Education
December 5, 2012

The following statement was given today in the House of Assembly by the Honourable Clyde Jackman, Minister of Education:

Parent Resource Kits Being Well-Received

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to provide an update on an important early childhood learning initiative now well underway in this province.

Earlier this year, I announced the Department of Education had embarked on a pilot project which involves the distribution of resource kits to parents at key points in their child’s early development.

The project, undertaken in partnership with regional health authorities at 20 locations throughout the province, involves the distribution of three separate resource kits to parents as their child turns two months, four months, and six months old as part of their routine public health clinic visits.

Mr. Speaker, we are getting tremendous feedback on these resource kits, which contain vital information for parents on how to ensure their child has the best possible start in life. They also include play materials, books and CDs designed to support parents in their efforts to help their child develop the emotional, social and language skills that will form the foundation of all future learning.

We are on track to begin distributing these first three resource kits province-wide in the spring. At that time, we will also begin piloting more parent resource kits, this time aimed at parents of children aged 12 and 18 months. Those will be distributed province-wide in 2014. Resource kits for parents of children aged 24 and 36 months will be distributed the following year.

By the end of 2015, Mr. Speaker, every parent in this province will receive a total of seven parent resource kits from the time their child is two months old, up to the age of three years.

Mr. Speaker, there is more brain development between birth and age three than at any other time in our lives. So we are very pleased to see the first of these parent resource kits being so well received – and that the importance of play-based learning in a child’s early development is a message that is being heard throughout the province.

It is parents, Mr. Speaker, who are every child’s first teachers. As a government, we recognize this, and we are committed to providing them with information and tools to help their children – our children – develop the knowledge and social skills that will prepare them well for school, and for life.

2012 12 05                                2:20 p.m.