THE BLOB TREE ::
..... here are the two newest BOOKS and details of a whole range of tools for people persons all over the world!
THE BLOB TREEThe Blob Tree came out of my work in the East End of London - working with young people who could not or would not read.
I led a large Team of People Workers working with street gangs including lots of group work....... and still do lots of Group Work.
The Blob Tree is about 20 years old now and is used all over the world.Now I am employed as a Trainer/Group Worker and also freelance Facilitator and Group Worker. These tools have been developed as I work with different kinds of beautiful humans week on week. There are Blob Tools with differing purposes because they are flexible for your use! All about helping people to open up and develop and grow ........ I use many of them in my work every week with humans who struggle with life. I love Group Work and find that creating the right climate of trust and easing humans into self revelation is the most beautiful experience in development terms. I also use these tools, and other tools in the range of books, in Facilitation and Training Staff who work with special needs humans in the Voluntary and Corporate Sector.Full List of Tools/Publications available ::1 Blob Tree CD-RomThis is 'The Big Book of Blobs' with no clothes on!It is the book in CDR format with 'The Blob Tree' and a collection of 50 of the currently most popular images for use with data projectors, computers, whiteboards etc..Contains Blob Iceberg, Blob Emotions, Blob Sleep, Blob Needs, Blob Christmas, Blob Doors and many more.This CDR, for personal use - with groups led by yourself etc., costs £20.00 + p&p = £21.002 BBB'The Big Book of Blobs' was first published in August 2005, now sold out, BUT republished February 2007. It has over 50 x A4 size 'Blob Tree' type tools.You have permission to photocopy for your own use in a face to face context.There are many beautiful and powerful new tools here with permission to photocopy for personal use.It cost £30-ish and is available only from:: http://www.incentiveplus.co.uk/
Their web-site is terrible - try the telephone:: 0190 852 6120
3 'You Are a Beautiful Human Person' BOOK.This was new in September 2006, a 'Mr Men' size book which has a few affirmative words alongside Blobs illustrations.It is affirmative to the hilt with also a gentle/simple Christian emphasis.Available from me ONLY.The book costs £6.00 + p&p = £7.004 A3 Blob Tree Posters - 2 sets of Posters - Top Sellers.Four A3 size posters have been published too.They are in colour and the pack has four different blob trees.A booklet is part of the pack with ideas for use.Not available from me.Order online from::http://www.incentiveplus.co.uk/5 MINI BLOB TREE POSTERS These were new product in May 2006. There is four different Blob Trees x A5 size, in each set, produced in colour and on good quality/thick paper. Ideal to use in small group work.Available from:: http://www.incentiveplus.co.uk/
6 The Very Stinking Rolling Magazine Book .This 250 page Book, published in 1991 by Harper Collins, has several 'Blob Tree' type images and 100+ Games and Exercises.The are many unique tested Group Work ideas and tools plus a specialist guide indicating sensitivity when working those with with Humans with Special Needs - we all have abilities and disabilities!AVAILABLE FROM ME ONLY.This Book costs £10.00* which includes p&p UK.
email me via home page.
7 The Little Book of Blob QuestionsThis was new in June 2006. Not only does it have The Blob Tree and 14 other Blob Tools, it has some ideas of how to use in a group context and several questions to trigger you own preparation for use.AND this you can buy on line ::Printed version or as a Download. (Not available from me.)http://www.lulu.com/content/3267068 The Big Book of Blob Feelings - a New in February 2007Full of Blob Tools which are much in demand by Counsellors, Educational Psychologists and Mediation Workers etc..Includes the Blob Tree, Blob Feelings, Blob Depression, Blob Families,and many more.Only available from http://www.incentiveplus.co.uk/9 Blob Spirituality - ONLY available online. Blob Spirituality is a book of visual tools designed to enable deep conversations about issues which matter to people. Using the primary languages common to all people - body language and feelings - it provides the user with a means to explore issues as wide as bullying and change, through to Christmas and Weddings. Take a look at the contents page to see the full range of visuals.Available as a download or to buy as a book ONLY from::http://www.lulu.com/content/56972310 Downloads or Books online::These tools are being added to regularly - feel free to take a peep .....See also these to download or order online::http://www.lulu.com/content/348459http://www.lulu.com/content/341012http://www.lulu.com/content/341007http://www.lulu.com/content/413403Hope this is helpful - please get back to me if you have questions.Pip Wilson bhp
EXTRA READING if you wish ...........
- two great reviews ::~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Read what the Times Educational Supplement said in January 2006
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Enlist the power of the Blob
Jerome Monahan
Published: 20 January 2006
The Big Book of Blobs By Pip Wilson and Ian Long £12 (including p&p); the A3 posters are £19 (including p&p)
Here are two new words that could well enter the lexicon in 2006.
The verb "to blob"and its associated noun "blobster" meaning a convinced user of Blobs in training and education work with adults and young people.
The roots of both are the endlessly adaptable "Blob" people (born of a collaboration between artist Ian Long and group worker and trainer Pip Wilson) and now gathered into a collection of over 50 fresh illustrations designed to promote communication and emotional literacy.
The book begins with the original "BlobTree" that has been doing the rounds of schools and counselling settings for many years and features a population of jelly baby-like figures climbing, hanging and falling from trunk and branches and demonstrating behaviour ranging from mutual support to out-and-out opposition or complete isolation. "This picture is over 25 years old," says Pip Wilson. "It emerged from my youth work in East London with young people unwilling or unable to read and has circulated since among teachers and other professionals often in the shape of photocopies of photocopies. Now we have greatly extended the range of Blob situations and scenarios - though all offer the same multiplicity of interpretation that made the original so useful a tool."
The new illustrations are gathered into four themed sections: places, such as playground and disco settings; issues, including bullying; families and death; occasions, including a Blob Christmas; and, finally, a set of personal development scenarios. "Most of the situations are open to symbolic interpretation," suggests Ian Long. "They can be used to help children and young people make the leap to some highly sophisticated thinking. They have proved an ideal prompt, helping people to open up about themselves in ways that more direct cross-examining often fails to do."
"The great thing about Blob pictures is the way they provide an entirely non-threatening way into young people's thinking," suggests Norwich-based sex and relationship educational development worker Molly Potter. "I have used them in a variety of circumstances and they are great for drawing out views without the need for any reading whatsoever. They have proved extremely useful helping both secondary and primary pupils. In addition, they have worked as a great ice-breaker for the PSHE sessions I lead with primary teachers." Included in The Big Book of Blobs is guidance about the importance of subtle questioning as the key to the successful use of the images. "The quality of the questions that young people are asked makes all the difference," says Ian Long.
"In co-ordination with the images, effective questions can move young people on from everyday communication to discussing their beliefs and feelings, and eventually reaching the kind of openness from which real progress can flow." Ian Long cites a powerful example involving a distraught Year 4 child he witnessed being able to use a Blobbing session to identify the figure in one image he most felt like at the time. "It was the necessary launch pad he needed to express his current emotions," says Ian. "He took the risk of opening himself up and it produced the extraordinary result of another pupil pointing to a friendly Blob embracing another to articulate how he would like to help his classmate."
For Jill Aitkin, assistant head at Canons High School in Harrow, the moment when Blobs proved their worth was in her work with a young boy whose mother was seriously ill. "His worry was being manifested in aggression," she recalls. "Using the Blob Tree picture with him gave him the chance to point to the figure in mid-air having fallen off a branch - this was how he felt and he immediately burst into tears. It enabled him to express his underlying sadness and anxiety." She adds: "Blobs are deceptively simple figures, recognisably human and manifesting an extraordinary range of emotions and relationships. They are a very direct and yet unobtrusive way to help adolescents explore their feelings."
Sarah Davidson of Slough Borough Council's Educational Psychology Service adds: "The Blob Playground and Bullying pages have proved particularly helpful. But intrinsic to all Blobs is their lack of specific identity.
They are sexless, ageless and without racial characteristics. Even the youngest children can come to own the images, finding in them Blobs that reflect their past and present circumstances and how they would like to be in the future."
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YOUTHWORK MAGAZINE - REVIEW OCTOBER 2005
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Youthwork review
‘One of the most dynamic, flexible and innovative resources the youth work world has ever seen.’
There you go, stick that on the back cover because we mean every word.
Pip and Ian’s ‘Blob Tree’ resource has been around for nearly twenty years now, making a great name for itself over that time. An A4 monochrome image, bereft of writing, it displays a large tree filled with sexless, shapeless, ageless ‘blob people’. Like stick men who’ve chomped one Big Mac too many, their simple yet animated forms are used to represent emotions, decisions, personality types and social situations. A person can point to the blob whose stance, expression or activity they most identify with, and perhaps explain why. And that’s it. Essentially, it’s just a tree full of conversation-starting blobs.
But that, of course, is the brilliance of it. Because of its simplicity, the tree becomes the perfect resource when attempting to get people to talk about themselves and their social interactions. Children enjoy the visual focus, and can discuss important issues; adults identify with the emotions presented in these abstract characters. And there’s no language involved, so the image can be used to the same effect anywhere in the world.
Pip and Ian return here with a whole book of variations on the theme, as their army of cartoons populate more than 50 new scenes. Spread throughout four themed categories, they place the blobs in a range of tree-substitutes – a playground, a protest march, a football match, a community and so on – each designed to spark a different kind of conversation and interaction.
Some examples: on looking at the book now (after all, which blob you are today doesn’t always define which blob you’ll be tomorrow), I define myself as the blob at the back of the cinema; and the blob walking through one of the ‘blob doors’. Simple and silly as they seemed at first, these little people have had a profound effect on my thoughts today.
That’s why this book is so vitally important to youth work in the broadest sense. These illustrations, though almost text free, are deceptively complex and engaging. The potential for both getting people to talk and releasing them to think, is awesome.
The acid test: I’ve tried this with young people already, and had stunning conversations off the back of it. If Youthwork ran the resource Oscars, Pip and Ian’s Big Book of Blobs would have just walked away with the award for Best Picture(s).
Martin Saunders
Editor of Youthwork
Oct 2005
