A children’s book to crow about

A former primary school teacher has created a children’s mindfulness book based around a rowdy rooster.

Marlborough mother-of-five Sarah O’Sullivan has published Calm the Farm, the tail of a cranky rooster who upsets the other farm animals.

After a challenging life circumstance, Sarah decided she needed to learn about mindfulness to help her cope with feelings of grief.

Now she is using her experiences to tell the tale of how the farm animals were able to regulate their emotions to cope with a cross Rooster.

Rooster also learns how to manage his feelings.

Sarah, a self-confessed book worm, says with five children of her own aged between 22 and six she has read thousands of children’s books.

“This love of books continues with weekly library visits for my youngest, George,” she explains.

Sarah says she wanted to learn ways to boost resilience and wellbeing in a fun way.

“At the time when there weren’t many mindfulness classes available.

“This led to a life-changing online course with Grant Rix from Pause Breathe Smile (PBS), a New Zealand organisation.

“At that time PBS was seeking external facilitators to deliver their eight-week programme in New Zealand schools and I taught the programme in several Marlborough schools during which time the idea for Calm the Farm came to me.”

Sarah’s debut story uses gentle repetition teaches children valuable steps to manage their own emotions while offering parents and educators a fun and engaging way to introduce these skills.

Sarah says she’s acutely aware of escalating mental health concerns and anxiety among young New Zealanders.

“It would be wonderful if this book could help families understand some of the things they can do to assist their children when their brains are at a prime growth stage to create healthy neural pathways in response to stress and suffering.

“Once this is learned, it can have a lifelong impact on coping with stress, relationships, contentment, and emotional, physical and mental health.”

Sarah ran a crowdfunding campaign to pay for the book’s illustration, done by Bec Brown, its design and printing.

Two backers gifted additional funds to enable her to donate a copy of the book to every primary school and kindergarten across Marlborough.

Published by Little Love (Mary Egan Publishing) and distributed by BookReps NZ, the 36-page book is on sale from 11 March for $22.