Intercultural Child & Family Centre / 1000 Women Child Care Centre

Transcultural Collaboration in Early Learning & Care ✨🌍

At the Intercultural Child & Family Centre, we believe that children thrive when they are surrounded by many ways of knowing, being, and belonging.

Transcultural collaboration invites educators, families, children, and communities to learn with one another through relationships grounded in respect, curiosity, and care. It is more than celebrating culture. It is about creating spaces where every language, story, tradition, identity, and lived experience is welcomed and valued. 💛

In our early learning environments, children:
🌱 Hear and share many languages
🌱 Explore diverse foods, music, stories, and traditions
🌱 Build empathy and understanding through meaningful relationships
🌱 Learn that differences are strengths
🌱 Develop a strong sense of identity and belonging

As educators, we continue reflecting on our own perspectives while co-learning alongside children and families. Through transcultural collaboration, we nurture inclusive communities where everyone has something important to teach and something meaningful to learn.

“Every child brings a world of knowledge, culture, and possibility into the classroom.” ✨

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I’m glad my office and I were able to help facilitate federal funding for dozens of worthy organizations in our federal riding of Edmonton Griesbach so they could hire summer students, providing many youth their very first jobs.

Kudos to the organizations giving these young people valuable experiences.

They include:
Chinatown Transformation Collaborative Society of Edmonton
Ribbon Rouge Foundation
Arts on the Ave
St. Michael's Health Group
Intercultural Child & Family Centre / 1000 Women Child Care Centre
Hope Mission
SihleSizwe

Today, we celebrate the incredible dedication, compassion, creativity, and heart of Early Learning Educators.

Every day, you create spaces where children feel safe, valued, heard, and inspired to explore the world around them. Through your patience, guidance, and meaningful relationships, you help build the foundation for confidence, belonging, curiosity, and lifelong learning.

The impact you make reaches far beyond the classroom. You support families, strengthen communities, and help shape the future one child at a time. Your work matters deeply, and the care you bring to each day leaves lasting impressions in the lives of children and families.

Thank you for all that you do, for the moments of encouragement, the comfort you provide, the learning you inspire, and the love and care you bring into early childhood education.

Happy Early Learning Educators Day to all the amazing educators who continue to make a difference every single day. 💛

Thank you to all the educators that inspire our ELCC community each and every day you are mighty!

Intercultural Child & Family Centre & 1000 Women Child Care is blessed to have you work for the organization.

We would like to thank you for all that you do for the families each other and the early learning community we so appreciate you !

Friday, April 20 2022 was Earth Day, which marks the start of the environmental movement in 1970 to demonstrate support for environmental protection and connection with nature, and includes a range of events coordinated globally including over 1 billion people in more than 193 countries.

In our playrooms, educators brought in soil, seeds, shovels, and other gardening supplies for the children. Together, they planted seeds and read books about growing, and the life cycle of plants.

An important part we incorporate in our daily practice is helping children demonstrate a sense of wonder and appreciation for the natural world through bringing all their senses to explore nature, taking pleasure in natural beauty, and connecting to and respecting the natural world.

Much to our delight, the construction of a green space is happening outside of our childcare, and children have been watching it unfold in the past few days as large trucks and commercial vehicles dig up and remove the dirt and rocks.

Educators took this opportunity to provide time, space, and materials for children to represent their thoughts and experiences in their own way.

To inspire and strengthen children's ideas, roles and concepts, being curious about how children may view and represent what was happening outside of the child care Centre. Educators provided commercial construction vehicles. Children expanded, created their own narratives and made meaning of what was happening outside of the childcare as they playfully engaged with the materials provided.

Two children waved to me as I visited one of our preschool rooms. One even ran up to me and grabbed my hand, leading me towards what they were engaged in. I found a small block city built around the two children, and they proceeded to explain to me what each of the buildings was.

“This is my house,” said one of them. “This is the museum and, the fire station.”

When they explained, I listened and talked to them, asking how I could help, and what they planned to build next. These children invited me into their imagining and were “participating with materials and ideas and others as a mighty learner” Alberta Flight Framework Document, - Makovichuk, Hewes, Lirette, & Thomas, (2014) p 47. In their shared imagining, they were “generating a shared repertoire of narratives and memories” - Flight, 47.

In inviting me into their building, they were demonstrating the “respectful and responsive relationship” that exists between when we “participated in [this] group initiative.” - Flight, 94.