Build a neighborhood community that is unified and fun for individuals and families. Learn how to build community through activities, groups, and more.
Do you find yourself wanting to be closer with your neighbors? Many of us live near many of our neighbors, but that doesn’t mean our neighborhood is a tight-knit community. If you are looking to change that then this article is for you. We’ll help you figure out how to bring your fellow neighbors together to build a stronger sense of community.
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The Importance of Community in Your Neighborhood
Facilitating a strong neighborhood community is important for many reasons. It can help you have a support system as a neighborhood when problems arise like power outages or natural disasters. It can help you take care of each other as a community when someone is injured and needs help getting their groceries. And it can help your community come together to face neighborhood problems like an unruly neighbor or local legislation. But most of all, building a community in your neighborhood can help you feel part of a group of people who care about each other and support one another.
Community Building Activities
One of the primary ways to create a strong community in your neighborhood is to organize community activities. These are fun opportunities to bring community members together to get to know each other and form neighborly bonds. The options for fun community development are endless.
Create a Neighborhood Watch Group
A neighborhood watch group can also be referred to as a crime watch because oftentimes the main purpose of the group is to look out for local crime and keep your neighborhood safe. A neighborhood watch program can be started by anyone in the neighborhood with the organizational skills to contact everyone and gather together some fellow watch members.
Join a Neighborhood App
This might surprise you, but there are actually a lot of neighborhood apps your community could utilize to stay in sync and support one another. Standard social media platforms are a great place to start, all you need is someone to create and manage the neighborhood social media account. Creating a Facebook page or Facebook group is a great place to create an easy-to-use community platform for your neighborhood. But there are also many apps specifically designed for an online community that are sure to also give you and your neighbors a sense of belonging and a sense of community.
- Nextdoor
- Front Porch Forum
- MyCoop
- Neighborland
- EveryBlock
Start a Community Website
If you really want to make everyone feel they are a part of a community, create a community website. With sites like Wix and Weebly, building a community website can be incredibly easy to do. To create a community website all you need to do is the following steps:
- Create a website builder account
- Pick a simple and easy-to-use template
- Name your website after your neighborhood
- Create the pages your community needs
Maybe you’ll create a neighborhood directory or contact page so everyone a part of the community can get in contact with leaders in the neighborhood or the HOA office. You might also have an events page that goes over community-building activities, local charities, local events, and more. If you have morning meetings once a week you might include those meeting times as well.
Create a Facebook Neighborhood Group
Do you need to stay in contact with the people that live around you in real time? Then creating a Facebook neighborhood group is a great way to do that. With a Facebook neighborhood group, community members can come to one page to post things, make announcements, and talk in real time with the rest of the online community.
Start a Book Club
Build a strong sense of community by starting some fun community building activities. A book club is a great idea for a fun group activity you could try. The books you choose will also give you and community members some fun and interesting topics to talk about in your book discussions. To start a book club all you need to do is the following steps:
- Invite group members
- Make a reading schedule
- Make a book discussion meeting schedule
Once you have the details of your club set up you can meet on a regular basis, like once a month, and discuss great books together! There are also plenty of other club ideas to choose from, like outdoor clubs, that can also be great for bringing people together to have some fun.
Community Service
It’s important for strong communities to have fun together, but it’s also important for strong communities to participate in healthy social emotional learning together through community outreach. Start by brainstorming community service ideas. You could hold a coat drive each year or gather donations for a local nonprofit organization!
Once you pick one, you can make a habit of putting on that community service event once a year. Not only will a yearly community service endeavor be good for the mental health of your neighborhood, but it will also help everyone form strong bonds with one another as they work together for a good cause.
In Conclusion,
Community development doesn’t have to be hard. All you have to do is pick a few community building ideas of your own and start reaching out to your fellow neighbors today! You might be surprised by how receptive your neighbors are to creating a stronger sense of belonging for everyone in the neighborhood.
