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Parents as Partners in Early Learning - Young parents.
[ 22 May 2008]
Coventry: Parents as Partners in Early Learning
‘Play, talk and learn' - a ‘creative play' project for young parents.
Play, talk and Learn was a co-delivered project, in partnership with two Children's' Centres (Radford and Valley House), Children and Families Education team (CaFE) and Creative Partnerships. The project aimed to work with 24 young parents up to age 25, offering them a range of ways in which they could engage with the project, either by attending creative play sessions, an 8 week taught course or by home visits, or a combination of these. The project centred around creative play and the use of found and recycled materials as a means of offering parents ideas and resources to help them encourage their child's learning and language development. There was a focus on communication, language and literacy, and personal, social and emotional development.
Creative partnerships have worked with schools and Valley House Children's' Centres previously. A team of artists had developed ‘the cabin space', a creative play space that utilized recycled and found objects for children's development, exploration and imagination. A parent attending the play talk and learn project described the environment as ‘... Alice in Wonderland. It's magical. Nothing is where you would expect it to be, like maps and chalk boards on the floor, which makes sense, really, for children'. The project utilized the existing cabin space for creative play sessions, but also aimed to offer parents home visits from an artist and children's centre worker to develop a creative play space in the home environment. The 8 week taught course was delivered at Valley house Childrens' Centre and was co-designed by CAFÉ and children's centre workers. The course focused on the ‘We're going on a bear hunt' story. A free crèche was provided for the taught course element by CAFE. The course covered topics such as rhyme and song, baby signing, speech and language development, and tips for talking to babies and children again with a focus of Communication, language and literacy and PSE development. As part of the taught course, Creative partnerships developed an outdoor ‘bear hunt' environment, including a cave, a house, mud, water and a snow area. Parents explored this area with their children after the taught element.
Three other strands of the project developed out of our original aims. A creative play space was developed at Radford Children's centre, a young mums' education unit and also a supported housing unit for ongoing use.
All parents participating in any strand of the project received treasure baskets that were developed appropriate to the child's age and interests. They also received a free ‘We're going on a bear hunt' story book and CD. Many of the parents participating in the project produced photo journals of their activities on the project and at home, the journals themselves were creatively produced, reflecting the ideas they had gained from the artists.
Parents who have participated in the project said that they had gained ideas to use at home with their children, often they compared the cost of commercial toys to the creative play materials found in treasure baskets and ‘the cabin' and felt that their child would gain more from the recycled and found objects. One young father told us ‘this has showed me that I need to spend more time connecting with my children...that I can use everyday things to connect to my children'.
Many of the parents engaged in the project said that they did not want it to end and had generated ideas during the project about further groups and courses they would like to take part in the future. Common themes were ‘help and advice with bringing up a child', ‘cooking for children', careers and college advice, ‘the social side of it', ‘helping each other' and having someone to tap into for signposting.
Radford children's centre will be using the creative play space developed in the atrium to deliver sessions to children in the nursery offer facilitated open play sessions to parents and children.
The success of the project has been a result of the delivering teams' flexibility in response to the diverse needs of all the parents. The project focused on parents aged 25 and under, but other parents wanted to participate and were included. The project also drew on each partnerships' strength and experience. The Childrens' Centre workers are investigating ways of co-delivering the project's continuation and building on the momentum gained to date.
How can I find out more?
There is a DVD available which exemplifies all aspects of this project. Please contact Jo Springthorpe on 024 7678 8444 at Radford Children Centre, or Kerri on 024 7626 6280 at Valley House.
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