The people who attend the Gateway sessions at Doncaster Mencap on Thorne Road are a busy bunch. They already attend two club nights a week, on top of attending day centres, social education centres or college. Some attend focus groups to represent the views of adults with learning disabilities in Doncaster. Some do voluntary work. Many of them support Doncaster Rovers and have a variety of other interests. Yet for the past five months a large group has been attending extra creative arts sessions focussed on healthy lifestyles.
With a grant from the Community Empowerment Network, darts artists provided a programme of activities that helped identify health goals and promote body awareness and mental health.
Jenny Coupe, a volunteer at Mencap and the mother of a member of the group, was keen to bring in fresh ideas and to encourage staff and volunteers to carry on such work on the regular club nights.
The participants really appreciated the variety of artists and artforms on offer:
"I've enjoyed it all, doing the different activities. It's difficult to say which one I've particularly enjoyed."
"Ali made me laugh! We sang and played musical instruments. I played the drum with Godfrey."
"We did body movements with Faye using streamers on sticks."
"I liked doing drama with masks, looking at moods and making up a story with Janet and Beci."
"Kate took us outside to collect leaves from the garden. We pressed them and used them to make curtains and garden tables."
"We made felt and prints and painted with Susan and Anne."
Sometimes the health theme was obvious - writing a song about things we really ought to give up, for example, or noticing how much better we felt if we did some movement. Other activities were not directly health-related but did make us feel better generally:
"It's been like a team-building exercise. We've all been helping each other."
"It's gone quick – time does when you’re having fun."
At the final session the group said a big thank you to the darts team and said that in the future they would like to do more drama work. Lasting products from the project are a CD of songs and a story created by the group, a wallhanging, window panels and decorated garden furniture.
This story was created in sessions with the participants.