Exemplary Practices 2008

Kinder Atii

Baker Lake, Nunavut is a small Inuit community north of Winnipeg that is the geographical centre of Canada and is home to 1700 people. It is a fly-in community that often gets socked in during a blizzard. Warm is -10C.

Rachel Arngnammaktiq Elementary School serves Baker Lake through its mandate of creating a partnership between students, parents and the community. Shannon McCarthy is the kindergarten teacher and she lives and works within the Inuit culture. She recognizes the important influence of family on child development. "I feel that parents are a child's first teacher," she says. "The lessons learned before a child enters formal school are quite possibly the most important she or he will ever learn."

Kinder Atii means getting ready for kindergarten. Like Angie Musyj, McCarthy believes in making connections early on. She realized that a comprehensive pre-kindergarten program would serve her community ably. "Parents are not always aware of the expectations of the kindergarten classroom prior to their children entering school. Sometimes school can be a scary place not only for the children but the parents as well," she says. The Kinder Atii program helps both parents and children transition to kindergarten and children come equipped with school readiness skills.

Pre-kindergarten children and their parents attend eight one-hour sessions throughout the year. They come in for an hour and McCarthy runs four sessions on that day split between roughly 50 children and their parents. Children are introduced to the structure and routine of the class as well as games, songs and stories. Music plays a large role in McCarthy's classroom. Like Jean Murphy, she works to create a secure environment for children and parents. After each session, parents are given a book and over the course of the year, eight books enter the household for parents and children to read. She also sends home a calendar at the end of each month with activities to be completed and if it is brought back to the next session, children get to pick a prize from the class treasure chest. Activities sent home are bilingual, in English and Inuktituk. Parents are welcome for the first five sessions. The remaining sessions, the children stay on their own while the parents go off with the student support teacher to discuss topics like literacy, numeracy and school expectations.

The program is relatively new but already it is fast becoming a standard in Baker Lake. When children come into kindergarten, McCarthy already knows them and their capabilities. The children are familiar with the school and the class so the transition is much smoother. "Parents who have had a child in Kinder Atii no longer feel that school is a scary place, they feel connected to their child's education in a real way," she says.