There are eight Children’s Centres across Knowsley that offer support to families from venues in Huyton, Kirkby, Halewood, Whiston and Prescot as well as in community settings and families home environments, when required. Many of the services and activities offered are delivered by volunteers from within the local community.
Children’s Centres offer a comprehensive timetable of ‘evidenced-based’ early years activities and parenting courses aimed at supporting families and children to reach their full potential. Staff, volunteers and partners provide a warm and welcoming environment to support children’s learning and development, giving parents the opportunity to build on their existing strengths and meet people in their local area. The centres provide inclusive health and wellbeing support, speech and language support, sleep support, parenting courses and differential support for families of children with special educational needs and/or disabilities (SEND).
The centres deliver vital community services, which wouldn’t be possible without the support of volunteers. In a twelve month period (2018/2019), Children’s Centres in Knowsley had supported 5,460 children under the age of five year, with 24 volunteers helping to deliver just over 60% of the centre’s universal sessions. In addition, 83.9% of those volunteers have accessed further education as a result of the volunteering programme with 25.9% going into employment.
