Granton – Community Ambassadors

Granton: Adult pledges from Data Lab, Edinburgh University

I will listen more and talk less
– Brian

I will listen to children and act if I need to in order to help them
– Marion Dunbar

I will always listen when a child tries to talk to me

I pledge to always spend time playing with children, to engage with them and to listen to them.

I will always look out for a child who needs help when I’m out.

To be proactive in listening, asking questions and take action where and when I can. I have three nephews so will do my best to listen, discuss and to take action with any worries they may have.
– Craig Skeldon

I pledge to listen and respect children’s decisions surrounding their freedom when they’re out playing with their friends ( 2 hours or more!!)

I promise to listen to children and help them when they feel bullied or ignored.

I promise to never ignore a child, listen to what they have to say and how they feel and to be kind to them.

I pledge to look out for children in my neighbourhood to help make sure they’re okay – happy, healthy and safe.

I promise to listen more to children, especially if they are upset.

I will listen more and make more time.

I will treat children with the same dignity and respect as adults
– Dan

I will make time to play more with my children and I will listen to them carefully.

I promise to give children more attention….(and be kind to everyone).

Who Cares? Scotland pledges

Following their workshop with the CP Ambassadors from Granton Primary, adult participants made the following pledges:

“I pledge to listen to children and to help a child when they need help. I will not ignore any child if they need my help. I will be kind to all children, even if I don’t know them.”
– Ellie Barrow, Who Cares? Scotland

“I pledge that I will not ignore anyone, I will be kind and not be mean. I will listen carefully to children and take their views seriously.”
– Susan Armstrong, Advocacy and Participation worker, Who Cares? Scotland.

Granton: Workshop with Who Cares? Scotland

Staff members, Susan and Ellie, from Who Cares? Scotland, the national advocacy organisation working with care experienced children and young people in Scotland, joined us in Granton Primary to take part in a workshop with six of our Community Ambassadors; Chantelle, Denon, Katrina, Alex, Agniezska and Darren.

Our Ambassadors explained their Dignometers to Susan and Ellie and shared their thoughts and views on human dignity, empathy, trust and kindness, which they have written in their Community Ambassador’s Passports.

We then played the Ginormous Dice Game, posing some challenging questions and creating some interesting discussions between Susan, Ellie and our Ambassadors.

Together, the adults and children drew maps highlighting the places in the children’s world where they felt safe or unsafe and then discussed why they felt as they did. Everyone discussed what adults can do to make sure that all children feel happy and safe where they live.

Following their conversations with our Ambassadors, the adults made a pledge about something they “will do” to make children’s lives healthier, happier and safer.

A big thanks to Susan and Ellie for encouraging such meaningful and interesting conversations.

We look forward to hearing from you and find out how you are getting on with your pledge.

Granton: Community Ambassadors Workshop

Today, our team of Community Ambassadors held their first adult workshop. The workshop’s adult participants were a team of Police School-Link Officers (SLOs) who work with Granton Primary.

Together, our Ambassadors and adults discussed Human Dignity, Empathy, Trust and Kindness. We played the Ginormous Dice Game and drew a treasure map showing where children felt safe or unsafe and talked about why. We thought about the people that children can trust to help and support them at home, in their community and in school. We had a great discussion about whether children are able to overcome their fear of talking to strangers if that “stranger” is a police officer wearing a uniform.

To finish our workshop, we asked the adults to make a pledge to children about what they will do to make the world a healthy, happy and safe place for children to live and to grow. Read what the adults pledged here.

Big thank you to our Police SLOs for coming in to listen to our Community Ambassadors. We hoped you learned why children think it’s important that they have a right to be listened to and to be taken seriously. Thanks also for sharing your memories of what if felt like to be bullied as a child.

Share your thoughts by leaving us a comment.

Granton: Adult pledges

Following their discussions with Granton’s Community Ambassadors on 7th November 2017, adults pledged to:

“To try and listen more.”
Paul

“I promise that I will listen to any child who asks me for help.”
Jenn

“I, Jimmy Dee, do solemnly declare to treat children as equals with respect and dignity for all.”

“I pledge to always listen when someone tells me they need help.”
Iain (Police Officer)

“I promise to make the world a better place to live in for every child in Edinburgh and beyond.”
Prince (Police Officer)

Granton: Ambassadors Passports

Our Community Ambassadors in Granton have been reflecting and thinking about the work we have been doing together in the programme.

To help with this Ambassadors have been provided with Community Ambassadors Passports and individually they have been thinking about the themes of Human Dignity, Empathy, Trust and Kindness and placing their thoughts and messages into their passports.

In our passport, we’re beginning to think about the important messages we want to send to adults. We are thinking about the workshops we are going to develop so that we can ask adults what we want them to Think, Feel & Do when we ask them for support.

You can see what our passports look like here;

Comments and reflections

“I’ve learned so much from Children’s Parliament and so have all the other children in my class. It’s nice just to get time to sit with you (CP worker) one to one in a quiet place“.

“Adults need to take time to listen to us and not be in a rush“.

“I helped my classmate when people were gossiping about her. I knew how she felt because it happened to me too. I was kind to her.”

“If there was no kindness in the world people wouldn’t have any friends and no one would want to go to school anymore.”

Granton Primary: Sandy’s Story revisited

Last week the Community Ambassdors helped to re-write Sandy’s story to change the difficulties he faced, including giving him his own room and a friendly school where everyone was kind. We went through the new story and finding examples of trust, empathy, kindness and human dignity. To help us understand what these mean we watched the videos that the Children Parliament Investigates Bullying Project had made.

TRUST

It takes a long time to get trust again if you lie
If someone has bullied you or hurt you in the past it is really hard to trust them again
When you trust someone you can tell them anything and they will help you

Watch a short film about Trust: https://youtu.be/X4ntEFpR_80

EMPATHY

When you put yourself in someone’s shoes
Lots of people start bullying because they have had bad experiences- like being bullied themselves or shouted at by their parents

Watch a short film about empathy: https://youtu.be/U-7lgaBn86M

KINDNESS

Being friendly, generous, considering others
Sharing is important
It’s good to help people and make them feel welcome

Watch a short film about kindness: https://youtu.be/NZPf86NcTJ4

HUMAN DIGNITY

Children should be seen and heard!
Adults need to listen to children so they can protect them
Giving children space helps them have human dignity
It’s good to be able to help your friends

Watch a short film about human dignity: https://youtu.be/cY0WbfXWOqM

Our questions for adults: What can you do to make children trust you? How can you make children feel listened to?

Granton: Sandy’s Story

In this session, our Community Ambassadors listened to a story about Sandy. Sandy is a fictional character, a 10-year-old boy who experiences challenges at home, in his community and in school.

Our Ambassadors explored the concept of empathy through hearing Sandy’s Story. Empathy is when you are able to see things from somebody else’s perspective. By putting ourselves in others’ shoes and feeling what someone else is feeling, we can better understand how our choices impact on other people.

Ambassadors listened to Sandy’s story and afterwards explored ways that the story could be better for Sandy. To read Sandy’s Story for yourself please click the link:

CP Investigates (Sandy’s Story)

The Ambassadors wanted to make some changes for Sandy

Have his own room, it’s not nice to have to share a room with your big brothers

His mum could take him to school so he feels safe

The older children are friendly and play with the younger children

Questions for adults: what can you do to make us feel safe and welcome in the community?

CAPE Granton: Our Community

We enjoyed a really energetic session today with our Community Ambassadors in Granton.

We talked about our Community which we described as “All the people who live in a particular area or place”. We thought about all the places where we love to be, as well as those that could be better or sometimes feel unsafe.

On maps, we drew all the places that we feel safe and happy and the places it doesn’t feel safe and why.

Have a look at our maps. We hope you enjoy them.

As Community Ambassadors we want to help adults understand what makes us feel included. We want to share ideas for how adults can listen to us when they are looking for ways to make our communities healthy, happy and safe.

Our question for adults is “What can you do to make our communities safe and happy places for us to grow up?”

CAPE Granton: Self Portraits and Human Dignity

On our first Community Ambassadors session with P6 we began by spending some time thinking about ourselves and produced self-portraits which looked at “the people we love to be with – the places we love to be – the things that we love to do and things we have learned, at school at home and in our community.

Here are some of our self-portraits:

After our self-portraits, we learned about something called Human Dignity.

Our definition of Human Dignity is;

Dignometers

Together we looked at experiences that children can have which removes their human dignity – and the experiences which can build children’s dignity and feelings of self-worth.

We put our feelings and experiences on our “Dignometers” some of which are posted here. We hope you enjoy them 😀

Our questions for adults from this session are; What does human dignity mean to you? and Can you remember an experience which left you feeling small, put down or sad?