Tuesday 20 July 2021

Sheffield CU Inspirational Stories

We know this year been really challenging for our children, young people and families in LOTS of different ways. Despite this, we are pleased to announce that we have awarded over 3,500 Bronze level awards, 2,800 Silver level awards and 2,500 Gold level awards to our fantastic Sheffield children and young people during the pandemic as well as awarding many more CU credits in between! We are SO impressed with the continued commitment to voluntary learning, whether that be home learning challenges, zoom gymnastics in the garden, virtual scouts groups, at school based activities or with our fab Learning Destinations now they are back up and running. As always, we are SO proud of all our wonderful CU members and their resilience during the past 18 months.

Another person who knows all about overcoming barriers to succeed is 19 year old Yorkshire born Jodie Ounsley who is the first deaf female rugby player to be selected for an international squad and represent England at Rugby Sevens, scoring her maiden try on the HSBC World Rugby Sevens Series stage in Cape Town. Profoundly deaf from birth, as a child she soon developed a determined mindset and the resilience to overcome barriers. Her positive view on life has led to lots of successes on her journey to becoming an international professional athlete. Whilst some would say her hearing was a disability, Jodie views it as a strength that has given her the opportunity to connect and reach out to children and young people to inspire the next generation.

We hope to bring you more from Jodie as we celebrate the Rugby League World Cup, which due to the arrive in Sheffield this Autumn, but in the meantime, Jodie has recorded a special video to congratulate our CU members on all their efforts and to share her inspirational story too! It is definitely worth a watch to click here to view: https://youtu.be/_4labtzW3LM or the link below and please share with your children and young people too!




Monday 12 July 2021

Your summer sorted!

The summer holidays are almost upon us (cheers from the children, worried faces on parents!), but we're pleased to be able to bring you our CU Passport Activity Newsletter - The CU Festival of Fun PLUS! which is full of activities, events and ideas to keep your children, young people and families occupied over the summer.

There are holiday camps and clubs, sports, the Summer Reading Challenge, discovering wildlife and nature, dance and drama, arts and crafts, music and circus skills. There are also some activities being run especially for children with special educational needs and disabilities. Why not take a look?

All activities will earn CU credits if children have a CU Passport to Learning, which will all go towards their CU awards. Some activities are charged for while others are free. And don't forget, there is the CU Festival of Fun happening right across the summer as well as the Bears of Sheffield Trail - phew! Download them here:

CU Festival of Fun: https://bit.ly/CUFestivalofFun2021

Bears of Sheffield activities: https://bit.ly/SCUBearsofSheffield2021

Don't worry if you attend a Sheffield school and haven't yet got a CU Passport to Learning. You can buy one online from us (£4.50 inc. postage to your home address) using this link: https://bit.ly/SCUOrderPassporttoLearning

So, have a flick through the newsletter which can be downloaded from https://bit.ly/SCUSummerPassportNewsletter2021

Have wonderful summer break!





The Bears are here!

Happy Monday everyone! Today we have some bearilliant news to share...the Bears of
Sheffield have arrived and we have TWO CU challenges to help you get involved!
From today until the end of September, there are 100 little bears and 60 big bears out and about on the streets of Sheffield and some will be hiding in indoor venues too. So, there's plenty of time to get out exploring the city, and do some bear-spotting along the way.

The Bears of Sheffield is being coordinated by Sheffield Children's Hospital NHS and Charity and will help fund a new Cancer and Leukaemia Ward at Sheffield Children’s through donations, merchandise, sponsorship challenges and fundraising throughout the trail. At the end the Bears will also be auctioned off to the highest bidder to raise money!

You can find details of the trail and more information at www.bearsofsheffield.com

In addition, the Sheffield CU Team have been working incredibly hard with the Bears of Sheffield Team and have developed TWO special Children's University Bears of Sheffield Challenges - and if you have a CU Passport to Learning, you can earn 3 CU credits for EACH challenge!

CHALLENGE 1: The activity trail

We'd like you to visit some of the bears on the trail with your families, then complete the challenge sheet, telling us which three bears are your favourites and why. Make sure you read the information plaques with each bear so you can also tell us some facts and new information you've learned. Then, it's time to get creative and use the template to design your own Bear of Sheffield. Once complete, email pictures of your completed challenge to us at CU@sheffield.gov.uk and we'll award you with 3 CU credits for your Passport to Learning.

CHALLENGE 2: The Sheffield CU Bears of Sheffield Fundraising Challenge

Since March 2019, we've created and published over 150 Home Learning Challenges so we couldn't let the Bears of Sheffield go by without creating a special one-off challenge! For this activity, we're challenging Sheffield CU members to create their own fundraising activity - it might be a sponsored activity, it might be raising money by volunteering to do jobs about the house or for others, or maybe even selling craft items or baked goodies that you've made. The choice is yours! Ask an adult to help you plan and run your fundraiser, then pay in the money afterwards. Everything you raise will help the Sheffield Children's Hospital's fundraising towards the brand new cancer and leukaemia ward so let's see how much Sheffield CU can raise together! Make sure you send us a Learning Reflection Diary (download it from https://bit.ly/SCULearningReflectionDiary) and photos or other evidence to show us your amazing fundraising efforts, and we'll award you with 3 CU credits for your Passport to Learning.

Get involved...

You can download both challenges from https://bit.ly/SCUBearsofSheffield2021

If you attend a Sheffield school and haven't yet got a CU Passport to Learning, don't worry! You can buy one from us (£4.50 inc postage to your home address) using this link: https://bit.ly/SCUOrderPassporttoLearning

We hope you all have a bearilliant summer with the Bears of Sheffield and we can't wait to see your adventures!






Friday 9 July 2021

Sheffield CU Festival of Fun - Your Summer Sorted!

The Sheffield CU Festival of Fun is back!

We're delighted to bring back our programme of FREE summer activities for the 7th year which includes more than 65 different activities!

They're all being delivered by our wonderful Learning Destinations and will be located in venues right across the city, so there should be something not too far away for everyone.

There's arts and crafts, dance and drama, cheerleading and tumbling, roller hockey and ju jitsu, clowning and circus, family gaming, outdoor drama, woodland exploration, discovering the history of Sheffield, inventing and making, and debating the big questions!

But that's not all - we have some activities which are planned especially for children and young people with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND). These activities will be delivered by experienced organisations with specialist staff on hand who are very happy to talk to parents/carers in advance about how their child's needs can be met within the sessions, so do contact them.

The activities begin on Thursday 22nd July and run right through the holidays, ending on Friday 27th August so that's the summer holidays covered!

BOOKING IS OPEN!

Most of the activities require places to be booked in advance, so have a look through the programme and find details of how to book your place. For information about the activities themselves or to discuss your child's needs, contact the Learning Destination directly (you'll find their details in the programme).

Of course, to maintain social distancing, the number of places is limited so PLEASE only book places if you know you will be attending. And, if you find you aren't be able to attend, PLEASE let the Learning Destination know ASAP so they can give the place to another child on the waiting list. We'd like to involve as many children and young people as possible in the CU Festival of Fun, so please be mindful of this when booking activities.

You can download the programme from https://bit.ly/CUFestivalofFun2021

Remember, the CU Festival of Fun is ONLY for children and young people who...

✅ attend a Sheffield school

✅ have a CU Passport to Learning (at the time of booking)

So, if you haven't got a Passport to Learning, buy one today (£4.50 inc. postage to your home address): https://bit.ly/SCUOrderPassporttoLearning

In the meantime, sign up to our parent/carer mailing list to receive updated information about activities and events throughout the summer and beyond, by emailing CU@sheffield.gov.uk


We can't wait to see you at the CU Festival of Fun 2021!