#Chances4Children: Leeds YJS offers lockdown challenge with added qualification

The challenge, created by Leeds Youth Justice Service (YJS), saw staff hand out bags and boxes of craft and cooking materials which enabled young people to take part in activities such as making a bird box or cooking a chocolate cake.

As part of the YJS’s partnership with AQA Unit Awards scheme, staff were able to come up with accredited awards to offer young people.

These included:

Making a wooden box

Planning, preparing and baking a chocolate cake

Creating zendoodles

Emotional wellbeing

Preparing simple meals

Nicola Lonsdale, Education Officer at Leeds YJS said: “It started as a way of occupying the children and young people I was working with. First was a young lad living with his mum and his previous charges were damage in the family home. He wanted to repair the damage and make it right, so I delivered him paint and wood and he managed to make an upcycled dresser. He went on to do the whole bedroom. His mother was so proud and it encouraged her to start an online doll making business. Weekly, you could see and hear the positive changes in their relationship.”