Since 2012, the Founder of Bizzy Hands Puppet Company, Michelle Botha has been on a mission to make a difference to people’s lives, and especially children, with an art form that she is completely passionate about; puppeteering and theatre. Through puppet shows, she has developed very specific formatted theatre shows that address social-emotional issues that children face on a daily basis.
“I started doing research and came across the concept of social-emotional learning.” says Botha.
One of the major problems that Botha has identified is social anxiety. Social anxiety in children leads to social awkward behaviour and/or lack of social – emotional skills.
Social-emotional learning (SEL) has been identified as a main factor in child development with direct links to academic achievements and ultimately well adapted, functioning adults.
“Without social emotional skills children become anxious which leads to social awkward behaviours; leaving them feeling alone and this can lead to being ostracised. If this is not addressed in childhood, they can grow up to be socially awkward adults, struggling with relationships, finding it difficult to keep a job and even resort to substance abuse.” adds Botha
With intense research and the guidance of Psychologist Gloria Marsay, Botha has created a series of puppet theatre shows with social-emotional learning themes. These shows address social-emotional issues that a child might encounter and guides them through the tools they can use in order to the issue.
The aim of these shows is to share practical social-emotional learning tools (SEL tools); to help little ones self-manage better, become more self-aware, be socially aware, learn relationship skills and master responsible decision making.
“Theatre is a safe way to expose children to difficult situations and show them first hand how to handle these situations.Puppets are a wonderful tool to interact with kids. Kids engage with puppets because they don’t feel threatened or judged so you can get to issues much easier and quicker.” she adds.
Psychologist Marsay explains in her books and research “There is evidence worldwide that implementation of SEL skills is effective for improving academic achievement as well as success in the future life.” **
Together with four talented actors, Botha offers these shows to schools in order to help address social-emotional learning.
The shows consist of three little monsters with different character traits and personalities. Steamroller Matty (character for self-awareness, self-management & social awareness learning), the shy and scared Mondo (self-awareness, self-management & relationship skills learning) and the up then down, food loving monster Mong (Self-awareness, self-management & responsible decision-making learning) stumble into the human world, a scary place for little monsters. This strange new place and people trigger the monsters’ unique awkward behaviours.
Jo, a human owns a convenient store and guides the monsters, giving them social- emotional learning tools to help them gain confidence, becoming more self-aware, and gives them more control over their special abilities. This also enables the children watching the show to recognise their own behaviour in a non-accusatory way.
“Presenting our puppets in the show as not knowing anything, empowers the young viewers. Firstly, showing the awkward child that they are not alone in how they feel and secondly, this places focus on the behaviour not the person or puppet.” says Botha
Bizzy Hands Puppet Company presented its first Social – Emotional Learning show in January 2023, with great success.
The Company will be officially launching its Social-Emotional Learning programme at the Johannesburg school for Autism on Thursday, 11 May 2023 to media, funders and schools.
We encourage schools to book the Bizzy Hands Puppet Company for all shows; social-emotional and/or general.