Staff at Family Fostercare Cumbria held a very special consultation day for the looked after children on 26th August, for that day was the day the Teddy Bears had their picnic!
The theme of the session was "Understanding and managing emotions" and the morning was delightfully wrapped up with a sweet Teddy Bears' Picnic!
Having received their teddy shaped invite a few weeks earlier, the children arrived at the office with their favourite teddy. To help them explore the topic of feelings they were invited to name a friendly teddy bear character (they decided on Charlie by the way) and then to talk about the different pictures of Charlie and how he might be feeling in each one. The children discussed different ways to describe some common emotions - happy, sad, angry - and why Charlie bear might feel that way. A really fun part of the session was thinking of strategies for coping with those feelings and we had some fantastic ideas.
There was plenty of creative expression too with mask making and colouring in, and the children also helped out with making sandwiches and decorating cakes before everybody set off for the Teddy Bears' Picnic in the glorious sunshine in Bitts Park.
Children, staff and teddy bears alike all had a fabulous and productive morning, and we were really encouraged and pleased to see how engaged some of the older children were in talking about emotions. All in all, a pretty good day!