The one-of-a-kind train will travel all round France from 2 to 20 November 2017, visiting 14 cities in 13 regions and welcoming 40,000 visitors. Its role is to help everyone better support developing children and fight against inequality.
The Early Childhood and Parenting train offers its visitors (parents, parents-to-be, grandparents, childcare professionals, students and jobseekers) a free, fun and interactive way to find out more about children’s development and supportive education. ÏDKIDS was keen to support this excellent early childhood initiative.
It was the perfect opportunity for some of the community’s brands to meet members of the public, organizations and professionals to talk about supportive education and positive parenting, motivated by their commitment to We Act For Kids and children’s wellbeing.
Staff from ÏDKIDS will also be in the partner village on the platform to talk to visitors on 2 and 3 November at Paris Gare de Lyon, on 4 November in Lille and on 20 November at Paris Gare du Nord. On board, six complementary topics will give visitors food for thought:
- Forming and strengthening relationships.
- Playing and communicating.
- Living well each day.
- Early intervention to detect vulnerability.
- Protecting children and their rights.
- It takes a village to raise a child.
There will also be a photo story and videos produced by Rigolo Comme La Vie, the leading crèche network in the Hauts-de-France region and a member of the ÏDKIDS community, featuring some of the organization’s main themes, including children’s independence at mealtimes, integrating children with disabilities into crèches, and fostering an intergenerational approach so that babies and elderly people can take part in joint activities in shared facilities.
The initiative was inspired by the miniseries “Penny for your thoughts” which is all about supportive education and features children aged 0 to 6. Rigolo Comme La Vie is one of its partner organizations.
These three-minute videos look at children’s development in the light of recent discoveries in neuroscience and offer ways to understand the impact that an empathic education can have on children’s brains. Ten of them were filmed in Rigolo Comme La Vie crèches.
Bubble Mag, the ideas hub for discerning and enquiring parents, will offer visitors its free seasonal magazine and will address the issue of parent/child dialogue by showing visitors a discussion-based game centred on bedtime routines called Bedtime Babble.
Oxybul products will be displayed in the carriages to illustrate the different topics covered and show how important play and experimentation are for developing children’s talents.
The ÏDKIDS foundation will present its partnership with Le Rire Médecin. The charity’s clowns have both theatrical and medical training and perform improvised and personalized shows for sick children and their families in 14 hospitals throughout France.
ÏDKIDS brands support the charity by selling red noses to their customers for one euro and donating the profits to support the benevolent work taking place in children’s hospital wards all over France. In 2016 more than 54,000 red noses were sold and the campaign will run again this autumn.
Conferences, debates and workshops will take place at every stop. The perfect opportunity for ÏDKIDS brands to talk about their expertise, commitments, the importance of play and community living to children’s development, the inclusion of children with disabilities, and more besides. The talks will be streamed live on the Web and broadcast on radio and television. 
Conference dates:
- Oxybul, Paris Gare de Lyon, 2 November, 3pm to 4pm, “Developing children’s talents through play”, and Gare de Lille-Flandre, 4 November, 6pm to 7pm, “Recognizing the importance of sensory-motor experiences in today’s virtual world”.
- Rigolo Comme La Vie, Gare de Lille-Flandre, 4 November, 12.15pm to 12.45pm, “Disability: how to help all children grow in the community” (workshop), and 4pm to 5pm, “Should communities conform to a family model?” Gare de Saint-Malo, 18 November, 2pm to 3pm, “Can professionals be trained in empathy?”
- ÏDKIDS foundation, Paris Gare du Nord, 20 November, 5pm to 6pm, “When everyone fights for children’s rights, anything is possible!”
This initiative is supported by Ensemble pour l’Education de la Petite Enfance. The community charity works with key stakeholders from the childcare, childhood, child protection and child education sectors. It is expanding its activities to raise awareness of supportive education methods. It keeps up with key international developments in neuroscience and epigenetics* to help guide educational decisions and allow everyone to contribute to building a better world.
Entry is free of charge but participants must register online. All aboard on this journey to the heart of children’s development! For more information and to register, go to https://train-petite-enfance-parentalite.org/
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