Save the Children’s Here to HELP project has been working in Gilfach Goch for 2 years. We’ve been working with children, young people and adults, read on to find out more about the work carried out to date. If you want more information on any of the activities and projects click on the links in the text to have a look at the project reports.

• We ran an after school club, where local children aged 8 and 9 years produced a leaflet about Communities First. This leaflet was given to all the children in Gilfach Goch. Click here to read the project outline written by Trainee Project Worker’s who ran the project. Or you can click here to have a look at the leaflet and print it out if you want to use it.
• We ran another after school club where children aged 5 to 7 years made puppets that represented people involved in Communities First. We then produced a DVD puppet show aimed at young children about Communities First. Click here to read the Trainee Project Worker’s project write up.
  

• Children’s Audit. We worked with a group of young people, who called themselves ‘The Gilfach Crew’. We trained the young people in peer research skills and they designed, planned and implemented research workshops in the local primary schools. The aim of the research was to find out what children think about Gilfach Goch and how they would like to see it change in the future. The young people then analysed the results, made recommendations and wrote everything up in a report.
  
  The young people organised a launch event for the report, which they invited local decision makers to. We have written up the project as a Peer Research Training Module, available in the Training section of this Cdrom. More detail on the Children’s Audit is available in the Project Write Up. Or, have a look at the Children’s Audit Report.
  
• Stop, Look and Listen: A film about young people’s views of Gilfach Goch. The Gilfach Crew decided that having got the views of children in the Children’s Audit, they wanted to find out what young people think about the community. They had training in filming skills and then spent time planning the film, making storyboards and shooting schedules and developing a script. They decided to base the film around the idea of a Big Brother diary room, with young people sitting in a ‘Big Brother Pod’ and answering questions about what they felt about the community from ‘Big Brother’. The young people took the pod to youth groups and the local comprehensive school.
  
  After the filming was completed, the Gilfach Crew helped with the editing. They then planned a film premiere to show the film to local decision makers. You can find out more details about how we did the film project in the Project Write Up.
  
  
• The Animated Game. Having made the film and done the Children’s Audit, the Gilfach Crew undertook a new project. They designed an animated computer game about young people getting involved in their community.
  
  The Gilfach Crew planned and helped to design five stages for the game around things young people can do to get something changed in their community. They decided the theme would be about trying to get a cinema in the local community.
  
  They designed and animated characters for the game by taking digital photos of each other and drawing cartoon bodies using computer programmes.
  
  The game shows how children and young people can get involved in their community to get something changed. It’s great fun for all everyone (including community workers!).
  
  
• Hendreforgan Project. We worked with Rhondda Cynon Taff (RCT) Local Authority to help them involve children and young people in the planning for the regeneration of the Hendreforgan Estate in Gilfach Goch.
  
  With the help of the school council at Hendreforgan Primary School, we produced a child friendly version of RCT’s survey. The school council piloted the survey and suggested changes to it. Then the school council distributed the survey to all the children in the school. The survey was filled in by 185 children aged 5 to 11 years.
  
  The results were fed into RCT’s plans for the regeneration of the estate.
  
  Look at a copy of our child friendly survey.
  
• Communities First Meetings. After their successes with the Children’s Audit and the film, representatives from the Gilfach Crew were asked to become members of the Communities First Partnership Board group.
  
  The Communities First Co-ordinator had been attending Gilfach Crew meetings since the beginning of the project, so the young people knew her well.
  
  The Gilfach Crew met before the Communities First Partnership Board meeting and decided who would go to the meeting to represent the group. They discussed what they wanted to talk to the Partnership Board about, and made a mini-agenda for their item on the agenda.
  

• Launches and Premieres. The Gilfach Crew were very keen to make sure that as many people in the local community knew about the work they were doing. They wanted to try and make sure that adults were listening to children and young people’s ideas. So, for two of their big projects, the Children’s Audit and the film, they organised big community events after the projects to tell people about them.
  
  For the Children’s Audit they organised a launch event for the report they wrote of their findings. They invited members of the Communities First Partnership Board, representatives from the local authorities and voluntary organisations and local residents. They did a presentation of the research process and their findings and recommendations. They wanted to make sure that their audit had an impact, so they got everyone who attended to fill in a pledge form, on which they wrote three promises of things they would do over the next three months to make the children’s ideas in the report a reality. Three months later we wrote to everyone reminding them of their promises and asking them if they had achieved them yet. Lots of people had!
  
  For the film, the Gilfach Crew decided to organise a film premiere and turn the local community centre into a cinema for the night. They had a big screen to show the film on, a red carpet, hot dogs and pop corn and ‘Oscars’ style awards for everyone that took part. They invited Communities First Partnership Board, representatives from the local authorities and voluntary organisations and local residents. Over 100 people turned up including the local MP and Councillor. Again the young people decided to get people to make promises to help them put the ideas in the film into practice. This time, the young people came up with three ways of doing it – writing the promises on a graffiti wall, typing them into a form on a laptop computer or saying them to camera while sitting in the Big Brother pod!
  
  Both the launch and the premiere were very successful, and showed adults in the local community how committed the young people are to improving the area. Since the launches the Gilfach Crew have been asked to become members of the Communities First Partnership Board and the Area Regeneration Board. They were also asked to Parliament to take part in workshops to advise the UK Government about how it could better involve young people.
  
• Child Rights Training for Adults. Working with the Communities First Partnership Board in Gilfach Goch, we found that there was demand for training in Child Rights for adults involved in community regeneration in the area.
  
  So, we developed a training module which could be delivered to the Partnership Board in Gilfach Goch. But, we didn’t stop there, we also developed guidance notes to go with the module so that community workers in other communities could use the notes to run the training module themselves with their community groups. If you want to do this have a look at the Child Rights Training Module (including guidance notes) for adults.
  
  The partnership board in Gilfach Goch wanted to have an introduction to children’s rights, and to find out more about children’s right to participate in decisions which affect them. They also wanted to know how they could help children and young people in the community to claim their rights. All of this, and more, is included in the training module.

The Trainee Project Worker is going to be working with 9 to 11 year olds in a playscheme in Gilfach Goch. The aim of the project is to raise awareness of children’s rights that are linked to participation in community regeneration, and to show the children examples of projects from around the world where children have got involved in their communities. The children will make 3D models of children, which display children’s rights. For more information on this project please contact Save the Children on 02920396838.

The Gilfach Crew have been asked to help the Local Authority in Rhondda Cynon Taff to organise a consultation day for their Hendreforgan Estate Regeneration project. The council have asked the Crew to plan and organise consultation activities to help the council find out what young people think should happen on the estate. The Crew have been given a budget to spend on this event. They will be in charge of deciding what the money is spent on. The Crew will be using the skills and knowledge they got from the Peer Research Training they did for the Children’s Audit, to come up with interesting and fun ways to find out from young people their ideas for the development and regeneration of their estate.