Superb photos taken by our Artist Kate Green – thank you Kate! – of the Finale on 1st June in Parkfield: the “It’s a Knock-Out” obstacle course, the Award Celebrations on stage with Adrian Sanders MP and the many free activities on offer after – all groups featured.
It is clear to see just how much the children, young people, families, staff, volunteers, artists and activity providers enjoyed themselves.
THANK YOU to all involved, directly and behind the scenes – it was just… awesome. 
This time courtesy of the leader of the Green Team, Julie MacFie-Jones – thank you Julie, fantastic photos that tell lots of stories! And a little plea from the team in the office: next time, let us swap and we’ll lead a team? 
More photos tomorrow, the photographic blog of the Finale!
(click on images to enlarge)
As a picture is worth a thousand words, we leave you with Go Adventures in pics!
Did you take photos and would like to share them? Please send to carmen@playtorbay.org.uk and they will feature in our blog!
Stay tuned, professional photos from Go Adventures Finale to come.
Photos courtesy of Charlie Chambers (Adelong), Rachel May Wibberley, Mandy Fisher, Kay Martin and Michelle Crews – thank you!
At our AGM at Parkfield 2nd May it was announced:
We are going on a BIG adventure!
In the words of the Quest Play Coordinator, Sarah-Jane Lowson:
We’re going on the biggest adventure we’ve ever been on and it’s right here in Torbay.
If you go over the hill in any direction, you’ll find drop dead gorgeous and weird and wonderful places to explore right on our doorstep, places like Greenway, Cockington Court and Torquay Museum but chances are you’ve only been there with school or with us if you belong to FUNk.
We want you to come to all of these places but not just for a visit – we want you to lead a creative team made up of local artists like Kate from FUNk and Mitch on sound and artists from a bit further away like the Barbican Theatre in Plymouth, the egg children’s theatre in Bath and Forkbeard Fantasy who have over 35 years’ experience of creating films, animations, theatre shows and interactive exhibitions.
We want you to make up the best adventure ever for these spaces and we want you to have a bit of an adventure whilst you’re doing it. We want children, parents, carers, any one who’s up for an adventure to get involved.
Where we are right now is going to be the Creative hub for this project. This is where we’ll make, animate, and build Quest Play Torbay.
It will be mad, it will be playful, and whatever you create in each space will belong to you, there will be big performances, grand openings and fingers crossed a digital trail depicting what you have created.
This project is brand new with a brand new way of thinking attached – we’ve been asked to road test this by the Arts Council (they’re who gave us some of the money) and what we do here in Torbay maybe the start of a quest play that spreads out across the whole of the SW with 1000’s of children taking up the challenge.
We can not wait! If YOU want to join in, call us now (01803) 850157 or email sarah-jane@playtorbay.org.uk
(sound mix in link above by Mitch Knight – Pump It Louder)
Super wild morning super wild kids.
77 people age 2 – 72 fetched up for a play
We had: make your own catapults, extreme bouncy castle, worm house construction, egg and spoon race with out the eggs because they had been ‘liberated’ for catapult target practice – we used marsh mallows instead – Got to be honest – thought there might have been a little bit of cheating – but all’s well that ended well because of Paula’s gorgeous Easter themed party bags! We had lots of cakes made by Indigos Go Wild the Next Generation Youth Club in our fab new kitchen - THANK YOU they were scrummy. We had amazed mums who hadn’t seen the kitchen before and the return of two very special young men who have come home to stay (you know who you are).
Thank you to the young volunteers for fetching up early to prepare for the day. Every-ones efforts made it so very worthwhile!
Sarah-Jane Lowson
(Community Development Worker at Indigos…what goes wild!)
Six Play Torbay-ans in a people carrier went excited and came back even more so!
Granted, the nine hour trip from Devon to Sussex was a bit longer than expected. But on the plus side we sang and danced ‘Follow the Yellow Brick Road’ on the hard shoulder of the M23, having decided to hop out of the car during the two hour standstill. How many people can say that?!
The hugs started pretty much on arrival, despite the fact it was nearly midnight. So… straight to the Mansion’s bar – quelle surprise! (Never did manage to balance that coin on the floating lemon. Grrrr).
Early rise the next morning: easy to do with this view from my room!
We happily trotted off to the Winter Gardens to set up. Play Torbay had a rather cool stand this year!
And during the entire day, we attempted to get #natplayconf trending with our ‘Social Media To Go’.
It was a buzz to see people sit down fearing Twitter and leaving glued to their smartphones tweeting and hashtagging away.
We also delivered the ‘Funding Haws’ workshop. The two and only Di Murray and Tanny Stobart (assisted by the rest of the team) presented it in a creatively visual way – anyone planting spaghetti trees soon?
The evening with the Award presentation was a tremendous success. All the nominees and all the ‘Pecker recipients’ were fabulous. No one ‘playworks’ for the recognition, for sure. But it is so nice to recognise fantastic work, fantastic passion, celebrating the fact that so many children and young people out there PLAY!
Presenting the Paul Bonel Award had us all in tears. I didn’t know any of the nominees but Fran receiving the award was so moving and her partner so brave and so eloquent… We thought Tanny, who fondly remembers both Paul and Fran and always shies from the public eye, did a great job presenting it.
As for me, I can still visualise the ‘public speaking tip’ my late Spanish Grandmother taught me. You who were there were all a sight to behold, I can assure you.
Wednesday was another great day. I’d love to know what the receptionist on duty at the Mansion made of me running out of the restaurant after breakfast with my arms stretched singing out the correspondent bit of “I am the music man” and being immediately followed by a dozen other playworkers I didn’t even know… The exercise was repeated coming out of the lift ready to check-out: everyone, who jumped when I stormed off singing, dropped their bags and ran around in circles singing out loud too. Yep. Most of us had only slept two or three hours after a full-on party night but we were all well awake after that.
Our lot all went to different workshops, intending to compare notes after. I was totally inspired by Wendy Russell – so much food for thought! And Arthur Battram will be including my article in his next book – wahey!
In between, meeting new and old faces. New ideas, new friendships. Including one from Spain! Si me estás leyendo Paula, hola cariño!!! ;-D This was only my second Conference but the same overwhelming feeling I had last year was re-ignited: when I first started working with Play Torbay, the like-mindedness, the contagious playfulness and the passion for Play of the three other people in the office was what immediately struck me. To come to a place hundreds of miles away and find 300 other people just the same and learn so very much the first time round was just amazing. To find it again and learn so much more this year was simply mind-blowing and truly inspirational.
Roll on 12th Annual Playwork Conference!
Carmen de Silva
“Play is a process that is freely chosen, personally directed and intrinsically motivated.” One of the Playwork principles. One thing is to be told about this and quite another to see just how much this means in practice.
So here I am, working towards my NVQ level 3 in Playwork, as a member of staff in a play session. A new family walked in: Mum, Dad and two children, a boy and his slightly older sister. The boy’s huge smile and shiny eyes caught my attention straight away as he walked towards us. The sister was absorbing it all from a more reserved stance, half hidden behind Mum. The Dad strolled in, a short distance away. I welcomed them in and the young man, age 8, introduced me to all his family. After a bit of a chat, Mum and Dad were perfectly happy to leave their son to play with us. Sister decided to go with her parents – shyness overcoming the urge to grab that enticing rope hanging from a tree branch. The boy hardly waved the parents goodbye: he knew no one there – some twenty odd other children but his eyes shot around everywhere, as if wanting to take it all in in one go.
“Will you show me all of it?” he asked eagerly. Of course, I replied, which side would you like to go to first? “There!” he said, pointing to the storage area. Inside, he was taking it all in. Loose parts, wood, tools, pens, cardboard, tubes, pots and pans, nets… Another child was changing his trainers for a pair of wellies – we keep a few pairs for muddy feet! “I don’t have wellies, could I have a pair too?” he enquired, by then with half his body in the wooden trunk where the wellies are kept, adding “I am a size 8!” Size 8 the young man was not, more like a size 3, but we found a pair, slightly too big, which put an even big smile in his face, if that was at all possible. “I have lots of energy” he informed me. ”Am I allowed to go on the swings?”
The “Am I allowed”s carried on for a long while. He was introduced to some other children and spoke to all affably.
Having spotted the tree houses and some children in them he ran towards one of them. There were three older teenage children eating an ice-cream. One of them shouted he wasn’t allowed inside. When he asked why not, a few rather unkind retorts followed. The permanent smile in that 8 year old turned out not to be so permanent after all. Especially when one of the teenagers threw half his ice-cream down at him, narrowly missing the youngster. He stared at the ice-cream on the floor and meekly said “what a waste of a good thing to eat….” My throat was knotted. I wanted to tell the older child off and yet didn’t. The little one made his way in the opposite direction. I followed rather than stay and speak to the older one – though that was my intention, when he was on his own. This older child had been coming to the setting since day dot and this was always the way he treated “newcomers”: seeing them as potential threats to the grounds he felt he needed to protect.
Another playworker who had not witnessed what had happened asked the young child if he was enjoying himself, to which he replied “I was, until I got bullied”.
Some other children arrived and started building things with sticks and twigs. He approached them with caution this time, observing from a distance. Gradually his confidence seemed to come back, together with “that” smile. Until the same teenager who had been unkind to him approached, to help with the “building”. The younger one took a few steps back but kept observing. When they were all happy with what they had done, the child slowly walked up to ‘the’ older one and asked “Please may I have a go?” The teenager eyed him up and down. I held my breath. “If you want” was his brusque reply. A semi-smile reappeared: he waited his turn and had a go – or three.
He spent the rest of the time investigating the grounds, always asking “Am I allowed to….” before venturing anywhere. Big smile. Good lunch. Good play.
The session was coming to an end and his family came to get him as I was having a chat with the same older youngster. The younger one approached me and said “Thank you for all you have done”. And looking at the teenager who had given him some grief and who was standing right next to me, he stuck out his little hand and said “I hope to see you again next week”. I felt myself welling up. There was a frozen moment until the older one clumsily and briefly shook the little one’s hand. And the family left. Little one had that big smile back. I looked at the older child. He mumbled to me: “That’s actually a good kid”. And he walked away.
Child led play. Child led resolution of conflict.
My best playwork lesson yet.
