Reflections on two years of Creative Sparks

As we take a break from Creative Sparks during the school holidays, we reflect on what we've been able to achieve with our after-school programme over the past two years since it began.

Creative Sparks was born from a desire to deepen our impact with children, to deliver regular and reliable sessions for local families, create environments where children feel safe and confident to express their creativity and try new ideas and to provide an impetus for our team to innovate week in week out.

The journey began in St Ann's Library, with its large double-community room, and an Area-based grant from Nottingham City Council via the Renewal Trust which enabled us to establish regular term-time sessions. Over two years, we've seen the children who were with us right from the start grow in confidence, taking weekly themes and topics in their own direction, helping new starters to understand the terms of engagement and suggesting their own ideas for activities. We've done all manner of activities: clay dinosaurs, conversations between alien planets, talent shows, paint-making and we've celebrated Christmas, Chinese New Year, Ramadan through crafts. Despite Nottingham City Council's financial situation putting a stop to the Area-based grant, we have been able to continue at St Ann's thanks to support from the National Lottery Awards For All.

“My child loves going to Creative Sparks in Strelley Road Library, he just can’t wait to go every week. It gives him so much fun and he gains a lot of confidence from this. Teachers are nice and creative.”

The learning from St Ann's caught the attention of Catalent Pharma Solutions, an international drug-development company with a site in Nottingham on the Strelley Business Park. We had been working with Catalent through the Nottingham Festival of Science and Curiosity and the team there were keen to help us bring the programme to their local community. It's now been a full year that we've been running weekly sessions at Strelley Road library, where we push the limits of space in the little community room and regularly make use of the outside area.

We've seen cross-pollination between the two sites, with parents recommending the group to friends in other parts of the city, and its been great to be able to continue working with one family as they moved house across the city and found themselves much closer to our St Ann's site. At Strelley we recognised the great value that parents/carers staying and joining session activities can bring, and introducing this to St Ann's, has brought about a calmer atmosphere of family learning.

“We have found that local children are so excited to come and join the Creative Sparks sessions. They genuinely look forward to it. We have found that the children really do engage with the staff - not only those running the group, but with library staff as well. It is fantastic. The library is more vibrant when you’re here!”

The Awards For All grant meant that we could begin to deliver the programme in another site, so this time we look south to the Meadows, where we knew there was a fabulous community room, gorgeous garden and thriving audience as a result of our work through the Festival of Science and Curiosity, and connections with the monthly Saffron Science Club run by University of Nottingham. At the Meadows the young people who attend are a little older, ranging from 9 to 11 years old, this has shifted the kinds of activities and space we provide, with a strong focus on nurturing independence, self-confidence and aspiration.

Delivering across three sites has meant we've needed to expand the team, mid-way through the programme appointing Melanie Wheeler as our Community Programme Lead to focus on planning and delivery and more recently appointing Ruth Lewis-Jones as our Freelance Workshop Leader for Creative Sparks, who is already bringing her wealth of expertise to our Strelley sessions and in our planning. The dedication and reliability of our amazing volunteers have been key, their attentiveness, calm and professionalism have enabled us to nurture and keep every child and family safe during our sessions.

As we look towards the next school year, we'll keep doing what we're doing, with our programmes confirmed until the Easter break. There'll be many more activities to come as we keep trying out new ideas; keep an eye on our Instagram for all the activities. We'll be exploring new spaces; a grant from the Gemini Fund will allow us to deliver Creative Sparks in an accommodation site for refugee and asylum-seeking families, providing much-needed creative expression and learning for these children, many of whom are awaiting school places and have limited access to educational activities.

Thank you to all of our 'Friends of Ignite!' for your continued support and partnership as we've gone along this journey, and for helping us to ignite futures.

In true Ignite! fashion, we must let the children have the final word:

"I love Sparks Club.... it's my favourite place"