Festival of Words family beach event

24 September 2018

​Families with young children are being invited to ‘make their mark’ at a special beach event, with local artist Ian Rolls, organised as part of the Jersey Festival of Words.

The department of Children, Young People, Education and Skills and the Jersey Childcare Trust is inviting families to attend a ‘Making Your Mark’ event on Saturday 29 September.

The event is taking place at Long Beach, Grouville, at 2pm, and families will have access to a beach library for storytelling and will also have the opportunity to contribute to some large-scale beach art with local artist Ian Rolls.

Mark-making is one aspect of young children’s early literacy development and forms part of the ‘Making it REAL’ approach (Raising Early Achievement in Literacy). Practitioners and parents use this approach to deliver early literacy education in Jersey schools and nurseries.

Children’s early writing starts to develop as they make connections between their movements and the marks that they make. Often beginning with lines, circles and scribbles children start to distinguish between the different marks they make and give meaning to them. Mark-making should be encouraged and celebrated as it is the foundation for children’s early drawing and writing.

The ‘Making your Mark’ event will be an exciting opportunity to celebrate children’s early achievement in literacy and all families with young children are invited to go along and take part. There will be plenty of mark-making and literacy activities for parents and children to take part in.

Senator Tracey Vallois, the Minister for Education, said: “I am really excited about the ‘Making Your Mark’ event. It is important that we celebrate and support early years education, and this event will be a fun and engaging opportunity for families to come together to do that. The early development of literacy skills forms a vital foundation for children’s education so we want to encourage children in every way we can.”

All families with young children are welcome to go along on the day and take part. It will begin at 2.00pm at Long Beach, Grouville.