A month's worth of activities!

Ahhh - Thank you Di and everyone else for all the feedback via Twitter - definitely enjoying the feeling of connection and wondering what colour that might be?
Loved the paint colour chart idea for helping people describe the intensity of feeling too -Thanks Donna xoxoxo

Day 4 Activity:
Theme 1 in Protective Behaviours says:
'We all have the right to feel safe all the time' and before I attended training in PBs I don't think I'd ever really thought about what safe might feel like, although I definitely knew what unsafe felt like! And my experience working with children, young people and adults tends to be the same. I can remember one time working with almost 300 children aged between 4 and 7 in a school assembly where we tried to create a Feelings Wall using a selection of photos from a day in the life of a puppet. Not once did the feeling 'safe' get offered despite the fact there were times the puppet did look like she felt safe. So I believe there is a need to teach this feeling word and help people work out what safe feels like for them, because if people know what safe feels like then they are more able to tune in to when they start to feel less safe!
(Realise that's a bit of a long-winded intro to today's activity!)
So, today's activity is to consider what colour the feeling safe might be for someone and what might they be able to see, hear, smell, taste, touch and feel in their 'Safe Place'.
Looking forward to visiting my 'Safe Place' today - it's certainly helped me to feel more contained during these challenging times.

Thank you for all the feedback from yesterday's Safe Place activity - here's one I made yesterday to reflect what's keeping me feeling safer at the moment!


And here's one Donna produced with one of her children using PicCollage:


And for those of you interested in my Puppet pictures, here's Molly feeling safe snuggled up in bed.


Thank you to Judith Staff for sharing pictures of a Safe Place Display she produced a while back with children in their first year at school - here's a link to the post:
www.protectivebehaviours.org/protective-...-pbs-in-practice#218

I'm feeling hopeful that all schools will now realise how important it is for children, young people and adults to feel safe and help them exercise the right to this when they return to school.

Day 5 Activity:
Yesterday I had a fab 'phone call from someone working in a Secondary School who had completed 2 day Foundation Training in Protective Behaviours a while back. She was keen to find a way to help the children feel safer on return to school and use PBs as the foundation for emotional health and well-being. We spoke about the need to reinforce Themes 1 & 2: 'We all have the right to feel safe all the time' & 'We can talk with someone about anything, even if it feels awful or small', throughout and how the strategy of One-Step Removed could help develop Free-thinking skills. (I had already decided Free-thinking was to be today's activity!)
As a reminder, Free thinking in Protective Behaviours is about creating a great number of ideas which can in turn lead to increased quality, encouraging people to share ideas without criticism and enabling members of a group to build on each other’s ideas.
When doing a Protective Behaviours free-think it is usual to use an ‘Even if’… statement.
For example: “How could we keep ourselves feeling safe … even if …?”
This format reinforces that we have the right to feel safe all the time and is solution, rather than problem focussed. Another format may include “What if….”questions.
So, today's Free-think is:
How could someone keep themself feeling safe even if they were asked to brush a crocodile's teeth?



Looking forward to hearing your ideas!
PS. Some further guidelines for Free-thinks:

• All ideas are accepted
• No criticisms or comments
• Ideas are not necessarily logical
• One word or VERY short sentence
• Encourage people to build on each other’s ideas
• Statements are written in speakers’ own words
• Observe the Language of Safety

To start the ball rolling here are a couple of ideas:- From Di in Oz.
Ask someone else to do it!
Ask the tooth fairy to cast a magic spell so the teeth cleaned themselves

Thanks Di for getting the ball rolling.
Here's a couple more from Donna & Co:

And even more suggestions:

• Make sure the Crocodile's already been fed
• Sing it a lullaby so it's sleepy
• Get a Crocodile Teeth Cleaning Network
• Distract the Crocodile
• Wear a suit of armour
• Say 'No!
• Ask for help from the person who normally cleans the Croc's teeth
• Ask 'Why are we cleaning the Crocodile's teeth?'
• Research how Crocodiles teeth keep clean in the wild & do that instead
• Throw it some edible toothbrushes available from most Service Stations!
  Well done everyone - what a fab list and you get to decide which feels safest for you (and the Croc!).