The Pre-school Playgroups Association set in motion the whole of the playgroup movement, which celebrates its half-century this year. An enormously successful organisation, it embodied many of the qualities and attitudes that government and policy makers would like to achieve right now.

The organisation tapped powerful reserves of learning potential, not only in pre-school children but also in adults, families and whole communities. It generated an explosion of lateral thinking and innovative social development that reverberates to this day – and then it broke up.

Mungrisdale Writers Group member Jill Faux was a key figure in the movement, and has contributed the final chapter of a new book about its rise and fall. Insights from the Playgroup Movement: Equality and Autonomy in a Voluntary Organisation is written by women who, like Jill, were at the heart of the organisation.

It looks at the nature of PPA’s success but – crucially – also turns an analytical eye on the reasons for its premature end and the lessons to be learned. So the book is not just for those concerned with children’s early lives and education, including parents, but also people interested in the involvement of adults in their own learning, and all those committed to the healthy development of a democratic society and a positive balance of power and responsibility within its grassroots organisations.

Jill Faux writes:

I wrote the last chapter – ‘The Impact of Change’ – which chronicles the way the organisation was affected by social and political changes during the first 30 years of its history. It is difficult to remember how things were but it was, for instance, only in 1964 that the Married Women’s Property Act was passed which gave women the right to keep half of any money they could save from the ‘housekeeping’!

There was little or no employment protection for women, abortion was illegal until 1967 and ‘the pill’ only became widely available in the sixties, so it was not easy for women to control their fertility. Also, educational opportunities were very limited for women – in 1961 75% of girls left school without any ‘O’ levels and only 7,000 women went to university, compared with 18,000 men.

This meant that there were many highly intelligent, under-educated women around with young children, either working at low paid jobs or choosing not to work and looking after children at home. These women formed the bedrock of the playgroup movement and many found fulfilment and increased self-confidence in their playgroup work – lobbying government, applying for grants and improving their own and their children’s life chances.

There was never enough money – any more than there is now – to provide consistently good quality pre-school childcare and education. Energetic fundraising, going on courses, writing booklets, seeking and taking advice from wherever it could be found, all led to a very high standard of play in the majority of groups. However, due to the embezzlement of a large sum of money by a staff member in the mid eighties, the association had to be bailed out by government.

This bail out was subject to conditions which radically altered the way the organisation managed itself. The long and vital tradition of constantly renewing voluntary input and control from the bottom up became a top down heirarchy, in which volunteers did what they were told instead of determining the policy and directing the few paid staff we had. We were unaware at the time of how this would radically alter the nature and effectiveness of the association.

One of the things we want to do by writing the book is to tell the story of the birth and growing confidence of the movement, celebrate its successes, but also warn others about the need to be sure of the value of their ethos and principles, so that they can guard against their erosion by well-meaning but ultimately destructive intervention from people who feel the need to call the shots if they provide the money. Organisations need to think very carefully about accepting help. We did it very successfully in some instances – where we could dictate the terms – but voluntary organisations can easily be flattered into disastrous changes.

There is no doubt that things had to change given changing times, but there were alternative structures which could have retained much more of what was good. This all sounds very heavy, but the chapters on the start of the movement, children’s play and the facilitating environment, as well as the way the movement spread into every area of community life and the huge take up of the development course network for parents and playleaders, show just how important what we had was and what fun we had. Not all is lost, but the essence of adventure and discovery is certainly no longer available to newcomers.

I personally went to playgroup with my eldest in Staffordshire in 1968, progressed through the movement as chair of the group, was a branch and county committee member and then, when I moved to Cumbria in 1973, became a Training and Development Officer.

In 1984 I became a national adviser to the movement. I have no formal qualifications, but when I retired I became chair of the Cumbria Early Years Partnership and undertook several reviews of children’s services for the county council as a consultant.

I well remember the inaugural meeting of Cumbria Pre-school Playgroups Association in the mid 70s. We held it at Ullswater School [in Penrith], and a swallow flew in and out all day feeding its young in its nest above the stage!

Insights from the Playgroup Movement: Equality and Autonomy in a Voluntary Organisation is published by Trentham Books, priced £21.99.

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