Meet Paizontas – the playful Greek partner of the project

Paizontas (English Playing) is a non-profit organisation founded with the aim of promoting the play in childhood. Family and Job and Playing got in contact through social networks when preparing the ProChil project concept and agreed about cooperation.

Aims of Playing are the following:

  • To raise awareness and educate the parents, teachers and the
    community regarding the promotion of play in childhood.
  • To change the culture around play in Greece.
  • To provide ideas and solutions for the support of children’s play.

“When working with parents, we see that children aregetting under presure in terms of what they have to learn, in what activities they have to take part during the week etc. We are trying to persuade parents and teachers about the importance of free play for the sake of the play itself, we want to give our children more freedom to come and enjoy what they enjoy, ” says Elida Kalpogianni, a member of the Playing team.

Playing is active in many projects – some of them are The power of play, Playing in the schoolyard, Play in the city, Working together, Moving and Learning outside, Outside the classroom and now ProChil. For 2018 deadline they are preparing new proposals focused for example on “green” playgrounds.

The most important programme with regard to ProChil is probably the Power of play which aims at promoting free play for preschool-aged children. The project focuses on parents and teachers and provides ideas and solutions for the support of children’s play. As a part of the programme Playing has produced information and educaton materials for parents and educators in Greek. In the project a total of 23 municialities, 13 municipal districts in Athens and 10 cities across Greece took part in the project.

We are glad to have Playing in the project!