Education for Social Change

Kyrran, a young group leader profiled

2009-10-15T17:32:00.000-07:00

Kyrran Cunningham, who’s 17, leads a Pioneer Group in Southwark District. He’s been doing this for a year, and before that was helping to run a Woodchip group, so he’s got an impressive history of Woodcraft involvement.

Kyrran reckons it’s easy to run a group, although TREE has plans to support young leaders who aren’t quite so confident. See Something for Everyone if you are interested.

(Kyrran is pictured here in the middle)

‘I joined Woodcraft Folk when I was 12, and first got involved in leading a group when I was 14, because there wasn’t an active Venturer group in my area. I thought Woodcraft Folk was a cool place to be, and it was easy to make friends there. I’ve found it easy
running a group, and just attended one training weekend to learn about safeguarding – I knew loads already just from being in Woodcraft. You can get friends to help you, and there’s always someone to support you in Woodcraft Folk.

Yeah, I’d recommend it to others – it’s fun, and you don’t know what it’s like till you do it. If you’re worried about whether you’ll be any good at it, just remember that you don’t have to be perfect – you just do it to the best of your ability. I thought our first summer camp would be so hard! But it was easy.

Two mums help run our group, and another DF called Peter. We recently took the group to London Zoo, and we’ve run sessions on things like anti-bullying and what young people think about the recession. We’re going to get to know other Woodcraft groups, starting with a Hallowe’en night we’ll do with another group. Scary stories and camp fires…’

Keeping the 'craft' in Woodcraft Folk

2009-07-03T07:09:00.000-07:00

Jessie is a young leader with Southwark Woodcraft and she also runs London Jewellery School. When she isn't teaching professional classes at her Jewellery School she often runs jewellery-making workshops in Woodcraft groups and other youth groups across South London. She uses a variety of materials depending on the type of workshop. These include, polymer clay, silver wire, memory wire and metal clay. In the past year Jessie has taken these workshops to national Woodcraft events like Venturer Camp and even an International Anti-Fascist event run by our Falken partners in Germany. The workshops can have political themes and are always very popular as participants are offered the chance to learn a craft, create their own unique designs and have something to take home.

Here is a video made by Dulwich & Peckham Venturers from Southwark Woodcraft for the camp news at Venturer Camp, where they decided quite spontaniously one afternoon, to showcase some of the Jewellery workshops and other things they liked in they style of a spoof-music video.

Jessie is looking in to how she can use renewable materials in Jewellery workshops at up and coming Woodcraft camps, and she is also interested in training a few leaders to be able to run these workshops with her and in their own Woodcraft groups.

Inter-Cultural Week in Germany, Report

2009-05-20T05:39:00.000-07:00

Report for Woodcraft Folk International Committee
(shorter article version is here)

There have been lots of young leaders from different Falken organisations involved in the IFM-SEI All Together project which aims to share, develop and pioneer diversity & inclusion practice. The decision to take a delegation to this regional inclusion event in Germany came from a few of us young group leaders from Woodcraft and Die Falken wanting to share our work together and give the teenagers that we work with a unique opportunity.

For a week in Easter, Dulwich and Peckham Venturers, a Woodcraft youth group for 13-15 year, run by Karl and Yuleane from Southwark Woodcraft, went on a trip to Germany to visit the annual Inter-Cultural Week run by Die Falken (Woodcraft's sister organisation).

Die Falken have a massive education centre where they run the event, called Salvador Allende House, named after the socialist Prime Minister of Chile, who died in an U.S.-backed coup. The centre can sleep up to 160 people, has media suites and large activity rooms, and is also home to the workers' library of Germany which documents the entire workers' movement of Germany.

Our Venturer group come from a wide range of cultural backgrounds, as do the Falken groups that were at the event, many of whom came from Turkish or Palestinian born families.
The educational philosophy is quite different from Woodcraft's as it is very outcome-orientated and leader-led. Yet there are many positives to the different approach, as the children explore a specific theme, in this case inter-culturalism, through a particular medium (radio,dance,etc) that they choose. For the whole event they spend all of their workshop time in that group learning and perfecting their skills and building up their confidence.

The Falken children were very welcoming towards our Venturers, using their English, showing them round the house and socialising with them. On the first day there were lots of team-building games and activities where participants would share personal and cultural information about themselves. They were given a display from the Falken team leaders that were running each of the workshop teams and then they chose which team they each wanted to be in.

Sculpture / Making a Radio Show / Street Dance / Hip-Hop / Animation

There was a day to visit the local town, where after having a look around the participants split into groups and gathered research and inspiration for their workshops. This included interviewing local residents in the town square about islamophobia and racism in the media, as well as taking pictures of foods and restaurants from different cultures.

There was alot more free-time than at Woodcraft camps because there were no aspects of co-operative living such as clans for cooking and collecting firewood. All the catering was done by staff and the structure of the event had a very different feel to it than a co-operative camp. Inclusion, diversity and internationalism were high on the agenda but most Woodcraft groups would encounter a few problems in adapting to the different structure and it highlighted to our Venturers the many positives of the Woodcraft co-opertive approach.

In the workshops the Falken team leaders were very skilled and professional. They were able to cope with having to use both English and German, whilst enthusing the participants and training them to a high standard in their chosen medium. During the generous break times and evenings optional social events were put on and there was plenty of time to lounge on sofas, play pool and enjoy the sauna. A few of us were lucky enough to have a look in the basement where the library of the German workers' movement is kept. Looking through the hundreds of thousands of books, banners, films and pictures, one only hopes that this once thriving workers' movement will be able to rise again and help smash the oppressive capitalist system that currently plagues the workers of the world.

There was a spectacular finale to the event with a performance that showcased all of the participants work and then a disco that went on well into the night.
Marcus ('Musquash') and Kyle ('Gopher') made a music video with some Falken friends about their experience. You can watch it here.

You can also see the Falken blog of the event with the radio show, pictures, videos and quotes from the event here.

Dulwich &Peckham Venturers would definately recommend Inter-cultural week to other Woodcraft groups that are interested in exploring the theme with Falken comrades.

"Hoch die Internationale Solidarität!"

("Long live, International Solidarity!")

Black History Month

2008-12-01T12:11:00.000-08:00

An article for the Youth Action Network's quarterly magazine Activate, in their December Racism edition.

In the Woodcraft Folk we have been involved in the movement for civil rights, equality and anti-racism for many decades. In April this year took our outreach projects Playout and C-Change to run the children’s area at the Love Music Hate Racism Carnival in London, which over 100’000 people attended. The event united young and old – Black and White, and highlighted the danger that racism and fascism present to civilised society. We live in a time where Racism, although not as vocal, is still present and institutionalised in our education and law systems, so in youth organisations we have a responsibility to ensure that young people are aware of the issues and know that they can be part of building a more equal world.

At Southwark Woodcraft Folk we have a mix of about 120 Black, White, Asian and Mixed Race young people in our groups. This year for Black History Month our young leaders led the way in organising a series of workshops aimed at engaging them in wider issues than just historical figures. Rolando, a 16 year-old Jamaican and Woodcraft leader ran an activity with our youngest groups on the Windrush, comparing it to his own experience of moving to the UK from Jamaica in recent years. With our older groups we discussed the Anti-Apartheid campaign in South Africa, looking at how leaders of the struggle such as Nelson Mandela and Dennis Goldberg (former President of the Woodcraft Folk) were part of a mass organised movement of South Africans supported by solidarity campaigns across the world. We used some activities from the Nelson Mandela Children’s Trust which helped with this and we also did sessions on African Dance & Jewellery, as well as Poetry & Hip-Hop influenced by Black Liberators and a small group went to see a film on the Black civil rights movement shown by the Trade Union Congress.

While Black History Month gave us a chance to look at Black Liberators, perhaps more importantly it provided us with a focus to look in-depth at the issues surrounding the struggles for equality, civil rights and anti-racism, and how mass movements of organised people can bring about positive social change. We hope that many of our groups across the UK will do an activity for Black History Month 2009 and we would encourage all other youth organisations to support Love Music Hate Racism events.

Anti-Fascist Footprints

2008-11-10T18:36:00.000-08:00

With a large delegation organised for the fast approaching Die Falken (Red Falcon = Woodcraft's German sister organisation) Anti-Fasict Winterschool, we planned an autumn planning meeting combined with themed walk.
David Rosenberg ran his Anti-Fascist Footprints tour of London's East End for a group of 10 young members of Co-opertive Youth and/or Woodcraft.
The tour really brings to life the history of working class struggle in the east end, the Battle of Cable Street and the events leading up to it.
We would definately recommend the tour to other groups and organisations.
www.eastendwalks.com

“David's knowledge and enthusiasm brought the period to life, reminding me of things I'd forgotten and introducing me to new characters and events in the rich history of East London's anti-fascist struggle. We went away feeling inspired to keep these great traditions of unity and defiance alive” (Steph G - East London)

Park Farm Work Camp

2008-07-19T16:20:00.000-07:00

In July this year, Co-operative Youth ran a work camp programme at Woodcraft Park Farm in Sussex.

A group of young adult volunteers from Co-operative Youth and RefugeeYouth teamed up for a 5 day work camp to help prepare Woodcraft Park Farm for the children's camps in the summer.

Run as a drop-in camp the volunteers were able to arrive and depart as and when they pleased which over 5 days meant we had quite a successful turnover of people, with most staying for 2 nights.

Hayley and Imogen, two 16 year-old DFs from Co-operative Youth took the lead on wildlife murals on the Portaloo blocks - previously ruled by the local council as being too ugly for the area. They were joined by a group of RefugeeYouth volunteers and other Woodies came down mid-camp and did some great work on mural. The end result was a beautiful child-friendly wildlife mural created co-operatively by an enthusiastic and dedicated group of volunteers.

Al, a computer person from somewhere up north, spent 2 days with 'camp chief' Karl cutting back brambles around gates, fixing fences and trimming all the grass around the adventure playground. Despite bramble scratches, thistle pricks and nettle stings, not to mention some unexpected problems, like finding out that the tractor grasscutter, the sit-on grasscutter and the lawnmower were all broken, the two 22 year olds got the previously overgrown playarea back into a fully accessible adventure playground.

With farm manager Tom at their side, 'District Fellow' Rolando and 'Keeper of Provisions' Tyrone maneuvered some massive victorian railway sleepers across a ditch to form a bridge, solid enough for horses or vehicles, between two camping fields.

Whilst all of the above tasks were being worked on, the most physically grueling of the work was being spaced out over the 5 days. A new farm gate had to be put in where the bridge brought the two camping fields together. The farm gate, complete with 2 ten-foot fence stakes required five-foot holes to be dug to secure them. Tom, Jessie, Karl, Rosa, Hayley, Rolando, Tyrone and Naomi hacked away into the clay and oak tree roots, over 5 days to make sure the stakes could be properly secured.

Together the gate and bridge are an important new addition to Woodcraft Park Farm.

To find out more about RefugeeYouth go to www.refugeeyouth.org.uk

Woodcraft Rocks against Racism!

2008-05-14T14:43:00.001-07:00

Woodcraft World (Summer'08) Article: Woodcraft Rocks against Racism!

In 1978 London Region Woodcraft Folk joined a march to the legendary Rock Against Racism concert, a defining moment in that decade’s defeat of fascists like the National Front. On its anniversary, thirty years later, more than 100’000 people headed to Victoria Park in the heart of London’s East End, to the free LoveMusicHateRacism Carnival.

The event united young and old – Black and White and highlighted the danger that racism and fascism present to civilised society. While legends from The Clash and The Specials rocked on stage with the likes of The Good the Bad & the Queen, Hard-Fi, DJ Hype, Roll Deep and others, members of the Woodcraft Folk demonstrated their commitment to challenging racist discrimination, offering a free and popular programme of anti-racism art, peace bracelet making, co-operative games, crafts, and C-Change activities to over 1000 children and young people.

Karl, was the voluntary co-ordinator of the Children and Young People’s Area for LoveMusicHateRacism: “This was an example of some of the most positive aspects of our movement coming together. With our two national outreach projects, Playout and C-Change, staffed and active, Woodies from all over the region answered our calls for help. Leaders from Southwark and Wimbledon were joined by 18 DFs and young volunteers who helped make the day a real success! “

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More coming soon on how you can involve your Woodcraft group with LoveMusicHateRacism events.

Outdoor Play

2008-04-05T04:47:00.000-07:00

This article on outdoor play (www.guardian.co.uk/society/2008/mar/30/children.health) left me wondering, what exactly inner-city children can to gain from new funding for play spaces? One-off funding for playgrounds can have little to no effect, without plans and policies for their regular use. To really increase outdoor play, the dangers of the playspaces need to be addressed, with continuing investment in upkeep and local use. As part of this, we need Councils to work with communities through existing voluntary sector organisations, building strong links and providing long-term funding.

A growing project in our co-operative youth movement is proving to be very popular with children and families. For five years our playbus teams of young, trained play leaders that reflect their communities, have been storming into parks and council estates in the school holidays and half-terms. We knock on doors, call up to balconies and get large groups of children to come and “playout”, with group co-operative games, sports and outdoor crafts. Thousands of Lambeth and Birkenhead children benefit from these free activities, particularly the active presence of play leaders, but other authorities have been slow to see the benefits of this type of outreach for developing the potential of their shiny new playgrounds.

Karl Rosen Darrell
PlayOut,

Karl's aticle in SE21 Magazine in South East London

2008-02-25T19:52:00.000-08:00

SE21 Magazine

Southwark Woodcraft Folk - Heard of them?

Jessie (20) has won her Big Boost award for a free creative arts playscheme. Karl (21), has just led a 2 year youth exchange project with the Indian Woodcraft and won a Jack Petchey Award for Outstanding work with young people.Cairo (13) was awarded money from Southwark Youth Opportunities Fund to take the children from 3 of our groups for an adventure weekend. Kasmir (14) recently won a Jack Petchey Youth Award and was able to get his leaders Karl (21) and Abe (18) to take the group to camp with the Danish Woodcraft.

For the past 2½ years local parents, students and supporters of the Woodcraft Folk have been setting up and developing voluntary community groups and projects in the Dulwich area.

We are a unique progressive educational movement for children and young people designed to develop self-confidence and activity in society, with the aim of building a world based on equality, peace, social justice and co-operation. In our groups we try to give members an understanding of important issues such as the environment, world debt and global conflict, with a key focus in recent years being on sustainable development and fairtrade.

We are currently looking for Elfins (see box), adult volunteers and keen 16-25 year-olds to join our Dulwich based groups. We have and friendly and inspiring network of more that 50 adult members and value people for what they can offer. Training and introductory sessions are available to everyone.

Renting state schools in Southwark and Lambeth has become so expensive that we are increasingly having to use community halls and private schools. Even so, our 6 groups still reach out to a diverse range of over 100 children each year and our mobile Playout project brings free co-operative outdoor games to a further 1000 in the holidays and half-terms. You will see our teams in big red “Woodie hoodies” in parks and council estates from Goose Green to Brockwell Park

Cooperative Youth is a self-run youth empowerment group, made up of an open network for 16-25 year olds who are interested in the aims of Woodcraft Folk and have been doing all sorts of fun and productive initiatives; such as, gaining training & youth work qualifications, volunteering at camps, running group, setting up community arts projects and outreach work with Refugees and children from low income families.
.southwark-woodcraft.org.uk

Co-operative YouthBank

2008-02-10T20:26:00.000-08:00

After reading a lot about YouthBank UK (www.youthbank.org.uk) I had a chat with some friends in Southwark Woodcraft Folk and we decided to go ahead with designing a co-operative youth-run model of the youth funding panels that YouthBank UK pioneered.

The West Norwood and Dulwich area of South East London is seriously lacking in youth provision and support for the voluntary sector.

By establishing a collective group to fundraise a community bank and offer small grants to other local young people to do community projects, we felt that we could really help bring about positive social change.

We started by making a promotional and very amateur video. 18 months on and CYB (Co-operative YouthBank) is an independent youth-run co-operative and a big success. Young people from Norwood to Peckham, aged 13-25 are offered easy-access small grants to start their projects, peer mentoring to support them and voluntary awards (such as YAA and Arts Awards) as a recognition for their community work.

Check out the picture of the newsletter to get a better idea of what we do at CYB.

Our website is in need of an update but check it out; www.youthbank.co.uk

2008-02-04T03:26:00.000-08:00

Southwark Woodcraft Folk visit India
CYEC Grant Report

Background to our Youth Exchange
The Woodcraft Folk is a national charity and a progressive educational movement for children and young people – both girls and boys - designed to develop self-confidence and activity in society, with the aim of building a world based on equality, peace, social justice and co-operation. Woodcraft Folk have groups for children and young people all over the U.K. but we also have sister organisations throughout the world, through our membership of the Brussels-based federation of progressive youth organisations, the International Falcon Movement.

The Participants
Our group, Co-operative Youth is part of Southwark Woodcraft Folk and is a self-run youth empowerment group for 16–25 year olds. We are open any young people interested in the aims and principles of the Woodcraft Folk children's charity. Our group is currently includes; leaders from our younger groups, students, youth workers, Co-op members, community activists and trainee-teachers. As a 2-year project it has involved not just our 16-25s, but also our 5 other younger youth and children’s groups, as well as parents and the wider Woodcraft movement.
The group that went to India were a group of 8 dedicated young leaders and helpers that volunteer every week of the school term and also during school holidays and half-terms, to run and support our community groups, made up of more than 100 children and teenagers from a wide range of backgrounds. Some lead their own weekly Woodcraft groups in schools and community centres, others co-lead and help, and a number of others have been taking fundraising roles and Treasurer and Secretary responsibilities. The group was lead by Karl, a 22 year-old who runs a number of Woodcraft projects and groups for teenagers from Dulwich, Peckham and West Norwood.

The Hosts
For our Youth Exchange we partnered a network of 16-25 year old volunteers from our sister youth organisations in India, Rashtra Seva Dal and Anthar Bharati. Their work is based in Pune in India, just south of Mumbai. Being part of the same federation of youth organisations, we have similar aims and principles. Together we chose the theme of youth leadership skill, with particular emphasis on Environmental Sustainability and Co-operative Living. Having already successfully completed the hosting phase of our partner organisation, our project had a strong identity and both the Indian and British young people put a lot of work into being well prepared for our visit to India.

The Theme
We decided early on that our trip would involve exploring each groups’ cultures and would aim to develop leadership skills in co-operative and social education for our dedicated young leaders. The project’s themes of Co-operative Living and Environmental Sustainability were chosen by the young people of both organisations.

Our Visit

Day 1

We met local youth worker in the city of Pune and visited Osho Park, a project that turned a former polluted wasteland into an ecological park, covering 12 acres of land, with herb and rare flower gardens. Some young people from our partner youth organisation and their leader, a Professor at the Pune University, guided us round and talked us through the educational projects that they run there.

Day 2

The following day we took a train a few hours out of the city and we visited one of the projects that our partner group run youth camps at. It was called the Home of the National Association of the Blind, Lonavala. It provides shelter to 100 blind people and offers some employment to “make them feel, self-reliant”. Our partner organisation takes teenagers and students there in the holidays to volunteer so we visited some of them and they took us on a beautiful hike through the valley, in the afternoon.

Day 3

On 30th Dec. the group visited “Surya Shibir” an environmental project dedicated to effective use of solar energy and environmental protection. After touring the grounds and having a game of cricket with some students the group got the chance to meet the founder and owner of the project. We heard about how the project originated and pioneered sustainable methods of home building and use of recycled materials. The group were very inspired and interviewed the founder and other staff with a video camera.

Day 4
On 31st Dec. we spent the day with some of the Indian young leaders that we had hosted in 2006. They introduced us to their families and showed us round their communities. We were taken to a local food and textile markets and visited a couple of parks. It was a great chance to for all of us from Britain and India to bond and learn about each other’s cultures.

In the afternoon we went to the University of Pune to see the Inter-University Centre for Astronomy and Astrophysics (IUCCA). A professor gave our group an interactive talk and demonstration on his educational outreach programme that helps to “popularise science among under privileged children”. By using child-centred methods and interactive and co-operative learning techniques the project aims to make the basic principles of science more appealing and accessible. The programme is famous across India and is seen as a champion of nurturing scientific outlook among the less privileged and primary school children.

We spent New Years Eve with a group of young leaders from our partner organisation and their families. They taught us songs and dances and took us to a street parade and fireworks show.

Day 5

After a late New Years we had to get up at 6.30am to start the 11hour long journey from Pune to Solapur and to Aurad-Shahajani, a town where our partner organisation run a teacher-training and cultural-education college for rural women-teachers. After the long journey the group was received in magnificent and traditional way (AARATI) by the students and were treated to a large dinner with the principle and her staff.

Day 6

At the college we were invited to engage with the students in their showcase of cultural arts and dances. The rural students are taught national Indian dances, arts and crafts to a very high standard and they were keen to share their skills with us. In the evening we showcased some English and Scottish folk dancing and sang at a campfire. We also got shown round a number of local primary schools and did Woodcraft games with the children.

Day 7

On 3rd Jan the group returned back to Pune, stopping off an orphanage in Naldurg that the organisation run, called Aaple-Ghar. The school/orphanage is home to 300 happy and healthy children and teenagers, many of whose parents died in an Earthquake in the late 1990s. We were shown round the projects many environmentally sustainable features, included a farm where the children are taught valuable animal-rearing and agricultural skills, as well as solar-cookers and solar water-heating panels. After meeting with the principle and a couple of staff we were able to make some plans as to how we could support the project in the future.

Day 8, 9 and 10

We spent the last three days in Mumbai with a group of young volunteers from our partner organisation. Our group chose to see a range of museums and to learn about Ghandi and the independence movement. We had a chance to see lots of famous Indian cultural sites and learn about Ghandi, the pacifist independence movement and modern day peace and anti-nuclear weapons movements.

Conclusion
Overall it was an incredibly successful trip. We achieved all our goals of visiting all the projects our partners wanted to see and achieving a range of learning outcomes for the participants. It certainly was not a holiday by any means. Instead it was an adventure and a unique experience for all the young people involved. As a co-operative group of 16-25 year-olds, all of our projects whether they are community-based, training, camping or international, are youth-run. As a result, this exchange visit was a valuable learning experience for all the young leaders and participants. The group were able to share aspects of their different cultural backgrounds (Anglo-Jamaican, Londoner, Scottish, Cumbrian, Bermudian etc) with the young people of our partner organisation and they learnt a great deal about different Indian cultures, which will help with the work with children from Asian backgrounds in South London. Lots of organisational and youth work skills were learned, cultural and environmental knowledge was exchanged and lots of fun was had. The whole group now feel a lot more confident about taking children and teenagers from our younger groups away for camps and international trips.

We wish to thank the CYEC for supporting our young leaders and our two-year youth exchange project.

Caving & High-Ropes in Sussex

2007-11-11T23:39:00.000-08:00

In November we took 3 of our groups at Southwark Woodcraft to Hindleap Warren, an East Sussex outdoor centre. The ancient woodland setting is very nice and the centre itself has excellent staff who are really good with leaders and young people (just the kind of people you need by your side when you are standing on a 40foot windy tree and about to jump onto a rope swing). The half-day tours of old salt mines are fantastic and all of our group had a great time.

The emphasis on the weekend was mainly on outdoor activities, but we

squeezed in some co-operative games and circle discussion time.

As always with all of our Woodcraft camps and weekends, by having children and teenagers from mixed age-groups and mixed backgrounds, we build a real sense of community, team and family.

When inner-city London kids and youths get the chance to experience the outdoors with a Woodcraft ethos and programme of co-operation and equality, you see them learning to drop the defensive 'shells' and the social barriers, that they unconsciously form for survival in London schools.

Come&Create - Summer 2007

2007-09-26T19:49:00.000-07:00

Project Background
One of the projects of our Co-operative Youth (the network of 16-25 year-olds in Southwark Woodcraft) has been Come&Create. It was started by Jessie (aged 19 at the time) when she launched a highly successful free arts club for children and families in West Norwood.
http://co-opyouth.blogspot.com/2007/05/come-and-creates-norwood-art-club.html
Come&Create is now a independent youth-run organisation that operates in the school holidays. Find out more at http://www.comeandcreate.com/.

Project Aims

To provide local children from low-income families with fun, exciting and creative activities in the holidays.
To develop links with and open up new young and local artists and workshop leaders from community, charity and refugee groups.
To work with the Woodcraft Folk outreach projects in the area, such as Playout and the Woodcraft Park Farm summer camps.

Come and Create!!!

Workshops

Jessie created a magnificent 3-week programme with a great range of creative workshop leaders who were either young, local and/or first-time workshop leaders.

These included young artists and african drummers from RefugeeYouth http://www.refugeeyouth.org/, local young street dancers and Circus skills experts from www.whippersnappers.org/, Rachel Rosen - an artist who specialises in metal and wire work, Knutsford's very own arts&crafts legend - Mr. Jolly Ben Jones, local Woodcraft Leader and Reggae star Hayeeryah (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xa9OcB-6HrQ) and young up-and-coming soul singer Nicola Sipprell www.myspace.com/nicolasipprell.

Day Trips

Each week we ran a day trip for the children and volunteer parents, where did themed arts and crafts. At Whitstable we did a seaside theme and at Woodcraft Park Farm, Southwark Woodcraft leaders Linda Osborn, Isabella Reyes and myself ran a Woodcraft/Native American day. In the morning the themed arts and crafts went down very well but in the afternoon we were hit by terrible weather. Nevertheless, we overcame the strong winds and pouring rain and were able to put up the Wigwam, make a fire inside and toast many a marshmellow. These day trips were very important. The majority of the group had never been to countryside.

Summer Camp

Southwark and Wimbledon's Woodcraft Districts ran an outreach project at their District Summer Camp'07. A group of children from Come&Create were able to attend this camp at the beautiful Woodcraft Park Farm in Sussex. None of the group had ever camped or been away from their parents/carers before, so it was a big challenge for both us and them.

The programme featured all sorts of co-operative, creative, fun and exciting activities and everyone had a great time.

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Project Info

Why West Norwood?

West Norwood is one of Lambeth's forgotten areas (south of Brixton) and has very few holiday and half-term opportunites for children, especially those from low-income families.

A number of us live in or have family in West Norwood, with close contacts on local council estates. Check out our video (up soon) to hear more about youth provision (or lackof) in West Norwood.

Funding
We were able to secure some a late funding agreement from Lambeth Council, just before the holidays. However, they took more than 6 months to pay us the money they had promised which meant that without the significant lending from Woodcraft and Co-operative YouthBank and Jessie going 2grand in debt for that period, the project would have clapsed. This is just one example of the problems voluntary and community groups face in Lambeth and Southwark.

Staff and Volunteers

We ran the project in an equal and co-operative way with all staff and workshops leaders being paid the same hourly rate. Jessie's role as Co-ordinator was to plan and organising the workshops, promote, outreach and take bookings. I ran the project with Sally, another PlayLeader. We had a number of volunteers from around London as well as 5 young volunteers from Wandworth and Dulwich & Peckham Venturers (see other posts on this blog).

Suggestions on setting up a co-operative youth group for 16-25s

2007-08-14T21:48:00.000-07:00

These are just suggestions based on what has helped our self-run youth empowerment group in South East London.
• Not having set days we meet on and by a couple of us sharing a coordinating role. This involves organising a place to meet, (i.e. someone's house, the venturer group, coffee shop, protest etc) 

• Flexible communication seams to be important; texting, emailing and phoning everyone a week beforehand, and then again the night before. (time consuming but our age need it. also money for calls & txts can be reimbursed if receipts are kept). 

• Establishing as an organised group (allows access to all sorts of grants) and then after a few meetings picking a name for the group (this helps with a number of things like establishing an identity - the more people involved the better 

• Doing some research on what is out there in the local borough for youths, find out about local youth councils/forums, encourage them to have a say on it if they are interested.

• Making sure they have a ‘mentor’ but take on responsibility for the groups function as much as they are able to, including planning events, making contacts with other DFs or community groups, grant applications

• Other things I can think of at this minute include, teambuilding games, day outings like swimming or peace protests, Millennium Volunteers & Youth Achievement Awards.

'Party for the Planet', on July 7th

2007-07-01T21:33:00.000-07:00

The Woodcraft Folk's C-Change project is hosting this free fun day for young people, children and families for everyone to come together and help make a difference.

On Saturday 7 July, Clapham Common, London will be swarming with activities, performers, games, music, interactive instillations, people and stalls on how we can tackle climate change. It will be a celebration of the planet we live on and how important it is that we take care of it. Make a date to be there. Followed by a unique unsigned Battle of the Bands.

C-Change is a new project for young people by young people, about Climate Change. The interactive website www.switchonswitchoff.org is full of exciting ideas, games and info on actions you can take. Run by the Woodcraft www.woodcraft.org.uk and the Centre of Alternative Technology

10/07/07

A group of us from Southwark Woodcraft ran a eco-powered juice workshop. It was a big hit with families but I wouldn't recommend bicycle-powered food processors to anyone.

We also set up our Playout tent to offer the children at the event free co-operative games and environment-themed arts and crafts.

http://www.woodcraft.org.uk/

http://www.switchonswitchoff.org/

http://www.playout.org.uk/

Come and Create's Norwood Art Club

2007-05-20T07:33:00.000-07:00

Jessie from our 16-25s group got a small grant and set up a free creative arts club for children in West Norwood. With the funding she booked the library for saturday afternoons and purchased a range of arts materials, paying a couple of young youth leaders from Woodcraft and the wider community to supervise children while she led the workshops on things like kite-making, claywork and crafts, on a voluntary basis.

With the complete lack of services for the working class children in the area, it wasn't too suprising that by running a quality service and by building links with the local council estates, the club became very popular.

What was suprising, was it came from young activists and that it didn't just benefit the children, infact all the parents would love joining in with the activities!

It was also a chance for young volunteers from Woodcraft and local youth groups to get some paid weekend work and as the club grew and a bit more funding came in, local artists were paid to run the workshops.

After 4 months of growth and success Come and Create's Norwood Arts Club finsished with an exhibition of the children's work at the Co-operative YouthBank launch party.

Jessie was no longer able to access funding from Lambeth as she had turned 20 (Lambeth Youth Opportunity Fund is only accessible for people aged 13-19) and it is a real shame that Lambeth Council make it very hard for voluntary projects like this to function sustainably. While more than £100'000 thrown at Lambeth Youth Mayor project and salaries for its support staff.

Jessie, Makeda and myself have since set up Come and Create as a not-for-profit creative organisation run by young people, with the aim of providing children from low-income families in West Norwood, opportunities for free holiday creative workshops, access to outdoor arts and dance.

www.comeandcreate.com

Dulwich & Peckham Venturers, In the Beginning...

2007-04-10T20:23:00.000-07:00

Setting up Dulwich & Peckham Venturers

There is very little for working class teenagers to do in the East Dulwich and Peckham areas of South East London. Particularly in the East Dulwich area, there are lots of big private schools, with amazing facilities and grounds that children and young people from state schools haven’t been able to access. Private schools which are often classified as charities have been put under pressure by the Labour government to start sharing their facilities. I teamed up with some other young adults from the Woodcraft Folk, educational youth movement and children’s charity to see what we could do.

What's being done
I run this youth group on Thursday nights for 13-17 year olds from Peckham and East Dulwich, with other young adult helpers. Like other Woodcraft groups, our focus is a programme of social education, with strong principles in, co-operation, peace, sustainability, equality, creativity and social justice.

Our teenagers have direct input into the group's programme which has so far featured; video making, topic-discussion on locally produced films (on gun crime and rap & grime music), local underground musicians giving talks and showcasing their videos, street dance classes, smoothie-making, co-operative sports, ice-skating nights, teambuilding games, t-shirt design, music making and democracy activities.

We now have a ethnically diverse group of 20 young teenager who regually attend, along with 4 young adult helpers who help me run the group.

Notable successes in the group have included our Jack Petchey Award winner Melika (13), who has used her award money to help expand the group to 20 members, with fun promotional activities, and 2 camps involving other local groups in their first weekend camps.

Initial Funding
I secured funds from London's Capital Community Foundation and organisational support from the local Woodcraft Folk (www.woodcraft.org.uk).

After writing to the local private school and getting the go-ahead to use their grounds for charitable purposes, I opened group for 13-17 year-olds and enlisted the help of a few local teenagers to help me promote the group in the two local state schools, through the use of flyers and presentations.