Local Hero Oluwa Shittu

Oluwa Shittu

founder of Play Woodenwritten by //Kabbo Hue Ferdinand Introducing: Oluwa Shittu, the founder and director of Play Wooden CIC.

Company motto: “A world of creative entertainment. Fun for both adults and children! Ethical and ecological reinvented wooden games with imagination and purpose.”

//Kabbo: Goes without saying, the lockdowns have left us all a bit jaded, isolated, suspicious and scared. And what is the better way for us to reconnect to ourselves and each other than through playing. I’ve spent time with Oluwa and his offering and have come away feeling stimulated, grounded and inspired. I thought it would be good to introduce you all to this visionary man, who started this business to encourage and introduce more playfulness into our fractured world. Oluwa, please, introduce yourself. social enterprise which offers alternative ecological wooden games for children and adults. We offer play activities in schools and after, in parks, workshops at festivals, including team-building experiences with corporates. We are able to offer activities wherever people gather to play and have fun.

//Kabbo: What is your motivation and how do you maintain your drive?

Oluwa: My motivation is to embrace the child in me, who is always alive and representing me in everything I do. I believe we must always enchant the importance of play in life, as we grow from child to adult. Playing plays a very important role in our cognitive development from childhood and does not change when we become adults. Secondly, our games are environmentally friendly. We do not use plastic or toxic materials. The only exception is that we use foam wrapped in ethically sourced Afrikan material to create soft games in order to accommodate our smaller children.

Oluwa: Good afternoon. My name is Oluwa Shtitu, I’m the founder and one of the directors for Play Wooden CIC. We are a small, leading

//Kabbo: What are the cognitive benefits for playing?

Oluwa: As Maria Montessori once said; “Play is the work of the child”, their language and it comes in multiple forms and dialects. It’s innumerable. In fact, it comes in hundreds of thousands of forms. Play is the means by which they express themselves and engage with the world around them.

Allowing them to play freely aids in the development of their own personalities and breeds the confidence they will need to thrive in this world. It is that freedom to grow happy and healthy, to be human and to develop their own characteristics that needs nurturing. Children play in free form and this should be cared for, not controlled and conditioned by adults.

Freedom of playing has a massive impact on their brain and character development. I can’t emphasize enough how crucial this is for their growth.

Play is the most important aspect of a child’s growing experience. It contains everything that is needed to be good, functioning human beings in their family, community and the world. I would say it remains that way even for serious adults.

//Kabbo: What is your dream? The exciting thing for us is that despite the pandemic difficulties, we’re not giving up! In fact, we got stronger as our profile and visibility have improved. People are now realising how important play is. We are coming out of the pandemic with more motivation and passion for what we do.

We ultimately want to get the community more actively involved. For example, we are running a survey on the Dalrymple Park area that has been abandoned and neglected. We are enquiring about what they want to happen there. Our intention is to put a permanent installation in there that the community has access to. We want to make it safe for children to use and we are receiving very positive feedback from the community.

//Kabbo: How can people get involved?

Oluwa: We are a social enterprise and have an open door policy. Come and speak to us if you have a passion for playing and working with children, the environment, community and adults in need. Join us and help develop this project going forward. We are located on City Road, St. Pauls, near the Malcolm X Community Centre and our door is always open.

Contact us: www.playwooden.co.uk 07522 410945

Oluwa: As long as play is important in society the future is always bright for Play Wooden. We want to bring this qualitative, ecological, alternative form of play to our communities as opposed to plastic and technological forms of playing. My dream is... try to imagine a spider web, expanding while staying true to our core values. We start here locally in St. Pauls. Then expand to Easton and St Georges Parks, then Knowle, Brislington and then, who knows, nationally and internationally. People from London have already contacted us and want our activities brought there.