Tamariki Wellbeing summer update

Celia Lambert, Kaikawekorero, Papakura Marae, with whānau who were welcomed to the marae with a Pōwhiri.

Supporting the Early Years System – supported by the NEXT Foundation

Since the formalisation of our partnership with Papakura Marae and the resourcing of a full-time role based at the marae to engage and facilitate whānau hui, we now have a current core of 12 whānau engaged in a whānau-led experimental approach.

Papakura Marae engaged a diverse group of whānau through their reach into the community with the many programmes they are delivering including: Teen Parenting, Tamariki Ora, Family Start, Whānau Ora. All whānau enrolled have current or recent lived experience of caring for tamariki aged from pregnancy to six months.

A mother and her daughter at a whānau-led hui at Papakura Marae.

Over the two-year project the intent is to learn with and from the marae, amplify the existing work of the marae to increase their capacity to serve their community and test, share demonstrate, model and promote new practice in the early years system. 

The whānau identified a need during the Christmas season at Papakura Marae and worked together to support other whānau during the long waiting times for food parcels and gifts delivered by Auckland City Mission.  This support helped to reduce stress and promote the building of positive connections with the community.

Creating Home  

Creating Home is our initiative that gives our community partners including Auckland Council the opportunity to co-design places and spaces that “create home” and are responsive to whānau who are parenting their tamariki away from home.

Our evaluation workshop in November unlocked insights from our co-design work with Manurewa and Māngere East Library teams. We prioritised the strategic learnings from this work that we will convene with a wider network of early years’ service providers in South Auckland in early 2020.

Key insights from this work included:

• In Manurewa, whānau feeling a greater level of trust in space and being able to parent more easily, such as access to toilet without having to queue for a key

• Staff observing reduced stress around this and being able to focus on customer service

• At Māngere East, whānau being welcomed into space by ‘community champions’, an informal role where whānau support whānau in space to know and understand the facilities and the opportunities to connect with other whānau
   
  We have strategic level support with the Libraries team to convene the insights from this work to support further development towards a whānau-centred way of working. We are also exploring the role the ‘champions’ and whether this role could be formalised as volunteers in space to support the libraries team to deliver whānau-centred practice.
  
  We will continue to work with whānau, the Council family and key community stakeholders to co-design spaces and create a culture where whānau can be supported in space to nurture their tamariki for lifelong outcomes. 

Plunket

Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet Child Wellbeing unit visit to Plunket Manurewa in 2019.

In December we hosted the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet Child and Wellbeing unit team to share insights from our work with Plunket. Together with the Plunket team we shared the journey of a whānau-centred co-design approach to the refurbishment of the Manurewa Family Centre, now named “Poutokomanawa.” The new offering in this space now meets the five minimums whānau told us they need to help reduce their stress and nurture their tamariki when parenting away from home.  

A final report has now been produced for the work with Plunket and the findings of the report will be convened further to the early years system in early 2020.  The strategic outcomes from Poutokomanawa are informing further whānau-centred work that Plunket are investing in.