Children not yet in kindergarten will once again have a chance to interact, play and learn with their parents and each other when the StrongStart BC program starts up on September 10.
Offered at Henderson and James Thomson Elementary schools and Kelly Creek Community School since 2008, the program provides a space for both parent and child to relax, explore and learn.
The goal of the free government-funded program, explained coordinator Rita John, is to prepare children for entry into the school system from birth onwards. “We’re as a rule trying to promote school readiness,” she said. “Our goal really is for kids to enter the school system excited about learning and happy to be there.”
This goal is accomplished through play-based learning. For example, said John, “if [the child] is starting to play with water, you can integrate the idea of learning numbers into whatever they’ve decided to do.”
Each drop-in session is facilitated by an Early Childhood Educator (ECE) who loosely guides parent and child in their exploration. “It’s a program where parents come and participate with their children,” explained John. “They’re the ones doing the hands-on stuff with their kids.”
Each StrongStart location is equipped with a house centre, a reading centre, a creative centre and a plethora of puzzles and toys. “It’s set up a lot like a kindergarten, except adapted to the learning of younger children,” said John.
Sessions follow a loose outline, including free play, snack, gym time and circle time, which integrates songs and stories. The exact activities of the daily program vary with the children present.
“They base the program that happens every day on the age of the children and the kind of children who are attending,” explained John. For example, if a group of children seems to want to run, the activities will be oriented around that. “It’s kind of thinking on the spot every day you go to work,” she added.
Because the ORCA [On the Road With Children’s Activities] Bus will not be running this September, the school district will also be hosting a StrongStart outreach program, which will use a large van to transport equipment between various locations. Outreach programs will be held everywhere from Texada to Lund to Lang Bay.
“It really is the ORCA Bus program on wheels in a van, slightly adapted because all the supplies need to be moved in and set up,” explained John.
Roots of the StrongStart program, which now involves 310 different centres across BC, stemmed from a provincial study led by University of British Columbia’s Human Early Learning Partnership. The study measured vulnerability rates of children entering kindergarten—in other words, whether children struggled in some area of their learning.
“The provincial vulnerability rate has been around 25 to 30 per cent and that’s fairly high, so the aim of the program is to help decrease that number,” explained John. “The provincial hope is to get the vulnerability rate around 15 per cent.”
Programs have been tailored to address all areas of learning, including motor, language, literacy and communication skills.
In addition to preparing children for kindergarten, the program has other benefits as well. “Children are introduced to other adults and other children but with their parents there as support,” said John. As children get more confident, she added, they start to interact with other StrongStart participants.
Parents can learn something new as well. Speaking as a parent herself, John explained that “you come away from these experiences with new inspiration on how to play with your kids and how to have fun.”
For more information on the StrongStart programs, interested readers can visit the websites of the elementary schools involved, as well as the School District 47 website, www.sd47.bc.ca.
