Home Interaction Program for Parents and Youngsters (HIPPY)

Tracy Bright

This year we enrolled 25 families into the Age 4 cohort and Age 5 started the year with 10 families and are fortunate to have two dedicated tutors to teach parents/ caregivers how to be their child’s first teacher. We currently have 11 families in Age 4 and 8 families in Age 5 cohorts. Unfortunately for many reasons we have seen families leave HIPPY however we have had the ability to teach families the foundation knowledge of the HIPPY program. This is the final year that families were recruited into the Age 4 cohort with the new curriculum changing to accommodate for children turning 3 years of age.

We have attended several events in the community including Under 8’s days, community events, Community Gro Fun Day, radio timeslots, local kindy’s and schools to increase the community’s awareness of the HIPPY program and the benefits of the HIPPY program for families. We have had great success with our HIPPY advertising on Facebook with over 2. 5k users reached regularly and our main HIPPPY recruitment post reaching over 4,200 users. The HIPPY families are posting pictures and videos of their HIPPY child doing their HIPPY activities weekly on our private group.

Our families have been actively engaged in the Parent Group Meetings and enjoy doing the activities for the week including making goop, playdough and learning about their child’s development through sound awareness, story comprehension and transition to school. We linked in with William Ross High School construction students who were more than happy to make HIPPY boxes for new children entering the HIPPY program. Thank you to all students and teachers involved in making this happen. The children love their new HIPPY boxes.

Highlights

Dad joining in HIPPY – age 5 child – second year HIPPY

Mum has been doing HIPPY journey with child without dad’s involvement. Dad has decided to do HIPPY with child too. Dad is doing HIPPY from Orange Pack 1 Age 4 in order, so as not to take away from mum and child’s time in Age 5. Child now gets to enjoy HIPPY twice with both parents.

Full time work and HIPPY

Mum has gone back to full time work – HIPPY visits are done via Microsoft Teams in Mum’s lunch break. Packs are dropped off in mailbox day before planned home visit. Family has been able to maintain HIPPY in their very busy schedule.

Community Visitors Scheme

Colleen Doyle

The Community Visitors Scheme (CVS) continued to operate under trying circumstances in 2021–2022 due to the ongoing effects of the COVID pandemic.

Taking on the program Coordinator role in January 2022 I needed to re-establish networks with the aged care facilities in the Townsville area of the Northern Region. The region extends north to Ingham, south to Bowen and west to Charters Towers. The funding provided to the program enables us to work with the 14 facilities in the Townsville area. These facilities include:

• Arcare North Shore

• Blue Care Caryle Gardens

• Blue Care Shalom Village

• Blue Care Mt Lousia

• Bolton and Clarke Glendale

• Bolton and Clarke Rowes Bay

• Carinity Fairfield Grange

• Loretto (Mercy Community Services NQ)

• OzCare (Villa Vincent)

• Parklands Residential Aged Care Facility

• Regis Kirwan

• Good Shepherd Nursing Home

The pandemic has significantly impacted our ability to physically visit residents within facilities, in May an additional mandate of the third COVID injection was put in place which had precluded some visitors from attending as they were not willing to have the third shot.

Contact has been made with all 14 facilities to offer the support of the CVS program. We will continue to pursue a relationship with the remaining facilities.

In an endeavour to mitigate the negative impacts on the program we have introduced several programs, these include:

The Post Card Project

This program enables multiple residents to be communicated with by a smaller number of volunteers. We have been supported with this project by TAFE North Queensland. 25 students participating in the Adult Migrant English Program (AMEP) commenced writing postcards to residents of Bolton and Clarke (Rowes Bay). This project was included as part of the assessment work for the students. Initially students were told not to expect a written response from residents, however the residents themselves chose to write back. This resulted in the students expressing a desire to meet residents face-to-face.

Postcards have also been written by other volunteers who wished to participate in the program but are not able to visit face to face. This has proven to be a highly successful way of increasing communications and social connections particularly while COVID was at its height.

Approximately

140 postcards have been sent since the program was introduced in March 2022

Feedback

Kim Pyke Volunteer Coordinator

Good Shepherd Nursing Home

“Hi Colleen, A quick email to say thank you for the latest postcards. The Residents are going to be excited when it’s mail call. Have a great week.”

Connected Beginnings

Tracy Bright

The Connected Beginnings Team have engaged extensively with community in the Upper Ross, sharing conversations on issues that have impacted them and providing insight into the issues that are significant to their community. The Connected Beginnings Team is working with the community to give them a voice to raise awareness about issues and the need for a collaborative response with stakeholders and partners to work on systemic changes to Close the Gap on the participation for First Nation’s children in early childhood education and health programs.

The networking activities with stakeholders included but not restricted to:

• Hosting at Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Partnerships information sessions

• Creating the Upper Ross Early Childhood Education and Health Action Group (Representatives from Government Departments, Community Organisations and Agencies)

• Creating the Upper Ross Centrals Network Group (Baptist Church, Salvation Army, PCYC, Shalom and Connected Beginnings)

• Networking with kindergartens and schools

• Participating in major events to promote the Connected Beginnings Program

The Sorry Day Dinner

The purpose of dinner was to show our respect to our local elders and acknowledge their contribution to First Nation’s Peoples plight. The night was about connecting community with our elders and educating the younger generation on the significance of Sorry Day and Stolen Generation.

The dinner was attended by local elders including Wulgurukaba and Bindal with

Randal Ross as guest speaker. The elders are an integral part of the Connected Beginnings Team; building cultural capability and identity for our children.

As a result of the positive feedback from community, the event will be held again next year which will lead into Reconciliation Week with the support of the Upper Ross Central Network Group.

The Upper Ross Central Group was initiated by the Connected Beginnings Team to collaborate, share and streamline resources to meet the needs of the Upper Ross community.

Connected Beginnings First Nations Group

The Upper Ross Connected Beginnings (CB) team played a key role in the establishment of CB’s First Nations National Group. The initiative creates a safe space for all CB First Nations staff across the country to share their knowledge and learnings, challenges and successes, and empower each other. The Upper Ross team co-designed the initiative with Ninti-One and supported by Commonwealth