Newsletter April 2020

Newsletter April 2020

4th May 2020

Cheshire Young Carers  is here to support you

The Cheshire Young Carers team are continuing to support young carers across Cheshire during the Covid-19 pandemic.  With staff working from home, daily conference calls means we are effectively continuing to deliver our core services. This includes most of our regular respite sessions using video conferencing technology plus some amazing digital activity packs all based around a theme like the jungle and space which have already been sent out.

Then there are the additional fun activities each week  such as quizzes and online bingo.  These are proving to be a huge success for the young carers as well as weekly ‘how to’ illustrated videos such as making a cake in a mug and the origami frog

The YAC’s (young adult carers) have been busy with their creative arts programme including engaging with a Rap Artist from Crewe to produce a fantastic rap, themed around the current climate we are living in.

Education Assessment Virtual Upgrade

The Cheshire Young Carers education team have designed a new digital tool which is now being used to help young carers tell us about how their caring role might impact on schoolwork.  This will help us to provide special guidance to schools when things return to normal.

Keeping Young Carers Connected

The engagement level on our social media channels has been astonishing with new social media posts each day, ranging from Monday Motivation quotes through to Funday Sunday competitions.  There are daily fun facts and support for everyone, and we especially enjoy displaying young carer activities including things they have made and done.

Improving the Wellbeing of Young Carers

We are delighted to tell you that Dan Nester joined the team last week who will work alongside Alan Jones to support young carers wellbeing, including mental health support.

Supporting children and young people’s mental and emotional wellbeing is always important and since the outbreak of Covid- 19, and the start of the lockdown, the importance of this need has vastly increased. In order to meet this need, we have been developing innovative interventions to support the mental and emotional wellbeing of young carers through this difficult and complex time.  In the activity packs we have created the “Help Zone” which has fun and engaging activities to support young carers in exploring the difficult feelings they are experiencing and also learn more about coping mechanisms and support that they can access. We are also creating animated videos that will run alongside the “Help Zone” topics to help get our support out even further to those who need it.

We have been digitally working alongside our young adult carers to gather their insight and knowledge to help us develop tailor made mental and emotional wellbeing sessions which will look at areas such as anxiety, depression and identifying individual strengths and skills whilst at the same time gaining an understanding of difficult feelings and finding coping mechanisms.

Written By Julie McHugh