February 2010

This month's blog includes updates and information on:

Speak Easy
Youfind.me.uk
Families Week
A push for workforce development
The new Parenting Strategy Monitoring Group
Launch of the toolkit

Speak Easy

logo Speakeasy is a community-based educational programme run by fpa. Its overarching aim is to offer a non-threatening group based opportunity for parents to learn together and acquire the confidence and skills they need to talk to their children about sex, sexual health, and relationships. The course is designed to be informal and relaxed, and is run over a number of weeks delivered directly by fpa Speakeasy trained facilitators.

We are going to be exploring across Staffordshire about how we can help more parents access this support, advice and guidance.

YouFind.me.uk

www.YouFind.me.uk , the online directory of activities for young people in Staffordshire, has been developed by Staffordshire's Young People's Service, District Councils and many other partners across the County.
YouFind.me.uk provides clubs and activity providers with an opportunity to promote their events and activities, free of charge, to 1000's of young people across the County.

National Family Week 31 May - 6 June 010

National Family Week - bringing families together

At the end of May this year, the country's second National Family Week will take place with the support of the FPI, encouraging people across the country to celebrate being part of a family, whatever shape or size.

www.nationalfamilyweek.co.uk

Look out for more advertising of events and activities in your local area.

A Push for Workforce Development

Objective 2 of our local Children's Trust Parenting Strategy is about Access to Services.

When we spoke to parents some of the key messages were around having staff who can listen to parents, work with and respond to adults as well as children's needs, have skills and knowledge about the family and parenting.

To help us take this forward I have been championing the development of an online learning module for staff to help develop their skills, knowledge and experience of working with parents.

I have had what is called a "scoping" meeting (basically a meeting to look at the value of the idea) with a regional partnership, hopefully we have made a strong enough case to take this forward - I will keep you posted.

However - don't forget about the National Occupational Standards for working with parents. More details on the National Occupational Standards can be found on my web page just follow this link /commissionerparents/linksdocuments/nos/

The new Parenting Strategy Monitoring Group

When we were in the early stages of developing the Parenting Strategy we set up a "Parenting Strategy Steering Group" this consisted of representation from the entire Children's Trust Partners. The role was to help develop the Parenting Strategy. Now we have the Strategy our role is to monitor it, we have therefore developed a smaller group top do this.

The smaller group will be responsible for reporting on the progress of the Strategy and progress reports will be fed into the Children's Trust. We will make sure that reports get put on the Children's Trust website site as well, so everyone can see what's going well or not so well as the case may be.

Launch of the Parent & Carer Engagement Toolkit

Most of my time this month has been spent making changes to the toolkit ready for its launch on the 29 March.

Unfortunately there are no places left at the launch, we were fully booked by day 3 of the invitation going out!!

You can book 'in house' training with us for your service. The resource is free for everyone to use and the website will go live on the 29 March so keep your eyes open for the web address.

Your View Counts Reminder

If you haven't put your views forward for the Children's Trust yet don't miss out on having your say log on to my website and complete the questionnaire at /commissionerparents

Last Modified: 28/04/2010 14:08:36
Back to top