June 13, 2012: Doodle Den provides early literacy model for Communities. 105 kids from Tallaght West today celebrated improved literacy skills after completing an intensive early years intervention programme.
The children worked hard since last September completing three hour-and-a-half long after-school sessions each week, as part of the Doodle Den programme co-ordinated by the Childhood Development Initiative (CDI). The Senior Infants pupils were five and six years old and from Killinarden, Fettercairn, Jobstown and Brookfield in Tallaght West. The programme also involved the children’s parents attending sessions to enable them to continue the children’s development in the home.
Doodle Den is a comprehensive one year after-school literacy programme, developed and under evaluation by CDI, to help improve children’s reading, writing and comprehension.
It is part of a major early years research and evaluation project taking place across Tallaght West, Ballymun and Darndale which is co-funded by Atlantic Philanthropies and the Department of Children and Youth Affairs. CDI Chief Executive Officer Marian Quinn congratulated the children and parents for their participation and success and thanked the staff who delivered the programme for their enthusiasm and commitment.
“We have been carefully measuring the effectiveness of Doodle Den and have identified the progamme as bringing real benefit to the children and their families. We will be bringing what we have learnt to the attention of the Department of Children and the Department of Education and hope more children can benefit from early intervention supports.”
The children in Doodle Den took part in fun activities to help them learn new sounds and words. Parents attended six sessions across the year which included active learning, discussion and interaction with games and books. Doodle Den also included one organised family activity per term such as visit a to the local library or story-telling sessions.
The programme was delivered on the ground by two community organisations, Citywise and An Cosán, whose facilitators worked with the children through story telling, games and other creative ways to help them enjoy learning.
Further Information
Ronan Cavanagh, Communications Co-ordinator, CDI: (086) 317 9731.