.gif)
.jpg)
Family Learning resources for journalists
'As parents we are not ashamed to have our knowledge updated by our children. Our kitchen table is where the homework of our girls always ends up. Every emotion has surfaced across that table. Without doubt my wife and I have our brains regularly tested and we occasionally fail but we discuss, we argue, we laugh, shout and get frustrated - but everyday all four of us learn!,' Philip Schofield, TV presenter.
'Learning and experiencing new things whatever the subject is the essence of life, we love watching babies and toddlers learn about day to day things with such enthusiasm, but we often lose that enthusiasm ourselves, there is no reason why adults can't have the same amount of fun learning, since, whatever your parents may have said, you never get to the point where you know everything, if you did you'd be bored!,' Phillippa Forrester, TV Presenter.
Welcome to the Campaign for Learning's family learning media pages, promoting the importance of family learning and the difference family support can make to individual lives, families and society. This part of the site offers everything you need to cover family learning and the Campaigns work in this field including the Family Learning Festival (the 10th anniversary celebration of the Campaign's annual awareness campaign to highlight the importance of family learning for all generations and society as a whole). For more information and comments on any of the Campaign for Learning’s family learning projects or family learning generally or to arrange interviews and advanced photo shots and filming, please contact Louise Dennis in our press office directly on ldennis@cflearning.org.uk or call 07976 175 978.
Campaign for Learning projects and initiatives:
Family Learning Festival
Family Learning Network
Family Fusion
Every Parent matters
Family Learning Resources
The Cream of Family Learning Festival events
Family Learning facts and figures
Inspiring case studies
Family Learning in pictures
Latest Press releases
CfL press office contacts
National Family Learning Festvial (throughout October), co-ordinated by lifelong learning charity the Campaign for Learning, is a major awareness campaign to give families across the country the chance to discover the joys of learning together right on their doorstep. Last year over 3,550 organisations took part in what was then National Family Learn Week to highlight the importance of family learning. To mark 10 years of family learning celebrations, the Campaign for Learning is making the whole of this October a Family Learning Festival.
The serious message behind the family fun is that family support of a child's learning has the single biggest impact on their educational development. The Campaign for Learning hopes to show families, through the Family Learning Festival, that this support is easy to give, fun to do and can often be life changing. Parents don't have to be experts to provide support for their children's learning and even small and simple things make a big difference. By bringing the Family Learning Festival into the headlines, the Campaign hopes to raise public awareness of the importance of family learning and the opportunities that exist through the Family Learning Festival, as well as focusing Government attention of the need to continue to fund and support family learning in the community.
For parents and carers who may be unsure about learning or have had bad previous experiences, the Family Learning Festival presents an opportunity to try out learning in fun, non-threatening ways - with signposting available to more formal learning opportunities, both for families and individuals. One of the beauties of the Festival is the way it's been taken on board not only by the full range of learning providers but by so many other organisations - including shopping centres, faith groups, libraries, culture, sports, leisure and arts venues, regeneration schemes, Trades Unions and workplace learning centres - reaching many families who traditional providers often find hard to reach.
For more information on the Family Learning Festival visit www.familylearningweek.com or click on the following link to find out what is happening this year. The cream of Family Learning Festival events.
The Family Learning Network is run by the Campaign for Learning in partnership with NIACE and ContinYou. Membership is free and already around 8,000 family learning practitioners have joined to share good practice, benefit from free resources and advice and attend prestigious events and conferences run by leaders in the field of family learning. It is estimated that Family Learning Network members support around 5 million families per year across England to learn together. The FLN website has up to date news, a wide range of useful resources and a free Family Learning Funding Directory, full of information on over 100 funding opportunities and funding support agencies. The Network produces its own quarterly newsletter, which carries national, local and regional news, information on the latest training events and conferences and a section dedicated to resources, publications and reports.
To find out more please about the National Family Learning Network and the support offered visit www.familylearningnetwork.com
Family Fusion is an innovative three year project working directly with Voluntary and Community Sector organisations. Funded through the Esmee Fairbairn Foundation, Campaign for Learning are leading on 'Family Fusion’to support the development, design and delivery of innovative and responsive family learning opportunities for people living in disadvantaged areas, develop further VCS family learning provision across all of the 47 regional family learning networks and increase and develop further VCS involvement in the National Family Learning Network and National Family Learning Week.
From Spring 2006 to March 2007 Campaign For Learning, with support from the National Family Learning Network, are delivering 9 FREE Family Fusion - Roadshows around the Regions events across England. Each roadshow will be an opportunity for VCS organisations and representatives from local and regional family learning networks to find out even more about Family Fusion and to meet with family learning colleagues from across the region and sectors. Each roadshow will closely examine the opportunities and benefits available to you, your organisation and families in light of ‘Every Child Matters’. The next roadshow takes place on 10 September 2006 at Southbank University, London.
To find out more about the Family Fusion project and forthcoming roadshows and events click here
Every Parent Matters is a joint project run by the campaign for Learning and Parenting UK, supported by the Change UP National Infrastructure Modernisation Fund. The two organisations have developed a strategic alliance to support the achievement of effective infrastructure and working between voluntary and community family learning practitioners and parenting service providers. Joint planning, shared ICT provision, media resources and training will underpin improvement of local support services and sign-posting. This alliance will promote integrated and sustainable delivery of the Every Child Matters Agenda by seeking to close important gaps in infrastructure and skills, and strengthen current joint workers links and practices. The idea behind this project is that Family Learning practitioners are already working closely with families who present multiple support needs, however, it is often beyond their professional boundaries to respond to these needs. Equally, parenting service providers are working with parents and raising their confidence levels and aspirations. Families need robust non-threatening progression routes in to further learning and Family Learning provides an excellent solution. The project has it’s own website, which will provide local key contacts for Family Learning and Work with Parents, an audit tool to enable organisations to map their local provision, support for effective signposting and opportunities to contribute to national debates on key issues affecting family learning and parenting organisations.
For more information on Every Parent Matters visit www.everyparentmatters.org.uk
