Cygnet Hospital Beckton contribute to Newham Word Festival

Newham Word Festival Logo

Cygnet Hospital Beckton recently worked in partnership with Newham Adult Education to provide two workshops for the London Borough of Newham Word Festival in November 2017.

This was the first Newham Word Festival and was held in the borough’s libraries, community centres, schools, and outdoor spaces. Over 150 events celebrated the written and spoken word.

Cygnet Hospital Beckton contributed two interactive workshops entitled ‘Words and Wellbeing’. The workshops used words to explore doing, being and becoming and were free and open to anyone in the local community to attend. The workshops were structured with activities to explore time use and how what you do can affect health and wellbeing.

Participants engaged in discussions on living a balanced life and what activities were meaningful for them and completing a time use record. This created some lively debate on categorising activities. Shopping and cooking were seen as enjoyable leisure pursuits for some and seen as domestic duties by other participants. This activity was followed by planting a plant and labelling the pot and tags to share their experience of doing, being and becoming.

The workshop evaluation provided much positive feedback and participants stated it provided new learning and they will reflect on their daily / weekly routines in a new light. Many participants attended both sessions and one participant brought her husband along to join in with the second workshop!

“I really enjoyed it as it was different. I feel glad that I was able to engage and help.”Newham resident

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