A new francophone daycare will be coming to Lloydminster as part of the $25 a day child care program.
The Government of Alberta and Ministries of Children Services are creating more affordable Early Learning and Child Care Centres (ELCC) across the province for all families, including French-speaking families.
Executive Director of Fédération des Parents Mireille Peloquin says the motivation behind opening a french ELCC was the lack of French resources in smaller communities.
“Francophone’s have very few services for them to maintain their language and culture in the Lloydminster area. There is a francophone school and early childhood services are really important in giving kids a really good start in their first language.”
In Lloydminster, École Sans-Frontiéres is the only school that provides programming in French and will also house the new daycare. Peloquin says they’re hoping to have two classrooms in the school for the daycare centre.
“We’ll be working in partnership with the francophone school board. They will be lending us some space within the school to operate. We’re going to have a wing of the school that will be dedicated to early childhood.”
The daycare will have a separate entrance and will accommodate 12 children from 12 months to five years old.
“We’ll be offering a preschool program within the hours of the daycare for three to five year old’s, but the daycare will have space for babies from 12 months to three years,” says Peloquin.
The preschool will follow Alberta’s play, participation and possibilities curriculum. Peloquin says the ELCC will have a parental engagement aspect, where parents are required to participate in their child’s development.
“If you register your child in our daycare parents will be required to participate in activities that help them to connect with other parents of the daycare. It’s not just a drop off, pick up and pay my small bill at the end of the month.”
The daycare is hoping for a September 4 opening date and parents interested in registering their child can visit their website.