CBeebies Grown-ups: A new area for parents and carers on the CBeebies website

Hi, I’m Sally the Senior Producer on CBeebies Grown-ups. If you’ve checked the CBeebies Grown-ups website today, you’ll have noticed there are some pretty big changes afoot and we now have a brand spanking new area specially for parents and carers on the CBeebies website! http://www.bbc.co.uk/cbeebies/grownups/

In it you will find a whole world of pretty amazing things for parents and carers, from useful resources to help you support your little one’s learning, to essential info about new shows on CBeebies. There are also funny behind-the-scenes extras for grown-up eyes only!

• Don’t know your split digraphs from your letter blends? Check out our special Alphablocks phonics guide for parents.

• Need to send your child’s birthday card into CBeebies? Everything you need to know is here.

• Want to watch what Mr Bloom’s like when the cameras stop rolling? Yes, we’ve got that too…

CBeebies has had a site for grown-ups for a long time but now that many more people visit the site on phones and tablets, (not just on computers) we need to make some technical changes to make sure the site works just as well and looks just as great however you access it.

The CBeebies website has been going through similar changes - in November I wrote a blog about how we are making it responsive to the changing world of devices and phones, and now it’s CBeebies Grown-ups’ turn!

February 2015 onwards sees us being welcomed into the main CBeebies website which is a massive opportunity for us! We’ve learnt a lot since our relaunch in 2011 and talked to a lot of parents about their needs.

The main outcome was that we need to move closer to the content as parents and carers were struggling to find our Grown-ups content in our separate area. This move also makes the most of the licence fee with efficiencies in having to maintain fewer websites, as we are one big happy responsive website.

Sadly this does mean our old site is closing and we say goodbye to some lesser-used functionality, however we have said hello to a lot more opportunities, and have incorporated some of our features into the CBeebies website, such as improved ways for grown-ups to filter content and find content that is not only fun but can support their child’s development.

Learning through play has always been at CBeebies’ heart. Research has shown that when a grown-up gets involved in their child’s play their learning opportunities are massively increased, and we’ve been working with top learning experts to add features to our games and activities that enable parents to get involved with their child’s learning and enrich their development while they play.

Over the next few months you will see more prominence on the CBeebies site and Apps given to our learning areas and tips for parents and carers.

Since 2011, our Facebook and Twitter grown-up communities have gone from strength to strength and we thank you for your involvement and love to see so many of you joining in. Thank you for all your support and we hope you continue to bear with us as we change over and get used to new systems.

See you soon,

Sally