Children Heard & Seen: Teddy Bear’s Picnic

Summer 2022 saw our collaboration with Children Heard & Seen, a charity supporting children and families impacted by parental imprisonment, venture out to the wild as the Give a Book team joined them on their weekend residential: Teddy Bear’s Picnic.

We handpicked a selection of family reads to gift to the children, celebrating sun, fun, family and adventure! We try to add as many of our specially curated books to our shop on Bookshop.org to spread the joy of reading, so follow the link below to get your hands on our Teddy Bear’s Picnic selection!

Teddy Bear’s Picnic

Give a Book members Ali and Mima led the teddy bear’s picnic, reading the classic We’re Going on a Bear Hunt before going on a real-life hunt for toy bears in the woods with the younger children, a lot of tambourines, and a bubble machine! After one child excitedly shouted, “I found the reading bear!” we gifted each child a book. It was lovely to see the children sit down and read with their parents.

Victoria and David ran a version of our Making it Up project with children creating their own storybooks and letting their imaginations run free. There were lost pandas, fairies, ghosts and much more. One child exclaimed, “This is better than gymnastics!” The silence as they all concentrated on making their books was really striking. And moving!

Having worked with Children Heard & Seen for over a year it was great to finally meet everyone in person and be a part of such a special day.

“I felt honoured to be working alongside Children Heard & Seen whose work is immeasurable, you just had to look at the children’s smiling faces to see it.”

Mima, Give a Book

Thanks as always to our publishing friends for working with us to get books to those who need them most!