the palm side instead. Open and shut it again. What went wrong?
The Mouth Is a Hinge
Making · Projects · Page 2 of 6
DIRECTIONS: Cut the oval out, fold it on the dashed line, and glue it inside the mouth.
It is printed the right size. No measuring.
A hinge needs a stop. Folded card gives the mouth a definite open and shut, so it can bite a word.
How it goes in. Fold on the dashed line and press hard. Put the sock on, find
the fold your fingers and thumb make, and take it off without losing it. Glue the card along that
fold: top half to the fingers side, bottom to the thumb side. Dry flat.
A tongue, if you want one. The tab hides under the fold.
Why bother with a tongue? Because it is the only thing that makes the
inside of the mouth worth looking at. A puppet with a tongue has a reason to open wide. A
puppet without one is a hole.
Glue the tab to the bottom half of the plate, at the back, so the tongue flops forward as
the jaw drops.
Eyes Decide Who It Is
Making · Projects · Page 3 of 6
DIRECTIONS: Cut out one pair. Stick them on with poster putty. Do not glue anything yet.
You cannot judge a face flat. Stick the eyes on with poster putty, hand in, and check in a mirror before gluing.
big — young, friendly, a bit daft
middling — ordinary, could be anybody
small — sly, clever, up to something
Three things to try in the mirror, in this order.
Move them…
and this happens
Closer together, then wider apart
Close together reads as cross and worried. Wide apart reads as young and a bit slow. Neither is wrong — pick the one you want.
Higher up the head, then nearer the mouth
High on the head and it looks at the ceiling. Nearer the mouth and it looks at you, which is almost always the one you want.
Both pupils turned slightly inward
It is now looking at something close by. Straight ahead and it is looking straight past you at the wall.
Try the big pair, then the small pair, without changing anything else. Say the same sentence in the puppet’s voice both times. What happened to the voice?
The Rest of the Face
Making · Projects · Page 4 of 6
DIRECTIONS: Cut out the parts you want. Poster putty first, same as the eyes.
Pick two. Three is a costume.
Shapes, not pictures: a triangle is whatever you say it is.
ears, pointedcat, fox, anything that hunts
ears, longrabbit, donkey, anything nervous
ears, roundbear, mouse, anything friendly
a noseglue it on the top jaw, at the front edge
eyebrowsthe cheapest expression there is
teethtwo is funny, a row is not
Hair: five finger-long lengths of wool, glued across the middle only, so they
hang both ways.
Making It Talk
Making · Projects · Page 5 of 6
DIRECTIONS: Three moves, in this order. Practice each one slowly on its own first.
The move
How
Why it works
It looks.
Turn the whole puppet — the head, not just the eyes — toward whatever it is thinking about.
This is the big one. A rough puppet that looks at you is alive. A beautiful puppet that stares into space is a sock.
It breathes.
Before it speaks, let the mouth open a little and shut again, once, with no sound.
Real people take a breath before they talk. Your puppet doing it is what stops it feeling like a hand.
It speaks.
Open the mouth on the LOUD part of a word, and only there. Say “po-TA-to” and open once, on TA.
Flapping on every letter looks like chewing. One good open per stressed syllable looks like speech.
The test. Say nothing and have the puppet turn and look at somebody. If they look back, it works.
Practice line. Look at the floor, look up, breathe, say: “I have been in
that drawer for four years.” Mouth opens twice: DRAW-er and FOUR.
Who is your puppet? Name, and one thing about them nobody would guess.
What is your puppet frightened of? Now have it look at that thing across the room, and write down what its body did.
Your Puppet
Making · Projects · Page 6 of 6
DIRECTIONS: Draw the one you actually made, and fill in the rest.
Draw it as it is, wonky ears and all.
Draw your puppet here
Its name
How old it is
What it wants
What it is bad at
A word it says wrong
Lend it to somebody for ten minutes. Watch what they do with it.
What did somebody else make your puppet do that surprised you?