Recently our Bundaberg Regional Council (BRC) started community consultation regarding the upgrade of our local nearby park and playground at Lake Ellen. Forestview educators were privileged to be part of the team to design the children’s activities at these community consultation days.
To extend onto this broader community consultation the BRC advisory team were also keen to speak with our Forestview children to gather their voice and ideas about what they like to see in playgrounds and what they like or don’t like about the current playground.
At Forestview Community Kindergarten, children are valued as active participants and citizens of local and global communities. Children have ideas, understandings, experiences and actions to contribute towards creating an inclusive, just, peaceful and ecologically sustainable society. Children’s active citizenship in C&K and Forestview learning communities begins with their right to have their voices heard, acknowledged and acted upon. Educators acknowledge, respect and promote children’s active citizenship when they consistently and in this instance the Bundaberg Regional Council have taken amazing steps to include our children’s voices in their decision making for our community and recognise that they are key stakeholders in this process. HOW WONDERFUL IS THAT.
Throughout the process the children were asked to think of things they love to see, hear or do in a playgrouind and they shared these ideas about how it makes them feel to use this type of equipment. We then had to engage in some voting. Roana and Monica from the BRC help up pictures of things that are at the park now and we had to move to the YES side or NO side to identify if we wanted to see this type of equipment stay in our park or be replaced. We also were able to vote on new innovative ideas the BRC planning team have for the park to identify which we preferred. Lastly we were given a magic wand to communicate the ultimate items we would like in our Lake Ellen Playground. We decided some climbing equipment, somewhere to ride your bike or scooter, lots of plants and natural elements, an icecream shop, monkey bards, a bigger and better train and a big, big ,big slide would be great. WE CAN’T WAIT TO SEE WHAT THE BRC COME UP WITH.
THANKYOU BUNDABERG REGIONAL COUNCIL FOR TAKING THE TIME TO INCLUDE OUR CHILDREN’S VOICES IN YOUR CONSULTATION PROCESS.
