Our Children’s Programme Producer Emily Little shares her reflection on this summer’s Playing Safe project.

Across June and July, a team of brilliant actors (who have previously attended our Young Theatre Maker’s Programme) went into 6 local Southwark Primary schools (Keyworth Primary, Surrey Square, John Ruskin, St Joseph’s, Comber Grove and St Pauls) to share our Playing Safe Project. Funded by USS (United Saint Saviours) and in support with Southwark council, Playing Safe works with Year 6 students across their final few weeks in Primary education before transitioning up to secondary school, looking at themes of local youth violence and supporting them to identify risky situations. Through Forum Theatre, the children met the Character, Ali, an 11 year old who is obsessed with Fortnite and football and see part of his story and relationships unravel, as his brother has been involved with a local stabbing.

We invited in the parents and carers of the Year 6’s to see the show after school. It was great to see the children be so enthusiastic about their family seeing the show too and sharing the experience. One parent commented, ‘It was really well performed’ and another said ‘I think it was great that my son could interact with the cast members’.

All the children across all 6 schools where invited to try intervene in Ali’s story and make different choices to try change his path. Seeing the children so engrossed in the character was wonderful, even those who seemed reluctant to join in, all had something to contribute by the end of the session.

We then engaged with 8 children from each school, where they had the chance to create their very own play over the course of the week. I was so lucky to get to see the final performance at Comber Grove school and was so impressed with the input the children had had over the week. To see 8 children perform something they had created over just 5 days was wonderful. To see the pride they had to share their work with their classmates was immeasurable. One of them even commented, ‘I like how we created a great play in 5 days!’.

Speaking to the children at the end of the project, they had all had a positive experience. One said  ‘It was fun that I got listened too and got a chance to be myself’. Here at London Bubble, we recognise that the end of year 6 is a tricky time in a child’s life and it is great to see such an impact in a short period of time.

We are excited that we have the funding to run this project again next year and work with even more children!