About Better Health Start For Life in Swindon
The Better Health Start For Life campaign, led by the National Literacy Trust and funded by the Department for Education and the Department for Health and Social Care, encourages parents and carers to adopt positive behaviours to 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 Swindon, we are delivering the campaign in partnership with Swindon Stories and Swindon Borough Council. Keep up to date with the campaign on the Swindon Stories Facebook page.
Swindon's digitised story trail at Coate Water Country 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 Swindon the story trail launched at Coate Water Country Park in partnership with Swindon Stories and Swindon Borough Council, with the bespoke theme of shipwrecks and swans.
The story trail is based on a story written by children’s author Rebecca Lewis-Oakes and illustrated by Aaron Cushley. The story trail leads families around the local park as they follow the adventures of Uncle Josh, Mia, Kai and their dog Scruffy.
Please scroll to the bottom of the page to view the 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.
- Scroll to the bottom of this page and download the story trail PDF
- 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 Coate Water Park (address: Marlborough Road, Swindon SN3 6AA)
- 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
“My son loved it so much that we followed it twice. He's disappointed with subsequent park visits when there's no story trail.”