In Primary School if you were good you got to take home a teddy bear for the week/weekend. What was that all about?

Teaching professionals may be the only ones that can answer this but I'm curious. It seems like this was a universal experience across the country and yet I don't know what the purpose of it was. Was it a genuine treat or was there a deeper meaning behind it? It felt like more of a chore to look after a teddy and do activities with it, take pictures of it, etc. Why did schools do this, and do they still do this?