Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Back to junior kindergarten. There's still a lot of confusion about this program, and I'd just like to try and clear it up for my constituents. I'd like the Minister of Education to just let us know what's the difference between junior kindergarten programming and, say, the programming at daycare and the difference between junior kindergarten and kindergarten. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Masi. Minister of Education, Culture and Employment.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The difference is junior kindergarten will be a free play-based program that's offered to all communities across the Northwest Territories. Currently, there are 11 communities that don’t have any licensed daycare programming, and we want to fix that. Daycares and day homes, they do their own programming; we also work with them to provide some programs, but junior kindergarten will be one that's offered throughout the whole Northwest Territories. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
So is the level of education going to be higher in junior kindergarten than a child could expect in a daycare, in a playschool, something like that? That's really what I'm getting at.
The NWT JK curriculum for four- and five-year-old children is play-based and supports children's cognitive, social, emotional, creative, and physical development, as well as cultural. As I mentioned, the EDI results that we've been seeing with the programs that already run in the Northwest Territories, we're seeing a big improvement in the communities that are offering junior kindergarten that are entering into the kindergarten system.
I realize that there are some communities who have no daycare, no playschool programs, so I'll confine this to Hay River. Can I tell my constituents that, if we're going to put daycare, playschool operators out of business, that it's for the benefit of our children because they're going to be getting a higher education in junior kindergarten?
Mr. Speaker, junior kindergarten is going to be optional to families, and secondly I also mentioned that we enhanced our early childhood programming to daycares and day homes. We see that there's a lot of waiting lists across the Northwest Territories for daycares and day homes that offer programming for zero to five, and the infants we've increased the funding. So I think that those messages need to be put out there for daycares and day homes and that it is optional for families.
Masi. Oral questions. Member for Hay River North.
The Hay River Playschool takes three- and four-year-olds. It's probably going to shut down after decades. That's an option. That's a real option that could happen. So I just want to make this as simple as possible: are kids coming out of JK going to be smarter than if they were in a playschool or a daycare program? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Any early childhood programming that's offered to our children, we have in partnership with the Department of Health and Social Services. We've developed Right from the Start, a strategy, an action plan. Any early childhood programming is going to benefit the children, going to benefit the families, and is going to benefit the communities for the children. Any children that go through an early childhood program are going to see results, whether it's through junior kindergarten, through a day home, or a day program. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Oral questions. Member for Kam Lake.
