Heroes are emerging from the unlikeliest of places in the pandemic - Captain Sir Tom Moore, Marcus Rashford, numerous local fundraisers…and now Basil Brush and Martin Roberts from Homes Under the Hammer.

They’ve teamed up to produce a video of Basil Brush recording a video of Martin’s children’s book Sadsville alongside specifically created resources for both teachers and families, to help engage with children on emotions around sadness and how to understand our own mental health.

Helping children access their emotions

The book is aimed at children from ages 6-10, and a link to the video of Basil reading the story and the resources will be emailed to all primary schools to access in the coming weeks from the Martin Roberts Foundation.

All the resources and the video are already live on Martin Roberts’ own website as well.

Sadsville is part of Martin’s The Villes series, which he wrote around two years ago.

It was written to help support the work of the NSPCC and Childline by raising awareness to children of their work and how they can contact them if they need help.

So far physical copies have already been sent to around 35,000 children over the last 12 months or so, by sending it to schools in Somerset and Hampshire.

However, Martin explained that because of the coronavirus pandemic and the upheavals children will undoubtedly have felt, he thought it was important the book and its message had a chance to reach every child in the country as soon as possible.

“We’re seeing a lot of research saying that young children are the ones who will be worst affected by this time…We wanted to get this out there to help teachers and parents have that discussion around why sometimes it’s OK to feel sad and down, but that also there are other emotions that they may feel that are more concerning, and that sometimes you need to talk about them with someone.”

As such, he is hoping that parents, teachers and pupils will be able to use the reading of the book by Basil Brush as a fun, engaging way into a discussion on these issues and that the resources - from assembly guides and worksheets to posters and feedback forms - can develop this further.

Peter Wanless, the CEO of the NSPCC said the organisation was confident it would have a hugely positive impact.

“Currently, we are hearing from children in their thousands who have been cut off from vital support networks such as school and friends, and that has increased their feelings of loneliness and vulnerability. However, there are many more out there who are suffering in silence, which is why we are doing all we can to let children know we are still here for them.” 

“Using Basil Brush to narrate Sadsville is a unique and entertaining approach to letting even more children know how they can contact Childline if things are tough, and I am confident it will be very successful.”

Glastonbury connections

Of course, one of the key questions everyone will want to know is: how on earth did Martin convince the funny furry fox to take part?

Celebrity connections are formed in the strangest of places, as it turns out.

“I’ve been an admirer of Basil Brush for years - he’s always had a warm place in most people’s hearts, the cheeky chappie little fox,” Martin told Tes.

“I actually first met him at a Children in Need event and it turned out he loved Homes Under the Hammer, so we had a bit of a mutual appreciation thing. Then I met him again at Glastonbury a few years ago where he was doing a set at the kids’ stage, which was really funny.

“I told him about the book and he said he’d be happy to read some of it, and I asked him how much [he would read] and he said, ‘Well, all of it’.”

From here, there was only one person to contact when a lockdown recording was needed.

For his part, Basil Brush said: “It was a booming pleasure to be part of Mr Martin’s wonderful book, to read his lovely story and help the NSPCC and their Childline service at the same time.

“The illustrations are perfect, but for some reason I felt peckish at the end - you’ll know why when you read it. It might even bring a tear to your eye.”

You can watch the story below.