How to Make Felt Puppets for a Flannel Board
Flannel boards give children the opportunity to be creative in their play. The boards, which resemble canvases covered with flannel or felt fabric, provide a surface onto which children arrange felt pieces into scenes from stories. Although most flannel boards come with felt puppets and shapes, you can freshen up a tired flannel board with a new set of felt puppets. Making felt figures for flannel boards is easy, and your children will love using the homemade puppets to invent new stories.
Things You'll Need
- Light card stock
- Pencil
- Scissors
- Straight pins
- Wool or acrylic felt
- Permanent marker
Instructions
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1
Draw flannel board puppet templates onto light card stock. Draw one-dimensional people, animals and objects, and keep the shapes simple.
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2
Cut out the templates with sharp scissors.
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3
Pin templates to pieces of wool or acrylic felt. Smooth the template and the felt as you pin to avoid warping the puppet's shape.
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4
Trace around the pinned-in-place templates with a permanent marker. Unpin the templates and remove them from the felt.
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5
Cut out out the felt puppets with a pair of sharp scissors Cut along the inside edge of the traced outline to remove any permanent marker lines.
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Tips & Warnings
When making people or animal puppets, begin with a simple body. Make a variety of felt features (such as assorted hair styles), accessories and clothing that children can add to customize their felt puppets.
