DETTAH
It's been a little more than a month since the territorial government rolled out junior kindergarten programming in some of the smaller communities across the NWT, but the benefits of the new play-based curriculum are already being felt in at least one Yellowknife area school.

Education Minister Jackson Lafferty meets junior kindergarten students from the Kaw Tay Whee School in Dettah during a tour of the school. It is the first junior kindergarten class Lafferty has visited since the program was rolled out in 23 communities last month. - Cody Punter/NNSL photo

"We've seen a lot of growth in our students," said Leah Lamoureux, principal at Kaw Tay Whee School in Dettah. "It really has added something special this year."

Dettah is one of 23 communities across the territory selected by the Department of Education, Culture and Employment for the new junior kindergarten program this year. The program will be phased in across all schools in the NWT over the next three years, with Yellowknife school boards being the last to sign on for the 2016-17 school year.

On Oct. 3, Jackson Lafferty, Minister of Education, Culture and Employment, toured the Kaw Tay Whee School in between semi-annual meetings with the heads of the regional school boards in Dettah. It is the first school he has visited since the junior kindergarten program got under way last month.

"It's great to see the younger students getting involved," he said. "There's a lot of excitement."

The Kaw Tay Whee School currently has four students enrolled in junior kindergarten in a classroom along with two senior kindergarten students. The school is no stranger to having 3 and 4-year-olds in the fold, having previously provided a daycare program.

However under the government's new early childhood development curriculum, students spend a full day at school instead of a half-day under the daycare. The new curriculum also requires junior kindergarten teachers have a bachelor of education, which daycare staff do not need.

"Our other program was really good - it was very effective - but this is an opportunity for parents and families to access more . in terms of schooling, in terms of services, in terms of support, in terms of learning," said Lamoureux.

In order to accommodate the new curriculum, the school was given $15,000 to retrofit the classroom and purchase new toys and learning aides. Whereas traditional kindergarten programs were split into different subjects, the new curriculum focuses on play-based learning to foster inquisitiveness in students. The advantage of this kind of learning is that it allows younger children's minds to evolve naturally through exploration rather than pigeonholing their interests into defined categories, Lamoureux said.

"It's a lot more hands-on and a lot more about (asking) questions," she said. "That allows us to tailor a lot of the learning to the student's interests and their choice, which research says makes them more engaged."

Through the program. students are also being taught Wilideh as part of the department's mandatory language component.

Although younger children take longer to get used to the routine of a full school day, Lamoureux said the junior kindergarten students have adapted remarkably well in the short period of time they have been attending class. Sharing a classroom with older students has helped with their progress, she added.

"Over the course of a month, the routine has developed and they have built meaningful relationships with each other and the adults in the building, and that has helped them grow into the program," she said. "They understand a little about what school is and what that means."

Lafferty said feedback from other communities who have implemented junior kindergarten have been mostly positive, although there are still some kinks to work out. He added that he recently met with aboriginal leaders from across the territory to see how individual communities could better tailor the program to their specific needs.

"That's the whole purpose of why we're here today -- to get the feedback on how (in) 23 communities (junior kindergarten) is doing," he said. "From my departmental perspective, we haven't really heard a major issue."

As the kindergarten program is not mandatory, some parents in Dettah has decided to opt out of it for this year because they don't believe their children were ready for school, Lamoureux said, adding she has kept in close contact with those parents and has extended them the opportunity for students to sign up halfway through the year should they change their minds.

"We'll work with them and their family to do what's best for them," she said.