369:’s Louise Carpenter, who wrote “for every statistic, or non-statistic, there is a real child who is trying to cope. It is because of this that Billy-Jo and the children and three other families agreed to feature in a BBC five-part documentary series, Sofa Surfers, about child homelessness, to be aired on CBBC next week - part of a homelessness season on CBBC aimed at breaking down prejudices, especially among children themselves. The series explores the day-to-day reality; the children's hopes, their dreams, their disappointments. But, more than anything else, it shows their bravery, a heartbreaking acceptance of circumstances over which they have no control.”
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business went bust. But the pressure of keeping a secret at school, and living in uncomfortable accommodation, with little money and privacy, leads to problems for Amanda and her family. Amanda struggles with the idea of telling her new friends she is homeless but decides to take the plunge reveal the truth about her situation.
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The first programme follows Shane, a bright articulate nine year old who is insightful about his homeless position, Shane and his family are living in emergency accommodation and make their fifth move in six months and find cockroaches and a leaky bathroom in their latest home. When
Christmas arrives
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Amanda, aged 14, is the subject of
Tuesday’s show, she recently moved into a hostel in north London with her father and her brother. It is a big adjustment from her previous life in America. Her Mum and two sisters are in Nigeria, so this is an opportunity for her to get to know Dad again after his
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Wednesday follows Sagal, an 11-year-old originally from
Somalia. She lives in a flat in temporary accommodation with her mother and her lively three-year-old brother who rules the roost. Sagal is very private and has told almost no one that she is homeless. She is keen to do well in school and has
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The film attempted to show the real lives of homelessness children through a week of observational documentaries aimed at an audience of 6–12 years old. Its approach was enabling the young and vulnerable contributors to speak candidly about their situation, and employed current animation techniques
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There are over 130,000 children living in the UK today without a permanent place they can call home. Sofa
Surfers is a BBC documentary series which takes a look into the lives of four homeless children living in different types of temporary accommodation. This is thought to be the first children’s
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Mel, 13, lives with her family and as one of the older children at the charity Save the Family’s sheltered housing project, she has become an unexpected role model for the other children who live there. During this penultimate episode Mel becomes a roving reporter for the series and finds out how
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described it as a “touching tale of a homeless child who finds refuge at a
Flintshire safe-haven.” Tim McLachlan, Save the Family chief executive, said: “We saw Sofa Surfers as an excellent opportunity to enlighten young people about homelessness and how it can touch anybody of any age.”
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to bring those stories alive. Each episode featured testimony from children, as young as six, and showed their resilience, black humour and mature understanding of the incredibly difficult circumstances they were in. Walsh spoke on
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described it as "Shocking story of homeless family." It went on to say "this heart-breaking five-part BBC documentary series Sofa
Surfers...explores child homelessness for other youngsters.”
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The series rounds off when all the families meet together for the first time for a weekend of celebration at Save the Family Wales, there are tears, tantrums and even a little romance…
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There have been 22 screenings of the episodes from this series, below are the details for the first UK transmissions.
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Save the Family works. At a fundraising event she interviews former
Conservative Leader Iain Duncan Smith.
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This series received wide recognition for challenging perceptions around childhood homelessness. The
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601:"Save the Family charity at Plas Bellin, Northop Hall, to feature in TV documentary Sofa Surfers"
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documentary dedicated to this subject. Using animation and rotoscoping techniques by the company
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nominated in 2010 was nominated for the Social Award at the Rose d'Or Awards.
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the cupboards are nearly bare as mum struggles to make ends meet.
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https://www.documentary.org/news/awards-roundup-june-9-15-2010
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Walsh made the acclaimed three part documentary series
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listed Sofa
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182:about challenges making the series.
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679:Homelessness in the United Kingdom
401:"The White Balance - Sofa Surfers"
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552:"Rose d'Or nominations announced"
520:"Search - BBC Programme Index"
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185:Two episode we filmed at the
18:Sofa surfing (disambiguation)
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387:"CBBC - Sofa Surfers, Shane"
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16:For other uses, see
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109:Running time
32:Sofa Surfers
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112:5 x 30 min.
94:Roger James
60:Narrated by
50:Directed by
653:Categories
373:References
253:2. Amanda
159:John Walsh
139:2009-03-16
103:John Walsh
86:Production
64:John Walsh
54:John Walsh
538:bbc.co.uk
345:Reception
332:Rose d'Or
271:3. Sagal
235:1. Shane
227:Channel
218:Episode
208:Episodes
180:BBC News
99:Producer
330:It was
289:4. Mel
187:Chester
137: (
132:Release
81:English
326:Awards
313:18.00
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316:BBC1
298:BBC1
280:BBC1
262:BBC1
244:BBC1
224:Time
221:Date
644:IMDb
337:The
642:at
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155:BBC
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Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License. Additional terms may apply.
