They ensure all children/young people have access to education, health services and community resources. We offer a trauma informed approach one to one support and group work to enable children to express themselves and encourage their self-esteem and confidence in a safe and friendly environment.
We do this through supporting children and young people through talking, listening, play and creative activities, this will later support them to build positive relationships with their families and wider community.
We enable children and young people to express and understand their feelings and develop coping mechanisms.
We also offer support to women to raise their awareness and understanding of their children’s experiences and impact of domestic abuse, rebuilding or strengthening their bond.
In the refuge, we offer a variety of services to children and their mums. We run multiple weekly group sessions to enable mums to attend well-being programmes. In these sessions we offer a range of activities for the children to enjoy, including arts and crafts, messy play, and role play. We also offer several after school club sessions per week, to ensure the children who attend school are still having emotional support. To rebuild relationships between mums and their children, we run weekly sensory sessions for babies and toddlers to attend with their mums, and explore different activities, which can include water play, edible messy play and animals. This gives women the chance to bond with their children freely through play
In half terms we offer trips for the children and their mums to attend, these can include going to places like the farm, soft play or theme parks. This gives mums and children opportunities to rebuild their confidence within the community.
We offer children over 6 years old the opportunity to take part in The Healing Together Programme. This programme is a trauma informed approach to give children the opportunity to learn about how their brain and body works and responds to feelings. It also provides them with coping mechanisms for when they are experiencing these strong feelings.
In the refuge, we support mums in accessing schools and nurseries. We have a good connection with local education settings, and if needed we are able to support them in arranging school transport. We are able to attend initial meetings to support mum and their child/children.
To encourage the children’s self esteem and confidence we celebrate all different kinds of cultural celebrations. Mums enjoy their children engaging and learning about new religions/ethnic back grounds. Very often mums will host parties for the families in the kitchen, where they will cook traditional food and play traditional music. We provide materials and support the families’ celebrating holidays like Christmas, Easter, Diwali and Chinese New Year.
