CultureLink Youth Snowboarding Sessions

CultureLink's Youth Centre Snowboarding Activity 

 Many Canadians embrace and enjoy the winter season by participating in recreational activities such as skiing and snowboarding. Therefore CultureLink Youth Centre wanted to share this experience with their newcomer youth. 

Partnership with Sankofa and Youth In Action to enhance the social integration of new comer youth in Snowboarding!! 

 The youth had an amazing time and learned quickly how to maneuver down the hills.

Here we are getting a crash course how to fall properly without injuring ones-self.  

Overall it was an amazing experience for our newcomer youth!! 

CultureLink's Youth in Artegration, Sankofa and Youth in Arts collaborated with Afrobeatz in creating an African-Derived dancing workshop for Black History month. 

The children and youth were given a quick history lesson on the history of Afrobeatz and they had the opportunity show off their dance skills with a specialized facilitator.

Youth in Action and Youth In Arts Trip to the Escape Room!

Youth in Arts and Action had a blast going to The Captive Escape Rooms. We puzzled and deduced our way out of the rooms, with time running out on the last door!

We had such a fun time that Youth in Arts took a different group for a smaller and scarier experience!

HAPPY INTERNATIONAL WOMEN`S DAY 

Youth in Action: Teambuilding Workshops!

Last week, Youth in Action teamed up with CultureLink's SWIS program in order to deliver fun teambuilding workshops to the EFL (English as a Foreign Language) Classes at St.Mary's School. Each workshops consisted of a few teambuilding activities, followed by a debrief where the youth reflected on the activities and how they can be a better team member at school and in all other areas of life. 

Below: One of our first groups meet and we break the ice!

Below: One of the activities was to build the tallest tower out of limited materials. We had some very creative structures as a result!

Below: Another activity was to fill a large cup of water by passingthe water from smaller cups down the line of teammates. But there's a catch, the cups have holes in them! The youth managed to problem solve and work together to win the race.

Thank you SWIS worker, Ronald Rojas and to St Mary's School for partnering with Youth in Action to make this amazing week possible!

Youth in Action: Multicultural Club

Acro yoga fun with the Mimico Club!

Such talented young women!

Youth in Action: Bike Club

After a very interesting bike-safety workshop, we took our bike club leaders out on a beautiful bike ride through the city. Below is a picture on the UP rail path, a nice little patch of nature in the heart of Toronto. 

This fun bike ride means we now have bikes at the Youth Centre, so there will be amny bike events in the coming months. Thank you so much to our volunteers, Teeva and Maria who will be the youth leaders for this project. Also, thank you to Chantelle from the Bike to School TO project for all her support on getting the club up and running.

May with Global Roots

Global Roots Program is well underway as we begin planting in our newly renovated gardens! It is a very exciting time as we prepare to collect our first harvest and fill the gardens with spring time plants like tomato, kale, celery and parsley. 

On our first day of programming, the youth planted sunflower seeds, by the next week the sunflower seeds had sprouted and the youth prepared the beautiful snack below for the seniors.

Looking forward to more gardening and filling this amazing space with some fresh, organic, edible plants! 

Kipling Bike Club: Final Days

The final weeks for the Kipling Bike Club were fun filled adventures as we FINALLY got nice enough weather to move the program outdoors. We had a nice picnic to celebrate the fun times all year. Can't wait to start it up again in September!

We also took a group from Marc Garneau for a bike ride in a local park. What a great way to end the season!

Mimico Multicultural Club: May Activities

 May with the Mimico Multicultural Club has been amazing as we are able to go outside and enjoy the beautiful weather! The group is still training hard for the MudGirl Marathon in June, but they are having lots of fun and staying active in the process!

On one program day, the group made comic strips out of polaroid photos. They came up with a story line as a group and then starred in their own pictoral journey! Below you can see the girls setting up their scenes...

At the end of the day, the group presented their stories to the rest.

On another day, we used the polaroid cameras to take posed 'high-fashion' photos as we did a nature walk.

When days are rainy at Mimico, we make our own fun indoors! On this day, the group choreographed dances to tell personal stories to the rest of the group. Such talented girls!

On another program day, the group headed down to a local festival to enjoy free food (like cotton candy and hand made cookies), activities (pottery painting and face paints) as well as some beautiful performances. In fact, some of the group were actually performing in the festival and we were able to cheer on our team as they sang!