Play Lab
Grounded in the Five Protective Factors, Children’s Council’s family services meet families where they are to provide comprehensive, flexible and individualized support and connection in a way that affirms and builds on families’ strengths.
Our evolving set of offerings include weekly playgroups, monthly parent cafés, a support group for new and expecting moms, a toy & book lending library and workshops facilitated by experts.
Children’s Council offers parents and caregivers structured opportunities to build confidence and community so that they can help children grow and thrive. Check out a visual diagram of our Parent and Caregiver Education Programs.
The Play Lab, which opened in Fall 2021, is an adaptable physical space that is used for the services listed above, along with hands-on education services for ECE programs and for parents on choosing child care. Take a look!
- The Play Lab reflects our place in the community—at the confluence of parents, caregivers and children.
- Parents can have an immersive experience of what to look for in quality child care programs. Home-based child care businesses can visualize how to set up their environment for early learning.
- Families can find a respite from life’s stressors; parents can support each other; we engage children while their caregivers access our services; children in the foster care system will have supervised visits with their parents.
- Parents and caregivers can borrow unique toys, books and learning materials from our curated library; enriching children’s environment and equipping educators with resources.
- Our staff use the Play Lab to seek client feedback and test new service delivery strategies to ensure our programs respond to community needs.
From this exciting new physical space, we plan to launch Play Lab Pop-Ups, allowing us to bring the most engaging, cutting-edge developmental toys, books and learning materials to families and caregivers around the Bay Area.
Children’s Council will take our expert-led playgroups and child development workshops “on the road” to communities that need them most — particularly in low-income neighborhoods — engaging children, families and caregivers in the power of play! Check out a Logic Model diagram of our programs, highlighting the short and long term outcomes we expect to achieve through this critical work.
