Fostering community (2022)

What does it take to help a family feel they belong? Well, whatever the answer is, you can't find it without listening first. This video explores the work that the Reach Children's Hub did bringing families together to build confidence, ease the pressure of early parenthood and check in on one another. Stay and play groups, walk and talk, family links and parenting classes all grew out of conversations with local families about what they needed and couldn’t find nearby. At the heart of the work is 'Our House': a home from home with a living room, kitchen, study and playroom, where families can drop in whenever they need to. We set it up, but families run it. For many, it has become an extended family and a source of the continuity of care they rarely find elsewhere. Parents of children with special educational needs describe how isolating those early days after a diagnosis can be, and how finding others going through the same thing changed everything. As one parent puts it, the SEND system can feel like a map with no signs or road names, and the families who get most lost are often those with the least support.