Since March, the fund as now distributed over £530,000 in COVID response funding:
– £363,249.63 in Survival Funding to 51 community organisations and businesses
– £167,435.56 to 23 groups to run COVID response projects
One of those projects was a grant of £12,670 to SNAP Cymru
SNAP Cymru provides information, advice and support for parents, children and young people who have, or may have, special educational needs or disabilities. At the height of lockdown they approached Pen y Cymoedd for help with supporting families and young people who would be particularly isolated and anxious.
They delivered over 700 packs to families. The packs were a comprehensive emotional support kit with anger management, mindfulness and communication support as well as a range of calming physical activities and home learning through play packs with colouring and other tools included with activities through the medium of English or Welsh as requested
A dedicated team of volunteers overseen by SNAP Cymru staff created, assembled and posted the packs from their homes.
They researched areas of interest for the children and found interesting materials: one 13 year old boy with ADHD was fascinated by the Titanic and another 9 year old with ASD wanted ‘masses of stuff on the Vikings’. They searched for printable art and craft activities related to individual interests and created interest based colouring, In addition every family had access to a behaviour/emotional support over the phone with pro- active calls as well as ‘open to all’ calls for support. A member of staff was dedicated to this.
“Thank you so much for the activity pack! It’s amazing and covers everything from numeracy to literacy, colouring, puzzles, and lots more, with our favourite characters. We’re very excited to get started. Fantastically put together. Thank you x”
“I am writing this to express my gratitude to SNAP Cymru in these unusual times, for being so caring and supportive. It has truly helped me and I honestly don’t know what I would have done without them. Who would have thought we would be living through a pandemic. None of us expected it and none of us were prepared, it has been frightening and emotionally jarring. I especially have felt anxious as I became a new mother just before lockdown. However SNAP Cymru have helped me feel supported with regular phone calls, offering help wherever I needed and where it was possible. I was sent a wonderfully put together activity pack to keep my son busy, and to help him better understand his emotions about the situation we all find ourselves in. He is becoming a wonderful big brother to his little sister and I feel that teaching him the ability to talk about his emotions has helped. There were techniques I wouldn’t have thought of in the pack.”
