Lower Oldpark Community Association
Project: 20 Pre-pre school places
Area: Belfast City Council
Avoca Playgroup, part of Lower Oldpark Community Association, is situated in Inner City North Belfast. The Playgroup serves a community that is one of the most deprived in Northern Ireland and still experiences civil unrest due to the many interface areas between communities. The Pathway Fund enables the Playgroup to run a breakfast club and to carry out home visits, ensuring there is time and opportunity to building trusting positive relationships with the families, so that the setting can provide a high quality affordable childcare provision in an area of high social deprivation.
One of the focuses of the project is to provide an early intervention service that helps to remove barriers and that helps achieve the best positive outcomes for the children. Research highlights, that one of the main barriers to learning is Speech and Language with up to 70% of children in socially deprived areas falling below the levels of attainment of their peers. The project uses the evidence-based programme Wellcomm, which is an evidence-based toolkit used to assess and support children’s speech and language development. When the 20/21 intake initial assessments were completed, it was established that 60% of the children were below the level for their age.
The results were reported back to parents at the settling-in interviews. Four parents were asked to contact their GP/HV and ask for a Speech and Language referral for their child. Progress of the children continued to be screened throughout the year using the Welcomm tool. At the end of the programme, it was identified that all children made significant improvement in their speech and language skills.
The end of year parental feedback about the Wellcomm Programme found that 70% had saw a marked improvement in their child's Speech and Language skills, with one parent commenting "Amazing! I cannot believe how far my son has come along in such a short period of time is amazing."
