Spotted: Bears in Gibbsboro. They have escaped from their child handlers and are now peeking out the windows of their homes. 

  All across the globe, families are finding inspiration from Michael Rosen’s bestseller, “We’re Going on a Bear Hunt.” The lighthearted story of a family who channels their inner explorer as they search for a real-life bear features the essentiality of an imagination. 

  Families can now “go on a bear hunt” without even having to leave their neighborhoods. 

 To combat the boredom of staying home, neighborhoods are asking families to place their favorite stuffed animal for all the neighbors to see. 

  Each family is asked to place a beloved stuffed animal anywhere in their home. Some hung stuffed sloths from their outdoor lights, others hid fluffy crocodiles in their bushes, while still others had a tea party with their ginormous teddy bears on their front porch. 

   No matter one’s age, there will always be something so exciting about going on a scavenger hunt, whether or not one is searching for bears. Something as simple as organizing a scavenger hunt is the perfect excuse to get out of the house and take in the outdoors. Just like the family in Rosen’s story, children are now distracted and entertained by the prospect of seeing a bear, tallying how many stuffed animals they can find.

    A “bear hunt” gets children and their parents to spend time together while offering a safe social distancing activity for the entire neighborhood. It creates a sense of community amid the coronavirus fears.

   Rosen’s book has inspired over 30 years of “bear hunts” in the United States, Australia, and New Zealand, but with the stay-at-home orders due to the COVID-19 pandemic, there has been a great surge of neighborhood collectivity. 

  One such “bear hunt” popped up in Gibbsboro. For hours, families could be seen walking up and down the sidewalks to find each and every stuffed animal.

   After posting the “bear hunt” plans on Facebook, nearly all of the homes in the Wynnewood neighborhood participated. People were excited. A few commented “love this” while others made sure to respond with what stuffed animals to look for at their homes.

  The Miami Herald spoke to one mother, “For about an hour we didn’t think about anything else that was happening in the world,” she said. “It was just about the bears.”