About Better Health Start For Life in Middlesbrough
The Better Health Start For Life campaign is funded by the Department for Education and the Department for Health and Social Care, and is led by the National Literacy Trust. The campaign encourages parents and carers to adopt positive behaviours and boost their children’s communication, language and literacy development.
The campaign creates easy and accessible resources for parents, carers and early years settings with children aged 0-5, aiming to ensure that all children start primary school with the recommended literacy and language abilities.
In Middlesbrough we are delivering the campaign in partnership with Middlesbrough Reads, follow the BoroReads Facebook page for local updates.
Middlesbrough's digitised story trail at Albert Park
In June 2021, we launched 12 brand new story trails in local parks and lakes across the country for families, carers and early years settings with children aged 2-5.
In Middlesbrough the story trail launched at Albert Park in partnership with Middlesbrough Reads, Middlesbrough Council and Middlesbrough School Readiness, with the bespoke theme of time travel.
The story trail is based on a story in the local park written by children’s author Rebecca Lewis-Oakes and illustrated by Aaron Cushley. The story trail leads families around the park as they follow the adventures of Uncle Josh, Mia, Kai and their dog Scruffy.
We are thrilled to announce that we now have a digitised version of the story trail, meaning that all families, carers and early years settings can download the trail to a digital device and carry out the activity whenever works best.
How to use the digitised story trail
- Have your mobile device fully charged.
- Download the story trail PDF (below).
- Pack your park bag! Get some paper and pencils at the ready, as we want to engage your little ones as much as possible
- Head to Albert Park (address: Park Road North, Middlesbrough, TS1 3LB )
- Start the trail by following the map in the booklet
- Carry out the trail with your little one and enjoy all that it has to offer!
- Your feedback is very important to us, so please spare 10 minutes to complete this survey, so that we can hear your thoughts and experiences.
The story trail pdf
91% of parents rated the story trail as excellent or good
Hungry Little Minds story trail evaluation, 2021