Children In Need 2018: 5 Activities You Can Do With Your Kids Including Pudsey Bear Face Painting

Children In Need’s annual show is back, with members of the public and celebrities taking fundraising up a notch. The yearly event raises much-needed cash for disadvantaged children and young people across the UK to ensure support is there when it’s needed.

Parents are able to do their bit by donating cash during the show and there’s no reasons they can’t involve their kids, too.

Use these five activities to start a conversation with your kids about the charity and Pudsey Bear with these five activities. Better yet, you could sell on your cakes or crafts to family and friends to show your kids how easy fundraising can be.

1. Pudsey Bear Face Painting

Thankfully, this is a face paint design anyone could do. Choose between spots or a simple yellow and black face paint to get your kids ready for the show.

2. Spotty Clothes And Pudsey Onesies

Get dressed up for the occasion with Children In Need’s official merchandise at Asda.

The Pudsey Bear onesie is perfect for a cosy night in on the sofa.

ASDA

If you don’t have time to shoot to Asda, spotty clothes will fit the bill.

3. Pudsey Ears

You can buy your own Pudsey Bear ears or alternatively you can sit down with your kids and make your own.

4. Pudsey Bear Baking

The options for Children In Need-style baking are endless, so here are a few to get you started.

5. Children In Need Crafts

Get the paper, glue and scissors out for an evening of crafts while you’re watching the show.

Before You Go

Why the world forgot about the #BringBackOurGirls Children

No-one knows where they are(01 of08)

Finding where the girls have been taken has proved much more difficult than expected. "The region where the captives were taken is remote and vast — including the rugged Sambisa Forest where surveillance drones are of little use — and where the Nigerian government has limited influence," Benjamin Radford writes on Discovery.

Little is even known about what efforts are being made to locate them: Mike Omerri, director general of Nigeria's National Orientation Agency, told Al Jazeera that releasing information publicly about the attempt to find the students "wouldn't be beneficial". This lack of information leaves a void, meaning there's little for the global media to cover. (credit:ASSOCIATED PRESS)

The hashtag may have made things worse(02 of08)

A horrible irony is that the explosion of international attention around the girls could have made them more valuable to the terrorists, so harder to rescue.

"The collective outrage of the Western world was irrelevant to Boko Haram, who reveled in the attention and recognition," Discovery reports. "First Lady Michele Obama was one of many prominent celebrities to embrace the cause, and the fact that the wife of the most powerful man in the world addressed the group in a viral May 7 photo posted to social media asking for the return of its hostages gave Boko Haram legitimacy it sought."

“Boko Haram sees the Chibok girls as their trump card,” a Nigerian military commander is reported to have said in the Sunday Times. “We think they are keeping them with their main leadership. The day we get to the Chibok girls will spell the end of Boko Haram, but I fear they will kill all the girls in mass suicide bombings in the process.” (credit:.)

We got distracted(03 of08)

By the time the girls had been held for six months, politicians and western media had shifted their attention to other terror concerns, as a global fight against the so-called Islamic State began. The group gained territory, and began killing Western hostages on video - the world was shocked and captivated.

Other major news stories, such as the rise of Ebola and lighter news like the Ice Bucket Challenge, also provided rolling media stories that - unlike the girls' captivity - offered frequent updates.

"The online community soon lost interest when positive results weren’t forthcoming," Discovery writes. (credit:ASSOCIATED PRESS)

They aren’t western or white(04 of08)

That the 219 girls are from Nigeria may play a part. Veteran journalist John Simspon has hit out at the media's "grotesquely selective" reporting of deaths from terror attacks around the world.

He believes that, with fewer foreign correspondents in the media, the place where people are killed or mistreated affects the coverage.

"It's grotesquely selective actually," he told HuffPost UK last year when speaking about the Paris terror attacks. "Don't get me wrong, it's not that I think the [Paris attacks] don't matter, it matters hugely what happened in Paris. It's one of the most important things of this decade. It's just that you know, 130 people die in other countries and we shouldn't let ourselves be blinded to that simply because we're more interested in Paris." (credit:STEFAN HEUNIS via Getty Images)

Little has actually been done(05 of08)

“Despite the global outcry against the atrocities Christian are suffering at the hands of Boko Haram, little has been done," says Paul Coleman, Senior Counsel and Deputy Director of ADF International.

Thought leaders of countries from the US to China promised to help, no diplomatic or military action has worked.

"As far as our girls are concerned, they have been abandoned," said Mkeki Mutah, an uncle of two abducted girls, to Al Jazeera.

"There is a saying: 'Actions speak louder than words.' Leaders from around the world came out and said they would assist to bring the girls back, but now we hear nothing. The question I wish to raise is: why?"

Former Nigerian president Goodluck Jonathan was criticised for not accepting international help sooner, and he rejected Boko Haram demands to exchange detained fighters for the girls, leaving negotiations at an impasse. (credit:Afolabi Sotunde / Reuters)

And options are limited(06 of08)

One solution could be to "buy" the girls back from Boko Haram through intermediaries, as they were captured to be sold as slaves - but this would mean the US and Nigeria were participating in the illegal slave trade.

"We all can’t just march into the Nigerian rainforest and snatch the girls back," Mohammed Adam wrote in the Ottowa Citizen. "That is the responsibility of the government, and the failure rests entirely with what passes for government in Nigeria."

He claims the failure raises "the fundamental issue of what use government really is, in many parts of Africa."

Observers have said that ex-President Goodluck Jonanhan did not take action to meet the grieving parents of the girls until until girl rights advocate Malala Yousafzai encouraged him. (credit:ASSOCIATED PRESS)

Boko Haram is fearsome(07 of08)

After watching its influence spread during a six-year campaign that has killed around 15,000 people according to the US military, Nigeria has finally united with its neighbouring countries like Cameroon to try and stamp out Boko Haram. It controls whole areas of Nigeria which are "no go" zones for the government, making hostage recovery highly challenging. (credit:Joe Penney / Reuters)

Some have given up(08 of08)

While parents of the missing schoolgirls still mourn, others have given up, or certainly lost momentum to try and find them.

Nigeria's incoming president Muhammadu Buhari said he could give no guarantees about their safe return. (credit:- via Getty Images)

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