Kirsten Larsen
Northern News Services

NNSL (Nov 30/98) - The laughter and the happy singing of children echo around a new and integral building in Rae Lakes, named in memory of a former Gameti First Nation chief.

The Johnny Arrowmaker Day-Care Centre has been in operation for two weeks after a year long construction process joining the old church to the Gameti Nation Band office.

"When the new church was built here they wanted the old church to go to good use, so we moved it over to our area," said Lana Paulson, band manager for the Gameti First Nation Band in Rae Lakes.

Renovations had to be made to the band office to adjoin the buildings and construct a new kitchen area that was not easily accessible to the day-care centre.

The centre has been in operation since Nov. 15 and, although it is operating close to capacity, all parents in Rae Lakes with children ages three to five are being encouraged to use the centre.

The day care schedules activities that encourage the development of language in English as well as Dogrib, and promotes interaction, creativity and object manipulation important to a child's early development.

Language development is one of the main focuses of the day care with scheduled sing-alongs and story time.

"We pick about four songs and sing them for a week so they get a chance to learn the songs, then, after that week, we pick new ones," said Gloria Ekendia, day-care worker.

"The songs are in English and Dogrib, too. The books are all in English."

All the day-care workers are Dogrib and are in the process of receiving their early childhood development certificate through night classes offered by the ECH co-ordinator, Marcia Dean.

The workers are trained to recognize traits which may indicate language development problems in children. If a language problem is identified, the child would be referred to a speech therapist. "We don't have a speech therapist in the region, which is a problem," said Paulson. "I know of one mother who takes her child out (to a speech therapist outside the region) for a week every couple of months."

The developmental learning encouraged in the day care can work as a step to the early prevention of language development problems.

"Sometimes it's easier to just give (children) what they want," said Paulson. "Hopefully, in an environment (that encourages language use) there will be less language problems."

Not all the activities scheduled for the children focus around learning, but just being in an environment with new toys and other children encourages growth.

"It's great that kids come in and get to do new things," added Ekendia.

An order has been put in for musical instruments such as tambourines and bongos to add to the variety of things available for play and for learning.