Seamless Day Update

The Seamless Day initiative is a unique program that provides before and/or after school care for Kindergarten students and other school-aged students, as space allows. Students connect with familiar educators throughout the day, which allows the educators to better meet the needs of the children and expand on their interests, curiosities, and wonders. The team of educators includes one classroom teacher and two Early Childhood Educators (ECEs).

During the 2021-22 school year, School District No. 83 piloted its first Seamless Day program at Silver Creek Elementary. District Principal (Early Learning) Jen Findlay gives a huge shout-out to the amazing team of staff, students, and parents who were open and flexible to design a program that supports school-aged child care in the Silver Creek community. There were 24 other districts piloting a similar before and after school child care program this year and all the educators were part of a provincial research project to learn more about the Seamless Day model.

Here is an excerpt from the reflections that were shared with the research team about the benefits of having two ECEs supporting Kindergarten students during the school day (thanks to Sally McLean, Seamless Day ECE, for writing the reflections):

Silver Creek Seamless Day: Our Prepared Environment Story 

In our school, we have had the opportunity to create a specific prepared play environment for our Seamless Day program. Children move between this room, their classrooms, other rooms in the school, and the outdoors throughout the school day and during before and after school programming. The room that includes our prepared environment is also used for small group tutorials, math lessons, art activities, and middle school explorations for different classes in the school at different times of the day. The prepared play environment takes up approximately half of the room. 

Every morning for 45 minutes, Kindergarten students from the K-1 classroom that hosts our Seamless Day program come to the prepared play environment while their teacher works with grade one students. This supports the Kindergarten students’ need to learn through play without distracting the grade one students from necessary lessons. The grade ones come for one hour, once a week, while their teacher works with the Kindergarten students. This recognizes the value of learning through play for older students as well. 

Our rich, age-appropriate free-play environment includes sensorial play, STEM activities, large construction materials, small construction activities, arts and crafts materials, and loose parts. Rather than having play centres, the environment is designed so that different materials can be intermixed, and children can problem-solve all manner of design, construction and spatial reasoning challenges. Children choose freely and explore widely, limited only by what the materials can accommodate. In this environment, we are able to leave creations in place to facilitate multi-day explorations. 

Many of our Kindergarten students had little or no preschool experience. They love slime, flubber, play dough, kinetic sand, and sensory bins, and they demonstrate a need for these sensorial experiences. They build with a mixed variety of large blocks, magna tiles, and loose parts to collaboratively create complex structures that show critical, aesthetic, and design thinking. They work with their own and other’s ideas to create original art and unique crafts. 

The Kindergarten children are also curious about the activities that they see older children and adults engaging in. We have been able to provide experiences for young children involving microscopes, magnets, force and motion, electrical circuit building, and robotics. With the support of a prepared environment, professional ECEs, and open-ended play time to pursue and explore their personal interests, children’s natural confidence and capability result in countless examples of spontaneous learning every day.

We have noticed, over time, that Kindergarten children are working more collaboratively, engaging with materials in more creative (and less destructive) ways, doing more precise work, regulating their behaviour, experiencing less conflict, and taking more responsibility for the care of materials and the environment.