Early Years Networks in action

This year, the Family and Children Connect Vic Park (FCCVP) group collaborated with Kensington Police and Community Youth Centre (PCYC) to deliver a memorable Children's Week event in October. Despite challenging weather conditions, the outdoor movie night was a resounding success and was dedicated to celebrating childhood and community spirit under the exceptional leadership of PCYC.

The devoted Kensington PCYC volunteers played a pivotal role in transforming the vision of Children's Week 2023 into a reality, alongside sponsors from the Town of Victoria Park, Victoria Park Community Centre and Woolworths Victoria Park.

The event was made possible through the collaborative efforts of local community members and organisations. Victoria Park Mens Shed volunteered their time and skills and staff at Kensington PCYC Outside School Hours Care (OSHC) generously volunteered their time and equipment.

The Narrogin Early Years Network (NEYN) provides families with children in the early years with support to promote optimal health and wellbeing.

Although the Narrogin community has many organisations and services that focus on supporting families in the early years it can be difficult for community and other organisations to be aware of what is available for families and their children. 

This can result in underutilised services which can negatively impact the health and wellbeing of children across many pillars.

Since 2014, NEYN have held an annual Children’s Week Expo which runs during Children’s Week, held this year from 21-29 October. 

This event is an opportunity for all service providers to come together and showcase what they offer to families. 

Each organisation brings along information on their services and a play-based activity for the children to engage in.

The NEYN Children’s Week Expo creates a safe, welcoming place for families to bring their little ones along for a morning of play, learning and a chance to speak to all the providers.

This year, 16 organisations including playgroups, schools, childcare, health, and local groups, such as the toy library, and family support services held a stall at the expo. 

Over 80 children and their parents/carers attended the event.

The NEYN were successful in receiving a children’s week grant which went towards venue use, providing a healthy morning tea and entertainment for families. 

The children had lots of activities available to keep their curious and creative minds entertained. 

There was sensory play, nature crafts, puzzles, play dough, kindy gym and much more. 

All activities focused on supporting the development and nourishment of fine and gross motor skills, language and creativity. 

Narrogin’s local socialite, Nelly the Numbat, came down to hand out books for the children. 

Local face painter Mary provided some wonderful creations which left many smiling little faces.

The local Child Development team at WA Country health offered free ear health checks. Eight children were screened, and two referrals were made to the ENT specialist.

The City of Canning is receiving an overwhelmingly positive response from the community in its planning and establishment of a network to connect services in the area and better support families. 

After an initial meeting was held to gather community input and determine interest, quarterly meetings were established. 

The group was named the ‘Canning Interagency Collective’ with the vision of services collaborating to support families in the City of Canning.  

More community members attended the second meeting and over 90 people / services have been added to the mailing list.  

A logo has been created to enable community members to recognise and identify the initiative and the first community event is planned for March 2024.  

There have already been many examples of services collaborating, including cross-referring, supporting each other, exchanging contact details after meetings and sending materials to be shared with the rest of the group.

In the Rockingham area, primary schools and early years practitioners (including child health nurses) raised concerns with the Rockingham Early Years Group (REYG) regarding parent’s education and awareness on the transition into kindergarten. Issues such as enrolments, school zones, supporting child development and how to prepare their child for this important milestone were identified. Service providers were witnessing children and parents being overwhelmed with the transition into kindergarten, leading to possible negative experiences in school for the whole family.

To address this identified need in the community, the REYG initially facilitated in-person workshops for families to discuss school readiness. Finding limitations in the number of families attending workshops, in 2020 the REYG developed an online campaign.

The City of Rockingham and Child and Parent Centre – East Waikiki, with input from other REYG members and early years practitioners, launched the ‘Be School Ready’ online campaign, consisting of six Facebook posts covering topics such as toileting, enrolments, routines and the importance of connecting with playgroups and ELCs. Videos also explained this messaging with families being directed to additional information on the City of Rockingham’s website.

The online campaign allowed for centralised messaging in Rockingham and encouraged collaboration of information and services from early years agencies. It also met the needs of families during COVID-19 lockdowns and restrictions when face-to-face workshops were limited.

In 2020, the online campaign led to a reach of over 6000 people, with 257 people accessing further information on the City’s website. This rose to over 20,000 and 590 respectively in 2021. One public comment on the last Facebook post in 2021 indicated that the campaign had been, ‘a wonderful support for families to understand the importance of the kindergarten year and the enrolment process”’.

In addition to the increased views of the City’s Be School Ready webpage, the CPC – East Waikiki also received around 50 new members on their Facebook page and had 40 enquiries about their transition to school programs. This led to 37 children graduating from East Waikiki’s Playgroup to kindergarten programs, with 100% of the attending parents/carers recommending that other families should attend the program before their child starts kindergarten.

The statistics showed that the campaign made parents more aware of relevant services in Rockingham. This awareness has the long-term outcome of increasing parent confidence in preparing their child for school, ultimately allowing for the family and school to have a more positive experience while transitioning into kindergarten.

Between May and June 2022, the Be School Ready campaign will again be promoted on the City of Rockingham Facebook page, with resources available on the City’s website. Posters will be visible around local child services and distributed via the REYG. Topics covered will include enrolments, toileting, developmental domains, parent self-care and routines, where to receive support and reminders to ensure immunisation records are up to date.

Three videos will be filmed and promoted – enrolments with East Waikiki Primary School, developmental domains and support through the Giggles Child Care Centre and parent self-care and routine importance with the Department of Education.

Read more about the Be School Ready initiative.

In 2019, the Gosnells and Surrounds Children and Family Network realised Network members were independently delivering programs, services and information to parents and wondered if there could be a better way to deliver by pooling their resources. Hence, GosTalks was developed, a play on the Ted Talks franchise, recognising that this was a similar forum for sharing research and ideas, but relevant to the City of Gosnells and surrounding suburbs.

The GosTalks format provides an opportunity for local organisations to come together to create a larger scale event with ‘big name’ presenters addressing local issues.

The inaugural GosTalks was held on 22 October 2019 at the Don Ron Russell Performing Arts Centre, with over 70 parents in attendance. The panel consisted of Claire Orange, Griffin Longley and local health professionals. Since then, there have been three more GosTalks on the topics of ADHD and Anxiety (with presenter Karen Young). Over 200 parents, grandparents and educational and health professionals have attended GosTalks events.

GosTalks is a collaborative community event involving working groups members from Centrecare, City of Gosnells, Communicare and Parkerville. Other organisations involved in the Gosnells Children and Family Network are invited to take part and often assist in formulating future topics, along with previous GosTalks feedback.

These events have been well attended with positive feedback from the parents and service providers attending. Parents are better informed of local services and parenting/child development issues and feel well-supported within the community. GosTalks also allows parents access to a variety of specialists and experts in child development and parenting.

In 2020, Peel Youth Services (PYS) delivered a 15-week pilot program of their Early Years Learning Hut program to support parents and their children from pregnancy to three years of age. Held at the Halls Head Recreation Centre, the program aimed to improve parent’s confidence and knowledge about parenting; enhance their parenting and life skills; increase the informal and formal support networks for parents; improve the school readiness of children in Halls Head; promote healthy eating; develop fine and gross motor skills, cognitive and listening skills among children; and increase the social capital among families.

2018 Australian Early Development Census data highlighted the need for additional support for children in the Peel region and the Mandurah Early Years Group AEDC Working Group determined that intensive supported playgroups would be an effective way to focus on the needs of children in the region.

During the pilot project, 25 families registered interest but due to the size of the facility, the weekly attendance was limited to a maximum of 12 families.  On average there were 13 children attending each week.

Originally, this pilot was set to run for the last two school terms in 2020, following the extended lockdown period at the start of the COVID-19 Pandemic. Due to high demand and need, Peel Youth Services decided to run the program for another two terms in 2021.

At the start of this pilot program, PYS assessed that approximately 75% of the children were not reaching their age-appropriate milestones, but by the end of the program there was significant improvement in all domains, with only 25% of children not reaching some milestones. The three domains of most concern were communication, gross motor skills and social emotional development.

Each week, tailored activities such as sensory/messy play, obstacle course, home corner, physical play, peg boards, mat sessions and a structured morning tea were set up to encourage the children to learn new skills in all domains. In addition, guest speakers were scheduled from the community to talk to parents such as the local dental nurse, child behavioural specialists and Playgroup WA.

PYS encouraged parents to participate in all activities with their children and explained the reasoning behind each session and how they could incorporate it into their daily lives. Some weeks, developmental checklists Me@2 and Me@3 passports were sent home with parents to encourage them to engage in different activities with their children to progress towards the developmental milestones.

PYS observed improvements in the attending children and their developmental areas over all sessions. The trial has been successful in most domain areas and has assisted parents in allowing their children to learn though play. It also managed to express to parents the importance of them role playing and engaging with their children at home.

The Paraburdoo Early Years Network was first established in 2019 and placed on hold during 2020 and the first half of 2021.

There was a recognised gap in coordinated and targeted parenting supports and opportunities for connection amongst parents in the region. Children in Paraburdoo were also identified with vulnerabilities in the physical, social and emotional domains in the 2018 Australian Early Development Census (AEDC) so it was essential that the Early Years Network was re-established in Paraburdoo.

Paraburdoo Primary School Deputy Principal, Caragh Livingstone, and Rio Tinto Community Engagement Advisor, Shaha Bin Sulaiman, liaised to create an EYN Coordinator position and in 2021 an EYN Coordinator was appointed. In partnership with Rio Tinto and the Department of Education, the position was funded for one day a week and based at Paraburdoo Primary School.

The EYN Coordinator first connected with key stakeholders, including the Shire of Ashburton, Rio Tinto, Karingal Neighbourhood Centre, One Tree Children’s Services, Department of Health and interested parent representatives.

After identifying a need for opportunities for parents to meaningfully connect with their children through everyday interactions, the Early Years Network came together to plan a messy play morning for 25 October 2021, as a way of celebrating Children’s Week and reintroducing the Network to parents and the community. Parents engaged with their children at activity stations and were given ideas of how to replicate the activities at home. A healthy morning tea was included. 

The event was well attended, with 83 parents and children having a great morning and parents enjoying the opportunity to connect with each other and be introduced to the idea of an Early Years Network. Several parents indicated their interest in becoming involved and were added to the mailing list.

The Paraburdoo Early Years Network has since been holding regular ‘picnic and play’ mornings to discuss AEDC data, ideas for parenting supports and planning for future events. These picnic and play catch ups have been informal, but targeted, to achieve the outcomes of a connected early years community.

In response to the low literacy levels, the Gascoyne Early Years Network supported the Paint the Town REaD project and partnerships were made with community groups throughout the town. The project aims to lift the awareness of the importance of early literacy and encourage parents to develop a routine of reading to their children, especially in early stages of life.

According to 2018 AEDC data, 17.6% of children surveyed in Carnarvon are developmentally vulnerable in the language domain, in comparison to 6.6% in WA or Australia. Service providers often see children with low levels of literacy struggle to engage in the classroom and experience social and cognitive development delays during their early schooling.

Paint Carnarvon REaD was introduced at the Network’s 2019 Children’s Week Event, with a small egg which needed to be read to, to make it grow. The egg had numerous visits to local playgroups and pre-primary classrooms where children and parents were educated on brain development and the benefits of reading to children from birth.

After each story time session, the egg would grow until it was ready to hatch on the launch day in May 2021. Partnering with the local growers/arts and crafts markets, this successful event saw many young families enjoying interactive games, craft activities, singing, performances and the big reveal of the mascot, Timmy Turtle.

Since the launch, Timmy has attended the 2021 Children’s Week event and visited numerous playgroups and schools in the local community.