Children’s Activities
Activities for children and young people
Imagination is more important than knowledge.
Knowledge is limited.
Imagination encircles the World
~Albert Einstein~
Drama Group
At the Drama Group, which runs every Saturday (term time only), the young people are taught skills in different areas of performing arts, all to prepare them in putting on an annual production in December. The children are taught in areas including, drama, dance, mime, stage fighting and singing.
Throughout the year the children take part in auditions, rehearsals and finally performing in front of a large audience over two days. Throughout the year, the children gain in other skills, such as self esteem, and it builds their confidence.
They make friends and build social skills in order to maintain good relationships with their peers. The children become a family and they will continuously support each other both on and off the stage.
This project has been running since 2009 and each year the show is bigger and better than the last. It has proven very popular, with audience numbers reaching well over 200.
School Holiday Projects
During the school holidays, we provide activities for the young people which focus on building life skills.
During the summer, which is the biggest project in our calendar, the children can attend for up to 4 weeks and will take part in various crafts as well as drama, movement and team building games.
These projects are often described as “Chaos with fun” but are actually planned and designed around building the confidence of the young people and giving them an opportunity to express their feelings in ways only they know how. The children have fun and enjoy being with others who understand them. They come in as children and are all on the same level, being taught how to cope with everyday life and retraining them in skills necessary for going into the world.
Our school holiday projects currently run as follows:
February Half Term – 5 days
Easter Holidays – 4/5 days
Summer Holidays – 20 days
October Half Term – 5 days
Children’s Voices
This programme, funded by The National Lottery Community Fund, will see the children using their voices to create training videos for professionals.
Having spoken for our children for many years it is now time to give them their own voice. They will have responsibility for running this project their way, with support from staff. They will meet with professionals to find out what their needs are, they will create questionnaires for the professionals, and the information learned from these will help them create the “scripts” for their videos. They will then go on to film scenarios for the videos, such as classroom scenes in which the child is being told to sit still, being given too many instructions at once, etc. with a child’s voice in the background explaining why they can’t sit still, how they can’t process too many instructions, etc. These training videos will then be presented, by the children, to various professionals (doctors, police, teachers, paramedics, etc) as training tools which should improve the children’s experience should they come into contact with any of these services.
Life Skills
The Life Skills project consists of one hour sessions of fun, games and life skills, such as menu planning & budgeting, making a bed, sorting washing, problem solving, etc.
Health & Fitness Programme
This is a health & fitness and wellbeing programme channelling the children & young people’s energies into a positive programme of sport and fitness which will help burn their excess energy while achieving goals leading to improved confidence and self-esteem.
Wellbeing will include introducing the children & young people to healthy food choices while thinking about what they eat and how it affects the planet. It will also include lifestyle choices, peer relationships, issues around road safety, recycling, again thinking of the planet, and other life skills.
For details on when any of these activities are available, and how much they cost, please visit the Diary Dates page