Children playing with finger puppets can be incredibly rewarding, fun, educational and, most of all, tremendously beneficial to your little one's learning and development early on in life. Encouraging children to play with finger puppets, especially during pre school years, can itself be immensely beneficial for both parent and child.
Brief History Around Puppets
Believe it or not finger puppets have been around for thousands of years, with them being used in some form or another in many cultures and civilizations.
In early 2000 BCE wooden string puppets were used for things like kneading bread in Ancient Egypt.
The earliest known drawing of puppets in Europe is from 1170.
American Indians used puppets for ritual magic.
China has ancient traditions of using puppets in theatre dating back to the 16th century BCE.
The oldest puppet ever discovered was a 28,000 year old figurine dug up in 1891, excavated from a grave in Czechia (Central Europe).
How Little Ones Learn and Develop with Finger Puppets
Language and communication: When little ones play with finger puppets their interaction and playtime help children to develop their language and communication skills.
Finger puppets allow children to be more vocal and expressive, helping them to use words and phrases that they would not otherwise ordinarily use. For example, the child is encouraged to vocally describe what is happening in the story that they are acting out with the finger puppet, helping the child to improve his or her vocabulary whilst developing their communication skills. Big Green Apple
Children should be encouraged to use finger puppets in role play scenarios and in story telling scenes as these types of settings will encourage and motivate the child to be more vocal and expressive.
Social and emotional development: When playing with finger puppets children become more proficient and are able to express themselves and convey their emotions more clearly and confidently. Of course, as time goes on they are able to build on their ability to convey their feeling and emotions more openly in a safe and friendly play environment.
Finger puppets allow children to role play and interact with each other in the same way as we do in our everyday lives. Children will learn and develop different types of emotions such as happiness, laughter, fear, anger, frustration, surprise, sadness, love and joy,
Learning and developing different types of emotions and feelings will help a child to develop, understand and accept different scenarios and different situations.
You can use finger puppets as a development tool to help and support little ones to develop their skills quite early on, normally in pre school years in a home setting. Big Green Apple
Parents too can play their part by asking a child to use finger puppets to convey their own feelings and emotions. Finger puppets really can be powerful learning aids. In turn, a parent can use their own finger puppet to convey to the child their own feelings and emotions in order to get a response from the child, thus allowing a child to develop feeling of empathy.
Cognitive development: Finger puppets can also help children to develop other skills which will encourage them to think and act more independently. Using finger puppets will also help with learning eye and hand coordination as children use their small fingers to move the finger puppets in different directions.
Developing eye and hand coordination during pre school years will help children later on in life when they come to learn how to use a pencil at school as well as helping them to excel at other physical activities such as sports where balls are involved.
Listening skills: Another crucial skill that children will develop when playing with finger puppets is the skill of listening. The skill of listening, especially for little ones, will be very important as they develop.
Teaching a child to listen to directions and to listen to what is being asked of them will understandably take time and patience. Doing this through playtime in an informal environment at home will bring its own benefits. You'll be amazed at how a child will respond differently through roleplay when using finger puppets. Like we said earlier, finger puppets really can be a great development tool.