Who we are
1277 is now being recognised as a movement of people (not an organisation) and this page is under review.
History
1277 is a loose alliance of representatives from UK church denominations, networks and other Christian organisations, that typically come together twice each year for a good chat on this subject.
Currently we have people mandated to represent the following:
- Baptists Together
- Care for the Family
- Catholic Church
- Church of England
- Daniel’s Den
- Methodist Church
- Moravian Church
- Mothers Union
- New Wine
- Praise and Play
- Quakers
- Salvation Army
- United Reformed Church
If you’d like to join us to represent a church denomination, network or Christian organisation not listed above then we’d love to hear from you – Contact Us
What are our aims & objectives?
Our main aim is to support church-based toddler groups. More specifically we try to:
- Raise awareness with church leaders to understand, support and value toddler groups both locally and nationally within churches and communities
- Create more local networks between toddler groups for mutual support and prayer
- Signpost leaders to resources, training and ideas
- Raise awareness of effective strategies for developing spirituality and faith in toddlers and their families.
And our objectives are to:
- Promote conferences /events and resources for group leaders both nationally and locally especially the National Month of Prayer
- Increase the reach of the 1277 National Network to a wider audience
- Share the vision with church leaders
- Collate research and other information about toddler groups in the UK
- Encourage toddler groups in UK to adopt good practice on support for volunteers, health and safety issues, etc.
How do we do what we claim we do?
We signpost relevant resources and events and we seek to facilitate networking between practitioners so that we can all:
- Encourage one another
- Develop and share best practice
- Pray together and
- Sometimes meet up.
And we do all this primarily by:
- Looking after this website
- Maintaining a Facebook group
- Promoting the month of June as a national month of prayer for toddler group.
When did we start doing this?
1277 emerged in 2009 as a response to the perceived need for more comprehensive and coordinated support for church-based toddler groups.
Prior to this date, many church denominations and some other Christian organisations were providing information and resources to support their own groups. When a collaboration in 2008 produced ‘Building Blocks’ (a training resource for toddler group leaders), it was so popular that it was agreed to expand and formalise the collaboration.
Since then, 1277 has collated, reviewed and promoted many of the resources available to toddler group leaders and has encouraged member organisations to produce new material where necessary.
The 1277 prayer initiative has resulted in the designation of June as ‘month of prayer for Toddler Groups’.
Our ‘Joining the Dots’ leaflet outlines how to start a prayer network in your area.