We are really proud of our members and will jump at every chance to shout about them and their achievements! This is a dedicated place to showcase our members and to shine the spotlight on their projects. Keep scrolling to hear from our new member Footprints Conductive Education Centre.
How it works
Footprints is a Nottingham based charity which transforms the lives of children living with mobility and communication difficulties across the East Midlands. At our centre and through our support, babies and children develop the skills they need to thrive and achieve their potential.
Our work is inspired by the principles and practices of Conductive Education, a holistic education approach developed to help children with disabilities consciously learn the life skills that come more naturally to others. Our work encourages the development of physical, communication, social, sensory, self-help and thinking skills, such as sitting, standing, touching, listening, looking, eating and playing.
We work closely with the child and their family in a safe, positive and supportive environment to encourage and motivate each child's desire to achieve tasks. At the same time, we give families the knowledge, confidence and strength to cope with the disabilities their child lives with and understand how they can help.
The age range of children attending our service is between 6 months to 11 years of age and our Education Team, together with children and families in group sessions, ensure a collaborative partnership working approach.
What has been achieved?
Footprints is a long-standing organisation, created in 1978 and in July 2022 we celebrated our 20-year anniversary of becoming a charity. We are the only Conductive Education centre in Nottingham and our families live across the East Midlands.
Over our 20-year history, we have transformed the lives and wellbeing of a huge number of children living with disabilities, and their families. Through Conductive Education and with our support, children develop the skills they need to thrive and achieve their potential.
We have a number of support/charity partners who we work with, as well as an ambassador team and a committed Charity Patron, Richard Whitehead MBE. We have a dedicated social media following, which gives us a strong platform to share information, raise awareness of our transformational work, and in addition reach families across the East Midlands who are in need of our support.
Our dedication and transformational work mean we form strong and important bonds with the families and care deeply for them, their children, their achievements and their potential and future.
Next steps
We are growing and developing our charity at pace – we’re seeking and working with new Charity and Support Partners, as well as collaborating with other charities and organisations to become stronger together. We have a dedicated wider team working with us, having recently launched our first Celebrity Ambassador (with more to come), to complement our existing Champion Ambassadors.
We are also diversifying our fundraising activities and have recently launched sky diving as a year long fundraising activity, with Tough Mudder and a night time walk as alternative fundraising activities to the usual marathons. We are working closely with local communities and are proactively involved in events, to help us grow the awareness of our charity and meet new supporters.
All of this work is enabling us to expand the services we provide to our children and families, including re starting hydrotherapy swimming sessions, regular coffee events for our families and sleep hygiene workshops. We are also launching our school transition project, where we better support our children who are leaving our service to go to school, and includes communicating with the school setting, offering visits to Footprints and also joining transition SENCO meetings.
By increasing our social media presence, promoting our recently launched new website and working with new partners, we hope to reach more families across the East Midlands and more potential supporters. As of July 2023, we have the largest waiting list in our history and we know that there are a huge number of children who we could support.
Our goal is to empower families who have disabled children more than ever, provide them with increasing support and focus on their emotional wellbeing.
More information
Website: www.footprintscec.org
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/footprintscec.newsandinformation
Instagram: @footprints_nottingham
Threads: @footprints_nottingham
Twitter: @footprintscec
LinkedIn: Footprints Conductive Education Centre
Email: enquiries@footprintscec.org