Author Karen Gee, Storytelling  session with year 7’s - Inspire Aspire 

On Monday 27 January 2020, Author Karen Gee returned to Highams Park school to run another wonderful storytelling workshop session with a group of  year 7 students

Successful Author, life coach and illustrator of the Dodger dog books Kim  Vymer joined her to help run the session.  We also had the ultimate treat of having Dodger join us and meet the students.

Karen has written a series of inspirational books about Dodger dog, a 7 year-old dog Staffie  who she rescued from Harmsworth Memorial Animal Hospital.

• Dodger, a certified therapy dog has been shortlisted for an award from Barts hospital trust in recognition of the difference he has made to sick hospital patients. He will find out if he has been successful on 12 Feb 2020 when he will adorn his specially made tuxedo to attend a glitzy awards ceremony.

Karen ran an excellent question and answer session focusing her discussion on core themes such as:

• Being happy – which involves looking after both our physical and mental health. Karen used the phrase “Better out than in” to convey the importance of speaking up about our worries and concerns. She also made a very poignant observation that :

"10% of what happens to us in life is linked to things which we cannot control but  the remaining 90% is the result of how we react.   Our actions affect how we live both now and in the future."

• Exploring emotions and feelings: Karen spoke about Shea a deaf dog and sister of Dodger who suffers from anxiety and had a bad start in life.
• Building good relationships with people and being open to accept help from others.
• Recognising people who care about us and appreciating them.
• Not making unfair judgements about people/animals or things – Karen offered the interesting fact that 100 years ago Staffies were used to look after children and were called ‘nanny’ dogs. She used the example of Dodger and the stereotypes levelled against him for being a Staffordshire Bullterrier to highlight the importance of judging people for their actions and words (not how they look). The fact that every 80 minutes in the UK, a healthy Staff is euphonised attests to this.

•  Being  resilient. Karen asked a lot of questions to the group about their own back stories. Many students spoke about speaking a different language or coming from a different culture. Karen used this to reinforce the importance of appreciating who we are, where we have come from and how this can affect our wellbeing. Karen the linked this to the significance of using kind words instead of negative ones like ‘hate’. She added that she chooses to focus on kindness in the Dodger dog books as she is reflecting the positive energy that she would like to put out in the world.

El Pero

• Dodger Dog will soon be published and distributed in Spanish speaking countries where a lot of the children experience extreme levels of poverty.
• This idea was motivated by Karen’s recent trip to South America. Karen hopes that by reaching children in their own language they will be able to understand how to be resilient and kind as well as enable them to continue to spread Dodger’s message of hope and positivity.

 We are very grateful for the time which Karen and Kim gave to both engage with and motivate our students.  The personalised signed copy of her 'How I became Dodger Dog' book which each student was given also served as a lovely gesture and memento.

Special Thanks goes Ms Pardoe, Mrs Taylor, Ms Howard Smith, Mrs Smith (L.S.A), Mrs Johnston and Ms Halkes for helping to organise/coordinate the session.