Shadow Puppets

 

[Image appears of a background of pencil drawings of a grasshopper, leaf, eye, gecko, sun, drum, ear, mouth, hand and two children and text appears: Questacon, Science Time, For 3 to 5 year olds and their carers]

 

[Image changes to show the words “Shadow Puppets” appearing surrounded by pencil drawings of a conical flask and test tubes, a flower, a paper plane, a butterfly, a robot, a torch, and a shadow hand]

 

Children: Shadow puppets.

 

[Image changes to show BJ waving and talking to the camera while sitting on a chair next to a small table]

 

BJ: Hi, I’m BJ. Welcome to Science Time, Experimenting at Home. Do you like doing experiments? I love experimenting and at home you can do lots of experiments with things that you find around the house. Today we’re experimenting with shadows. Have you ever seen a shadow before, maybe outside on a sunny day? Well, we’re going to make shadows inside today. What do you think we need to make a shadow? First we need a light. You can use a lamp or a torch, or you can even ask your grown ups if they’ll use the torch on their phone. 

 

[Image shows BJ taking a phone from the side of the seat she is sitting on and holding it up and the image shows BJ turning on the torch on her phone]

 

That’s what I’m going to use today. So, I’ll turn the light on. Wow, can you see that? It’s quite bright isn’t it?

 

[Image shows BJ shining the phone torch onto the wall next to her]

 

Then we need something to shine our light on like this wall. What do you think will happen if I put my hand in front of the light, between the light and the wall? Let’s test. 

 

[Image shows BJ holding her hand between the torch and the wall and creating a hand shadow on the wall and the image shows BJ moving her hand around and the shadow moving around too]

 

Do you see? I’ve made a hand shadow? Hello. Hey, when my hand moves what happens to my hand shadow? It moves as well. 

 

[Image shows BJ opening and closing her hand and making a shadow on the wall of a closing and opening hand]

 

Open, close, open close. So, whatever my hand does, my hand shadow does as well. I can even make my hand into different shapes. 

 

[Image shows BJ making her hand into a barking dog shape and the hand shadow on the wall makes the barking dog shape too]

 

So, what does this shape look like? Woof, woof, woof, woof, mm, woof, a bit like a dog. 

 

[Image shows BJ making her hand into a quacking duck shape and the shadow on the wall shows a quacking duck shape too]

 

Or this one, quack, quack-quack, quack? You can make your hands into all different shapes and make some shadow hand puppets. 

 

[Image shows BJ making a bird shape with her hand and the shadow on the wall makes the bird shape too]

 

Tweet-tweet, tweet-tweet. What do you think will happen to my hand shadow if I move my hand closer to the light? Mm, we can experiment. And when we do an experiment in science it’s good to ask a question, have a bit of a think, and then test it. So, have you had a think what might happen? Shall we test? 

 

[Image shows BJ with her fingers outstretched moving her hand closer to the torch and the hand shadow on the wall becoming much larger]

 

What do you see? What’s happened to the shadow? As I moved my hand closer to the light the shadow gets bigger. What do you think will happen to the shadow if I move it further away from the light? Let’s test.

 

[Image shows BJ moving her hand away from the torch and closer to the wall and the hand shadow becoming smaller again]

 

It gets smaller. 

 

[Image shows BJ moving her hand closer to the torch and then further towards the wall making the hand shadow on the wall change from small to large in size]

 

So, we can make our shadows bigger and smaller by moving them closer and further away from the light. Now, my hand makes a really good shadow because it blocks the light from touching the wall. I wonder what other things will make good shadows.

 

[Image shows BJ placing her phone torch onto the table and taking a piece of paper from the drawer in the table]

 

I’m going to set up my light there because in this drawer I’ve got lots of different materials that I found around the house and we’ll see if they can make good shadows. Do you think a paper will make a shadow when we put it in front of the light? Let’s test. 

 

[Image shows BJ putting the piece of paper between the phone torch and the wall and creating a shadow on the wall with it]

 

Yeah, it makes a nice dark shadow. What else have we got? 

 

[Image shows BJ picking up a piece of red cellophane and placing it between the phone torch and the wall and creating a light red shadow on the wall]

 

Some red cellophane, mm, will that make a shadow? What do you think? Let’s test. What’s happening? The light is shining through the cellophane and making a coloured shadow. Oh I like that. That’s good. What else have we got? 

 

[Image shows BJ picking up a plastic lid and placing it between the phone torch and the wall and creating a shadow on the wall with it]

 

Here I’ve got a plastic lid. I wonder if that will make a shadow, what do you think? Shall we test? 

 

[Image shows BJ putting her hand up next to the lid and creating a hand shadow as well above the container lid and then taking her hand away]

 

Yes, you can see the shadow but you notice the shadow’s not quite as dark as my hand shadow was. Some of the light is shining through the plastic. I wonder what would happen if we drew a picture on our plastic lid. 

[Image shows BJ taking down the plastic lid and drawing a picture on it and then placing it back between the phone torch and the wall and creating a shadow of a person on the lid on the wall]

 

I’ve got a crayon and I’ll draw a picture. Now, what do you think will happen? Let’s test. Do you see the crayon is blocking some of the light from shining through the plastic? You can experiment at home with different things you can put on the plastic. Maybe, crayon, or texta, or even paint, and see if they block the light. That one’s good.

 

[Image shows BJ putting down the lid and talking to the camera]

 

Now, we can make some other shadow puppets. I’m going to use paper. 

 

[Image shows BJ taking a person puppet from the drawer and holding it up]

 

And here I’ve got some paper and I’ve cut it out like a little person. To make a puppet you can stick something on it as well. I’ve used a pencil but you can use chopsticks, anything you like. And now, I’ve got a little handle for my puppet. Let’s see what happens when we put it in front of the light. 

 

[Image shows BJ putting the puppet between the phone torch and the wall and creating a shadow puppet on the wall]

 

Here’s our shadow puppet, do you see? And we can make it bigger, do you remember how? 

 

[Image shows BJ bringing the puppet closer to the torch to make a bigger shadow and then moving it closer to the wall to create a smaller shadow]

 

We can move it closer to the light, or we can make it smaller. Can we see a face on our shadow person? 

 

[Image shows BJ tracing around the puppet with her finger and continuing to talk to the camera]

 

We can’t, can we, because the shadow we can see around the edge of the puppet but the paper is blocking all the light. So, we can’t see a face. How do you think we could make a shadow puppet have a face? Maybe if we take away some of the paper so the light can shine through. 

 

[Image shows BJ picking up another puppet with the eyes and the mouth cut out and holding it up and talking to the camera]

 

Here, I’ve cut out some eyes and a mouth. When the light shines on it what do you think will happen? Let’s test. 

 

[Image shows BJ holding the puppet between the phone torch and the wall and creating a shadow puppet with mouth and eyes visible]

 

Do you see? Now our shadow puppet has a face. Hello, I’m very happy.

 

[Image shows BJ picking up another puppet with coloured cellophane stuck over the eyes and mouth area and holding it up]

 

You can also maybe stick some coloured cellophane onto your puppet face. I wonder how, what that would look like. You can experiment at home and find out. 

 

[Image shows BJ putting the puppets down and continuing to talk to the camera]

 

You can make puppets out of all sorts of things that you find around the house. You can make paper ones like we have or you can find other stuff. I went into the kitchen and found some spoons. 

 

[Image shows BJ picking up a wooden spoon with wool hair on top and holding it up and then wiggling it around so the wool hair moves]

 

Here I’ve got a wooden spoon. There we go, I’ve put some wool on. Now, the wool feels nice and soft but do you see as I move the puppet the wool hair moves? Do you think its shadow will move as well? Let’s test. 

 

[Image shows BJ holding the spoon between the phone torch and the wall and moving it around so the shadow looks like a puppet with hair moving around]

 

Oh look, it looks a bit like hair moving around. Now, I can make other things as well and use other materials.

 

[Image shows BJ putting down the wooden spoon and picking up a different spoon with foil spikes stuck around the top and holding it up and talking to the camera]

 

So, here I’ve got some foil. This feels a bit stiffer than the wool and it makes a nice sound as well. What will this look like? Let’s test. 

 

[Image shows BJ putting the spiky topped spoon between the phone torch and the wall and creating a shadow with spiky looking hair and then moving it in and out to make the shadow bigger and smaller]

 

Hey, the hair doesn’t move around as much but it looks nice and spiky doesn’t it? It makes pointy shadows. And I can make it bigger and smaller.

 

[Image shows BJ moving the puppet back and forth and the shadow moving back and forth too]

 

Now, do you see how I’m moving the puppet by moving my hand? I wonder if there’s any other way we can make our puppets move. Maybe you could find a toy that moves, like a toy car, and put your puppet on that. 

 

[Image shows BJ picking up a puppet stuck onto a Duplo car and then placing it on the table between the phone torch and the wall and creating a shadow on the wall]

 

Here I’ve got a toy car and I stuck a puppet on. Shall we test and see what happens? I’ll give the car a bit of a push.

 

[Image shows BJ pushing the puppet in the car and the car running off the edge of the table and the shadow of the puppet in the car moves across the wall and disappears too]

 

Ha-ha, it went all the way over the other side and it made our puppet move across the table. 

 

[Image shows BJ continuing to talk to the camera]

 

Now, lots of things will make a shadow. What about your toys? Do you think your toys could make a shadow? You could experiment with all your different toys and see what their shadow looks like. 

 

[Image shows BJ picking up a green dinosaur toy and holding it up and then placing it between the phone torch and the wall and creating a dinosaur shadow]

 

Here I’ve got my favourite toy, Mutty, the muttaburrasaurus. I wonder what Mutty’s shadow will look like. Do you see his shadow there? 

 

[Image shows BJ moving the dinosaur towards the torch and then towards the wall making the shadow bigger and then smaller]

 

We can make it bigger, oh it’s a big dinosaur or smaller. 

[Image shows BJ talking to the dinosaur toy and then picking up the dinosaur toy and holding it again]

 

You look very nice, Mutty, yes, you do. Once we’ve experimented with making puppets out of different materials around the house and seen what your toy shadows look like as well, then you might even like to make some stories. 

 

[Image shows BJ picking up the puppet spoon with wool hair and the dinosaur and placing them between the phone torch and the wall and making shadows showing them talking to each other]

 

So here we’ve got our spoon shadow and our dinosaur shadow. “Oh, hello”, “Hello”, “Hello how are you?”. “Oh, I’m good, how are you?”. “Oh no, it’s a dinosaur, at least it’s only a little dinosaur. 

 

[Camera zooms in on the dinosaur shadow enlarging and then the image changes to show BJ moving the spoon with the wool hair off of the table]

 

Oh no, it’s getting bigger and bigger, I’d better run away, ahh”. Ha-ha, so you can make up some stories with your puppets and then you can put on a puppet show for your family. 

 

[Image shows BJ placing the puppet and the dinosaur on the table again between the phone torch and the wall and then the image shows BJ placing them on the floor and talking to the camera]

 

You can use the wall like this as your puppet theatre or you might like to try a sheet. Get a big sheet and stick it on two chairs and you can make a puppet theatre.

 

[Image shows BJ putting a puppet theatre onto the small table and talking]

 

Here, I’ve got one that I made earlier. And when we make a puppet theatre like this, we don’t need to put the light in front of the puppet theatre, we can put it behind. What do you think will happen? 

 

[Image shows BJ putting the phone torch behind the puppet theatre and the torchlight shining through the puppet theatre and then BJ making a hand shadow on the puppet theatre]

 

Shall we test. So, if I put the light behind the puppet theatre the light shines through and if I put something in front you can see the shadow. You can’t see my hand though; you can only see the shadow. So, let’s set up our puppet theatre scenery. 

 

[Image shows BJ holding up some cardboard cut-out trees and then the image shows BJ placing the cardboard cut-out trees behind the puppet theatre to create tree shadows]

 

Here I’ve made some trees out of cardboard so we can pretend our story takes place in the forest. So, we’ll put it in front like that, there we go, stand it up, perfect. When you’re doing your puppet show, you might like to experiment with different lights. Now, the lights are quite bright in this room and I wonder what the shadows will look like if we turn the lights down a little bit. Let’s experiment. 

 

[Image shows the lights in the room dimming and the image shows the shadows of the trees becoming darker on the puppet theatre and BJ can be seen talking on the left]

 

Do you see? We can see the shadows really well. You can experiment with the lights in your home. You can maybe close the curtains or do it at night-time as well after the sun goes down and see what difference it makes to your shadows.

 

[Image shows BJ picking up the spoon puppet with the wool hair and the dinosaur puppet and placing the spoon puppet behind the puppet theatre]

 

So, here we’ve got our scenery and we’ll get our shadow puppets. We’ve got our spoon puppet and our toy puppet. 

 

[Image shows the shadows on the puppet theatre showing the spoon puppet walking behind the trees, the dinosaur puppet coming on the left, and the spoon puppet running off to the right]

 

Let’s see what it looks like, do-do do-do do, “Here I am walking in the forest, minding my own business”, until, “Oh no, here comes a dinosaur, ah, I’d better run away, run away, run away, run away”, “He, he, he, he, he”.

 

[Image shows BJ talking to the camera again and the image shows the lights becoming brighter again]

 

Lots of fun. So, we’ll turn the lights back up. 

 

[Image shows BJ picking her phone torch up from behind the puppet theatre and putting it on her lap]

 

So, experiment at home with shining your torch through lots of different materials and see which makes different sorts of shadows. 

 

[Image shows BJ holding up the spoon puppet and wiggling the hair and then continuing to talk to the camera]

 

You can use all different materials to make some shadow puppets. You might like to have stuff that moves on your puppet, or stuff that doesn’t. And then after you’ve done all your shadow puppet experimenting you can put on a puppet show for your family. I want to see what you’ve been doing as well, so make sure you record your wonderful experiments to show me. You can take photos, or you can make a video of it like I have today, or you can draw a picture, and you can send it to me so I can see all the wonderful experimenting that you’re doing with shadows. So, I’m going to keep playing with my shadow puppet theatre now and we will see you next Science Time, Experimenting at Home. 

 

[Image shows BJ waving to the camera and smiling]

 

Bye.

 

[Image changes to show a purple background with the Science Time logo in the top left corner and a magnifying glass being held over a butterfly above text: Have Fun Experimenting with Your Little Scientists At Home!]

 

Song: Outside, at the playground, in the sunshine. There is science. Wake up.

 

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