Puppet as a motivational tool

The thesis deals with a specific aspect of the use of puppets, which are highly important for preschool children. Using puppets, children can express and develop without inhibitions or cares, learning about themselves and the world around them. In general, children get their first contact with communication and language through their mother tongue, which they learn through experience in their environment, often related to their basic needs and through play. The theoretical part of the paper outlines some key points for using puppets in foreign language learning, according to curricular areas. It presents the field of language and the aims that a preschool teacher can realise in the learning process, followed by activities using a puppet according to parts of the curriculum The empirical part provides a case study of teaching two children from a French family to speak Slovene. Using a puppet in this process, the theoretical findings were tested in practice. During the two-month project, I established that a puppet is a strong motivation tool, that children using a puppet express themselves in a foreign language without stress, that it allows expanding the vocabulary in a dynamic and interesting way, and makes it easier to establish communication between an adult and a child