Bark Off 2022
This year’s Bark Off was a huge hit with 80,000 pupils across 365 schools nationwide taking part and there has been such a brilliant buzz about the event that we wanted to share it with you, along with some of the fantastic feedback that we’ve received.
“PSHE have said the booklets have been invaluable and that the students have been enthralled!”
Our Bark Off Booklets were incredibly well received with pupils enjoying a range of activities such as writing postcards to our very own Underdog Wonderdog - Mighty Mack, learning about the healing powers of dogs and the magic we have within ourselves to bring about happiness to others and help ourselves, paw print legacy artwork and creative writing linked to a short animation. The activities were aimed at children aged from 6 to 13 and all of them were inclusive and adaptive and designed to enable the pupils to have fun whilst learning valuable lessons along the way.
As always, our schools were wonderfully creative in running their own Bark Off week and came up with fantastic ideas to raise awareness of our charity and how children help dogs and dogs help children. There were dress-up days and character creations using our Hero Hound mask template; baking and ‘barking’ bake sales with ‘pup-themed’ cupcakes and other delicious delights inspired by Fyn’s recipes and even tasty doggy treats sold at Summer fairs. Special assemblies were held using our Assembly PowerPoint – Not All Heroes Wear Capes and some schools even had a few, very special therapy dog visitors of their own – needless to say, they went down a treat! One school even had their pooch taking part in a ‘Thousand Ball Throws’ challenge – pawsome idea! Lots of fun was had whilst important learning took place and thank you a million times to anyone who raised a few pennies for pooches along the way; we really are grateful.
“We’ve just had the best afternoon with Mack visiting; it was fantastic!”
Pupils got their creative caps on to enter our competitions. Some computer whizzes created a Hero Hound of their own on Minecraft, other pupils used their artistic skills to draw and paint their character whilst some showed super sculpting skills to make theirs out of clay, one even made a beautiful model using fantastic sewing skills! The write-ups for the Hero Hound characters really touched us all and it was clear that the children had put a lot of thought into how dogs help us every day in so many ways; they were very moving to read and left Sqaishey Quack with a very tough decision in choosing our winners. You can find out more about our winning Hero Hounds here (LINK).
“Thank you for the amazing feedback on my Hero Hound. I have really enjoyed making Jessie. I love dogs and I really like what you are doing to help them.”
Bark Off was created to raise awareness of the special qualities that dogs have and the magic that they bring to us and also to support children in becoming happier and more confident in themselves so we’d like to say a massive, heartfelt thank you to everyone for getting involved, for joining in and for making this event so special. We’re incredibly lucky to have such wonderful supporters behind us who enable us to continue the vital work we do to encourage children helping dogs and dogs helping children and we’d like to celebrate them all!
This is just a snapshot of The Great British Bark Off 2022 but if you’d like your school to get involved in next year’s event, sign up now because it’s guaranteed to be ‘Pawsome!’
“Our pupils have LOVED taking part in The Great British Bark Off! They thoroughly enjoyed all the activities, especially the writing and the baking, and it was great to do something different and fun together. I feel they have learned so much about themselves and how to be more confident but also how, when it seems like there is no one to turn to, they can always rely on their pets and also find strength within themselves to overcome obstacles. It’s our first time taking part but we’ll be back for Bark Off 2023!”
