Ayr Bear Goes Viral
16 May 2018
When Jessica Jamieson-Holliday took the class bear home for the night, she didn’t realise just how far their adventure would take them.
Robert Jamieson, the four year old’s father from Ayr put a photo of Jessica with Jofli Bear from Wallacetown Nursery School on Facebook with the message, “Please like and share, this is the wee teddy that my wee angelcake has to bring home from school for the night, this is his adventure to see how far he can travel through Facebook.
Within the first day the photo had 1000 likes and is now racing to 12000 with comments added from America, India and Australia. One Facebook follower even made a map to show Jessica and Jofli’s worldwide tour. Robert says “Jessica loves hearing my phone beep and she asks ‘Where are we now, who has shared us?’. I have Jessica a couple of days a week and we go out on our bikes to the sand dunes but our virtual adventure has taken us around the world in record time.
The post even found its way to Suzi O’Neill the creator of Jofli Bear. “I think it’s great to see children and parents having fun together,” says the entrepreneur from Sheffield. “Some parents see the task of having the class bear for the night as a chore, but the purpose of the take-home-ted is to help improve links between home and school and to encourage parents to interact in their child’s education.
Robert and Jessica have shown that you don’t have to go far to have an adventure, and that teaching is not just for teachers. It is well documented that children learn more from their parents than their teachers, and that the effort put in by parents by reading stories aloud, meeting with teachers etc. has a significant impact on a child’s educational achievement.
So maybe the next time the class bear comes home for the night you might enjoy the adventure a little more knowing that there is a purpose behind it, and that the time spent together will have more of a positive effect than you may have thought.
If you would like to help and share in Jessica and Jofli’s quest to scale the globe you can find their post on Robert Jamieson or Jofli Bear’s Facebook page.
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