Puppets and Character Cutouts

How to use it

1. Choose, decorate, or create any characters and props you want.
2. Move, arrange, speak for, or simply look at the characters; there is no required story.
3. Characters may change roles, names, powers, relationships, or sides at any time.
4. Set aside a figure or stop the play whenever you want.

Reflection prompts

• Would you like to tell me anything about the play, or leave it in the play?
• What should stay the same or change if we use these characters again?

Facilitator guidance

Maintain a nondirective stance unless structure is clinically indicated and consented to. Avoid fixed villain, victim, rescuer, family, or diagnostic roles, and do not infer lived events from enactment alone; use ordinary safeguarding assessment when concerns arise.

Adaptations & accessibility

• Use preassembled figures, magnetic pieces, larger handles, or tabletop stands.
• Offer blank, nonhuman, fantasy, mobility-aid, and ambiguous-role figures.
• Permit parallel play, silent arranging, or clinician-assisted movement.

Review considerations

Licensed play-therapy and safeguarding review required before use. Assess choking, cutting, sharp-edge, material, and supervision safety for the child's age and abilities; do not treat symbolic enactment alone as disclosure.