Parent Workshops - Stay And Play Sessions

[Guest]

Hi all,

 

I work in a reception class and would like to arrange some 'parent workshops' for parents and children to attend together.

 

My aim is to plan for six workshops during the year, one for each area of learning. We would like to invite about 10 parents at a time to take part in a 'hands on' activity with their children.

 

I have thought of ideas such as making cakes, playdough etc, but could really do with a few more ideas.

 

Does anyone else run this sort of workshop? Have they been successful?

 

Thanks

[AnonyMouse_73]

Hi Emma

We used to run these when I worked in school. We would have them at the start of the day, for about an hour. We would have a theme (eg messy play; number) and have a variety of activities for the parents to do with their children. We tried to think of activities they could fairly easily have a go at at home, without needing to spend a lot of money.

 

They were very popular, but took time to get going, to begin with they would stand back and watch their children, but in time they were getting stuck in too.

We always invited all parents which did make for very busy times (39 children) and many would come with younger siblings too. They were sometimes exhausting, but very worthwhile and lots of fun!

 

Good luck with it.

[Guest]

We do regular stay and play sessions twice a week in a morning just before school starts for 20 minutes. They are linked to all areas of learning and will be games and practical activities such as number/alphabet bingo, dominoes etc.

 

We also have WOW sessions each term linked to our topic. This term I am doing an Easter Activities session with things like an easter egg hunt, easter bonnet making etc.

 

We usually have a good turn out of parents, but make it so all children can take part regardless of whether their parents come or not. Usually the parents end up working with a whole group of children!

 

It's a good opportunity to see how the children and parents are together and nice to stand back and enjoy!

 

Hope they go well x

[Guest]

we had a mark making workshop for parents and children. We had lots of different mark making resources out for parents and children to engage in. it was a great success the parents were amazed about the diffent media's that we used for mark making, not just writing or drawing with pencils etc and this workshop encourage parents to be more involved and that they too could also provide different resources at home with their childs learning like foam, spagetti, sand etc etc

[Guest]

we have weekly stay and play sessions. we used to end up with 30 sets of paretns so now its on a 4 week rota but parents cancome to which is best. They stay 9-10.30 and they love it! they really appreciate being invited in and this makes them more compliant like when i ask them to let the children go in ind because we just dont have the room because they know they can come in to school other times. x me n my tas like it because we can chat to parents for example a mum stayed in class whilst we had a out of the blue assembly to help pop a display up and was having a cup of t and a biscuit with my ta. let us know how you get on with yours x