First Choice Kids Clubs promote learning through play

First Choice offers more Kids Clubs than any other major tour operator, for considerably more hours per week. From this winter, they will be further enhancing their Families product offering, making it even more appealing to both parents and children.

First Choice believes that learning and fun should go hand in hand, ensuring children are enriched both socially and academically. First Choice Kids Clubs of the future will be welcomed by parents keen to stimulate their children’s minds during the holidays, offering fun activities subtly linked to the national curriculum.

The company is currently trialling a series of enriching new children’s activities at its Holiday Villages that connect to primary key stages 1 and 2. However, “Play and Learn” (P.A.L) activities will be run in such a way that kids thoroughly enjoy them without realising they are educational; the principle focus is still on having fun and making friends.

Tim Williamson, Marketing Director at First Choice says: “As other operators strip offerings from their overseas products, we are continuing to invest in our resorts and Kids Clubs. We have continued to increase the number of overseas staff and the focus now is on offering differentiated activities overseas. We believe this is hugely important, as it not only gives our customers great value and quality for money but distinguishes First Choice from its competitors”.

Williamson continued, “Before embarking on the trials, we took advice from a variety of experts including the Department for Education and Skills, Local Education Authorities and Parent Teacher Associations. However, in order for the project to work, we need to get the balance right – Kids are on holiday and if they feel they are back at school, they won’t want to get involved – the key is to keep it fun”.

Ideas currently being tested overseas include activities such as “Pirates Paradise” which includes a treasure hunt that helps children to master map reading, or “Extreme Extinction” in which children learn about fossils and dinosaurs, do their own cave drawings and take part in an experiment to make a model volcano and create an ‘eruption’.

In another session, ‘Viva Espana’, children learn about some Spanish traditions and culture, and play a game to learn some essential Spanish words and numbers. At the end of each session children will have a review of what they’ve achieved and take away a worksheet with a certificate of achievement to show their parents and at least one piece of work.

Winter holidays are also being given a twist for families. This winter, First Choice has taken its experience of activities in Holiday Villages into traditional ski resorts – as well as trialling more activity led Kids Clubs, such as ice-skating or tobogganing, They will also be increasing their excursion programme to offer a range of ‘winter wonderland’ experiences such as dog sled rides and skidoos in Lapland, for example. If successful, these will then be offered to families in a range of resorts from winter 2007.

The company is also increasing the number of ‘Premier’ properties in its ski programme and increasing the number of places where spa treatments are available.

For further information, visit firstchoice.co.uk.