The Tuscany Glen Association together with the Department of Sport, Recreation and Amenities is hosting a family recreation games day each month. This month the event will take place on 19 March between 11:00 and 16:00 at the Tuscany Glen Mosque.

These programmes will take place on the second last Saturday of each month for the remainder of the year.

The Family Games programme initiative was officially launched in Kuilsriver in January 2015, and has since branched out to various other communities within Cape Town.

The programme includes various activities such as board games, klawerjas, dominoes, scrabble, ice breakers and circle games. This year, a variety of new activities will be introduced, including thinking art skills such as how to make play dough, mixing different colours, drawing, colouring in, painting, and using white candles and water paint to make potato stamps, amongst others.

All members of the community are welcome to attend but, in particular, we would like families in the community to engage with each other in a safe and friendly environment. 

The aim of this event is not only to bring families together in a positive environment, but also to show that there is more to life than the everyday norms that communities are accustomed to. Children as young as 6 years old, who have been attending these programmes regularly have shown positive improvements in their attitudes toward their personal lives. The programme also teaches youth discipline, respect for one another and how to interact with others without using violence and antisocial behaviour as a tool.

The City is dependent on partnerships with community organisations to run sustainable programmes. This family programme specifically targets the religious sector as a partner with the City to engage families in regular programmes. Churches and mosques have access to facilities which can complement City facilities and add to the variety of programmes in communities.

This is a pilot programme and the City hopes to roll this out to more communities and involve more stakeholders over the coming months.