VUOROVAIKUTTEINEN NUKKETEATTERI LASTEN JA NUORTEN TUNNETAITOJEN EDISTÄJÄNÄ (Interactive puppet theatre promoting emotional skills of children and youth)

2019–2020

In the spring of 2020, Roosa Halme and Marja Susi published a publication called Vuorovaikutteinen nukketeatteri lasten ja nuorten tunnetaitojen edistäjänä (Interactive puppet theatre promoting emotional skills of children and youth). It’s based on the work they did with children and youth in Finland Proper over the fall of 2019. It’s a continuation on their project from 2017, Kohtaamisia nukketeatterin keinoin (Puppetry as Encounter), that took them to mother and child homes and shelters, retirement homes, and centres for people with disabilities. 

Halme and Susi have seen that the wide scope and form pf puppetry suit well a wide variety of encounters in different situations in life. They wanted to use interactive puppetry to widen their experiments in working with children and youth. What dimensions could you find in puppetry’s different means together with children and youth, and the adults working with them? What new could be brought into light as an individual and within a community using different techniques of puppetry? The method is based on the block theatre activities Roosa Halme had previously used as a free artist and as a school artist, coordinated by Turku Recreation Services.

Both Halme and Susi hoped the publication could open new perspectives to its readers, giving practical suggestions on how to see puppetry’s interactive possibilities especially with children and youth who, for some reason, face challenges in expressing and recognizing their own emotions. Their focus on the project and the publication was on promoting emotional skills and on investigating different emotions using different puppetry techniques.

The project included workshops at four locations: Finnish Red Cross Turku refugee centre’s group home, Ilpoinen and Piispalähde schools, and Merikratos Oy’s child protection group home. The project was made possible by Finnish Cultural Foundation’s Art for Institutions grant. The project was also supported by Aura of Puppets puppeteer network and KO-KOO-MO ry.

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Vuorovaikutteinen nukketeatteri lasten ja nuorten tunnetaitojen edistäjänä (Interactive puppet theatre promoting emotional skills of children and youth)

Download pdf (in Finnish)