Feel Your Best Self (FYBS), the UConn interdisciplinary partnership that brings credibility, accessibility, creativity, and joy to learning about emotions and emotion-coping, has earned yet another accolade. Through expanded collaborations, FYBS launched a new animated shorts series this fall to bring the lovable puppet friends back together as they help each other navigate big feelings. The animated shorts have been nominated as a finalist for the 2026 Kidscreen Best Digital Series award in the preschool category.
In 2023, the original puppet video series won FYBS its first Kidscreen award in the Best Web/App Series—Original category. The internationally known Kidscreen Awards recognize over 35 categories spanning programming, broadcasting, and digital media; entries typically include productions from PBS Kids, Nickelodeon, BBC Studio, and many others. The FYBS puppet series also won several gold and silver Telly awards in 2023 and 2024.
Since the release of the original puppet videos, the FYBS team received requests from educators and families for additional options, such as shorter versions of the strategy videos to use with even younger children or when time is tighter. The team mulled over different options, eventually selecting a subset of the strategies to share via both songs and animated shorts. Thanks to the talents of Molly Ferriera, FYBS implementation coordinator, and musician Ethan Hanzlik, the songs came together for release over the summer, with instrumentals ready to be featured in the shorts.
“We landed on creating animated shorts as a good option to extend our multimedia presence in a way that maintains the core steps to learning the selected FYBS strategies while bringing the highly recognizable puppet friends together in digital format,” says Sandra Chafouleas, Feel Your Best Self co-founder and Board of Trustees Distinguished Professor in the Neag School’s Department of Educational Psychology.
The FYBS team selected six of the twelve strategies that are most easily adapted for younger ages, and worked with UConn’s Digital Media & Design department as part of a course in which undergraduate students gain experience with real-life projects. Emily Wicks, co-founder of FYBS and manager of operations and collections at the Ballard Institute and Museum, and Ferreira worked with the course instructors and students as their client. The student team, made up of Elijah Carini ’25 (SFA), Tatyanna Kelly ’25 (SFA), Kathryn Markey ’25 (SFA), and Nicholas Sanzone ’25 (SFA), set up project timelines and deliverables such as storyboards, character animation, and script writing, and worked together throughout the semester-long course to present and revise ideas to FYBS as the client.
“We loved the idea of continuing our work through yet another partnership with a UConn entity,” Wicks says. “The students in the class came up with terrific ideas and designs that helped fuel the directions that we took with this project.”
After the course ended, the FYBS team further refined the scope, and then worked with Alopra Studio to complete the series featuring the FYBS strategies and more. The animated shorts series was made possible through generous continued support provided by the Neag Foundation.
The series, which was just released this fall, is already a hit.
“Being nominated for a Kidscreen award again is an unbelievable honor,” Chafouleas says. “Both kids and adults need simple ways to handle the big feelings that are all around us right now. FYBS resonates with them, creatively bringing the science of emotion-coping to a broad audience.”
“We are thrilled that these special puppet characters continue to connect with kids and caregivers in such meaningful ways,” Wicks says. “FYBS is a testament to the power of partnership.”
The 2026 award winners will be announced at the annual Kidscreen Summit in February. The animated video series can be found on the Feel Your Best Self website or the FYBS YouTube channel and is available in horizontal or vertical formats for both big and small screens.
