NCT Antenatal Classes

[NotQuiteCockney]

I organise NCT antenatal classes. I'm debating fiddling with some things.

• Currently we offer two six-hour days, with a two-hour BF class. We are debating offering a single eight-hour day, asking parents to read up a bit before they come, with a two-hour BF class. Obviously this would be cheaper.

• I am debating setting up a yahoo group for attendees. Or asking them if they want to share email addresses before the class? Setting up a yahoo group and inviting all of them would be easier ... I do everything by email, so all attendees have email, for sure.

you know about the NCT CBC yahoo group?

CBC? I know the treasurers have a yahoo group.

We did the eight hour day course in the branch I used to be involved in when we were massively oversubscribed and no other branch in the area had teachers. They were hugely popular and brought us through a bit of a financial crisis. However, our teachers didn't like doing them - our 'norm' was six or eight weekly 2 hour sessions - as they didn't get to know the attendees and the attendees didn't get to know each other so well (and alot of people do it for the social network too). But then it's less of a departure for your teachers. One thing we did find (and as a small provincial branch this mattered to us) was that the people who came on these courses by and large didn't get involved in the branch post-birth in the same way that people who had been on the longer course did.

The yahoo group is a great idea I think. It'll make it much easier and less awkward for them to form a network.

Class Booking Co-ordinators

here

Thanks, CM!

We are managing ok with a two-day class. We've almost never had the evening classes, as our teachers are always commuting in from somewhere far away. (We do train teachers! We've trained two lately. Both now live far away.)

I do want to encourage them to get to know each other better. I worry that this might impede them from coming to the coffee mornings and getting more involved. To help avoid this, we:

• have a branch volunteer visit the class to talk to them
• encourage people to join the NCT with their class fees, so they get the branch newsletter

can you do a mix of a couple of Saturdays and a couple of evenings, so the teachers are only commuting in for e.g. 2 nights, but the class has maybe 4 sessions to get to know each other?

Like the yahoo/email sharing idea for a one-day course.

Are you thinking of providing reading matter yourselves for the one day course?

Oh, no, I can only get my teachers for weekend days. So I either use two weekend days to do one course, or to do two.

They do get together for a separate two-hour BF session.

I don't think we'll provide reading material, but I don't know. My teacher ended up accidentally doing a one-day course recently (she had the dates wrong), and it went fine, so we thought we might end up offering them. It would be quite a bit cheaper for the attendees.

Do you do the postnatal discussion groups? They were always a good way of getting people back together and involved in the branch. Hard to find teachers though.

(Know what you mean about training teachers - we trained 2 in my last year in the branch, one moved away and the other finished her training, manufactured a huge row with the committee, left and was last seen offering private antenatal classes...)

No we don't. Did you have normal teachers for those?

I think our main teacher (who is stopping teaching for us, essentially. She's only available in the summer) helped organise people into groups and made sure they got back together later.

You have to train specifically for the post natal group leader - it's a much shorter training period though. They aren't classes as such, more discussion groups that the leader facilitates. They were v popular when we were offering them - nearly everyone from the antenatal classes did them and they were also something we could offer people who had not been able to book onto the antenatal course. But it's yet another teacher to find of course.

Hmm, that could be worth doing. I'll mention it to the other committee members.

these NQC. You need specially-trained discussion leaders, but maybe you could borrow one from another branch?

Don't your teachers do reunions?

doh! x-posts.

MrsFP, can I ask how you advertised your Early Days courses?

TBH it was usually mainly from the antenatal classes and from among those who couldn't get a place in the antenatal classes because they were fully booked - we would routinely offer the postnatal in that case and they nearly always took it up. We also did the usual posters in antenatal clinics and with health visitors (some receptive, some not at all), in libraries, and in the maternity ward at the local hospital too - they worked quite well. Oh and we pushed them quite hard at the As New sales. You need to find people just before or just after they have the baby I think - if their baby is 3 months old it's too late really.

I think our longest standing NCT teacher does a reunion. Must ask the other teachers.

were they pushed quite hard at the a/n classes Mrs FP?

we send Early Days flyers to all the a/n clients, advertise to HVs etc, put up posters and offer to those who didn't get an a/n place (inc just after their baby arrives), but a lot of people don't seem that interested.

NQC, one of our teachers does a coffee morning for mums as well as the debriefing reunion and finds that really helps the group bond and kind of wakes them up to the fact that they should get together regularly.

The tricky thing is, I do want them to bond, but if they live locally, I want them to come to our coffee mornings, more, as that's more likely to get them actively involved with the branch.

I need to think about what to promote and have a chat with the teachers.

We do have an area-wide yahoo group, which is very good, but not promoted enough to the women who get in touch with me. I took over the job a few months back, and other than changing names and phone numbers, haven't really changed the documents we send out yet.

We have weekly coffee mornings, by postcode (first letters, anyway). They're open to anyone, just drop in really. So we already do ok for postnatal. I wonder if people who do antenatal classes maybe don't bother with the coffee mornings?

We do have a volunteer from the committee visit the classes, to talk to them about the branch, and about a tiresome advertising thing. So we do already make that effort.

our coffee mornings really suffer from the fact that so many women go back to work 6 months after the birth. There are apparently way fewer p/n groups round here than there were 10 years ago.

Most people seem to hang out with their a/n group for those six months and don't seem to see the point of getting to know people at coffee mornings because it's only a "holiday" from work iyswim. There's also a lot of "competition" from all the baby yoga/gymboree/baby massage-type things available now - lots of people just don't have a spare morning to go to an NCT group.

Tbh, the coffee mornings I've been too seem quite divorced from the rest of the branch activity.

Yeah, lots of women do go back. I guess I like the coffee mornings particularly because they let people with kids of different ages mix more, to share experiences etc etc. And if you aren't going back after six months, what happens when your a/n group disappears? Well, I know they often still stay in touch, but if they're all back in offices then, it's not the same.

I think most of our branch committee people were recruited at coffee mornings, one way or another.