A series of fun and free online activities to keep residents of all ages active and busy during the coronavirus lockdown has been devised by Schools and Lifelong Learning officer Callum McLeod and his council colleagues.
Callum and his colleagues came up with the idea of putting together activity packs for children, young people and families to use at home to keep them physically and mentally active during the lockdown.
Whilst doing their research they realised many of the top tips were websites so they created an online directory of fun activities which started increasing in size until it eventually ended up as a dedicated page on the Council website.
The top tips include a wide range of advice for families starting with babies/infants, then moving onto children up to 12 years followed by general sites for learning and sport suitable for a range of ages right up to adults.
Some of the titles include: Mummy Bubble, Busy Toddler, Cosmic Kids Yoga, Activity Village, Live Bold and Bloom, EpicDash and Ted Talks.
Callum, who is usually based in the Council’s South East Lifelong Learning office in Gilmerton, is now working from home in north Edinburgh with his family, trying out new and different ways to support each other.
Callum, who was based at Broughton Community High School before redeployment as part of city council’s ‘transformation’ initiative, said: “It didn’t take long for us to realise that there would be families all over the city stuck in front of the telly or computer, potentially climbing the walls or bored to tears, so why not put something together for the families to keep them occupied in fun ways.
“It soon became apparent that it was far easier (and far safer in terms of the virus) to put everything online so people could pick out activities to suit their different needs.”
Every time Callum circulated a list of possible links he was deluged with replies including further suggestions – to the extent he is currently working on Version 6 of his helpful guide!
Callum added: “It’s been a massive collective effort from many, many people working together, and putting a silver lining on what could be quite challenging times.
“We soon realised the potential out there for families to turn a ‘challenging time’ into some ‘quality time’. There should be something there for everybody – so why not check out the links for yourself?”
