Creative Age Working creatively with people living with dementia and their supporters, as cofounder of Open Arms Artists' Collective:‘in-the-moment’ participant-led engagement through movement, dance, drama, story-making, poetry, music and the visual arts. Our aim: to enrich continuing lives, build people’s confidence and affirm a sense of belonging.
Speak Up! Speak Out! A civic courage Forum Theatre event organised in response to planned hate-crime towards Muslim women. A resilience-building workshop for school children, their parents and invited community members.
'Distant Memories'
The culmination of a confidence-building project for mums. Women from Bosnia, Kurdistan, Latvia, Lebanon, Nigeria, Pakistan and the UK tell their stories in a performance of 'Distant Memories'. 'West Park Welcomes The World' To mark its 50th anniversary, West Park Primary School's Year 5 and 6 pupils learnt about the school's history from ex pupils and staff. Together they created a performance - 'West Park Welcomes The World' - telling the school's remarkable story through songs, shadow puppetry, film and theatre. This received wide national media coverage. Read more here.
Becoming a School of Sanctuary
Creating a culture of welcome and inclusion for refugees and people seeking asylum in schools. Reverend Dr Inderjit Bhogal OBE, founder of the City of Sanctuary Movement, gives West Park Primary School the School of Sanctuary award in recognition of its committed work. The Parent Ambassador Programme Training adults on the OCN "Becoming A Parent Ambassador' accredited course. Mentoring the qualified ambassadors as they embark on employment in schools. The role of the Parent Ambassador is to support newly arriving families with induction and integration in their new communities. Women Talking
Women from different communities living in the same neighbourhood came together to talk, listen, ask questions, share food, walk, make art, sing, visit each others' places of worship, visit each others' homes and build friendships. They shared the experiences they'd had together over a period of six months in front of an invited audience.
The Making of Me
Improving the quality of life for older people in care homes using the arts. Many of the participants in these sessions had dementia. The 10 week residencies in care homes in Gloucestershire and Oxfordshire were part of The Making of Me project with The Courtyard Centre for the Arts, Hereford.
Parent + Child Groups
Parents and children learn together in creative ways, make new friends and find out what their community has to offer them in the process. The group decides what activities they want to do. Visibility of parents increases in the school community, since groups often choose to share their experiences in school assemblies. Creative Learning Projects
Focuses have been on topics or themes - e.g. the Great Fire of London, Shakespeare, the Anglo-Saxons, Transition, code-breaking, Magna Carta, discovering the local area, from Stone Age to Iron Age, South America - or on approaches which help schools address their specific needs as a learning community - e.g. looking at negative behaviour towards newly arriveing families, helping staff be more creative in their teaching, developing the outdoor space for enhanced teaching, learning and play.
Counter Culture
Investigating the implications of diminishing opportunities for exchanges over counters. A mainstream school and a special school researched counters using archive material and by interviewing 62 local people with experience of working behind counters. They then devised a piece of theatre based on these real life stories and performed it at the Arena Theatre, Wolverhampton. The project generated a book documenting the process, a photographic exhibition and oral history recordings for the City Archives. Read blog here.
United Nations
Children from an English school linked with a Swedish school via Skype, sent each other films and made their voices heard. Their messages of peace to the world were transmitted via morse code from a World Heritage Site in Grimeton, Sweden - a longwave radio station. The Swedish children hosted a live streamed broadcast from Grimeton on United Nations Day during which all the children's films were broadcast. To watch our 3 minute film made for UN Day, click here.
The Corner Shop Community Project
Children in schools in Smethwick and Wolverhampton researched corner shops in their neighbourhoods and local archives. From the real stories and information gathered, they devised a piece of promenade theatre in their schools and performed it in front of their local community. Read blog here. Belonging
Exploring the theme of Belonging with women asylum seekers and refugees in Heath Town, Wolverhampton, in collaboration with Hope Community Centre.
Special Correspondence Club
A rural school meets an urban school, first through letter-writing, photography, voice recordings, dance, devised theatre and finally through each hosting the other for a class visit. A book was made documenting the whole project. Lost For Words
A creative writing project to help improve children's writing, using drama, music and visual art. At the end, each child was given a bound book containing all their project-related writing and a CD of songs inspired by their lyrics, sung by them.
Count On Us
A maths project in which children learned to understand the relevance of classroom maths in real life contexts. The children suggested where they wanted to go in the community in order to apply their mathematical skills and knowledge. The project culminated in a maths-inspired performance at the local arts centre, telling the story of the project.
New Cross Hospital Project
Working with young people living with cancer, using masks. Lasqueti Island Community Theatre Workshop, British Columbia
Drama and voice workshops on a remote island off the west coast of Canada for participants with little or no experience of performing, leading to a largely improvised community performance.
|