This section offers a curated selection of organizations and resources for community members and professionals working with and in support of the early years. Some of the resources and readings have been suggested by the Network Members and inform their work.
Indigenous Early Learning and Child Care
Research and policy have become more clearly intertwined through the critical work that strives to advance our understanding, responsiveness and creativity of early learning and child care (within and among First Nations, in British Columbia and beyond). Through inquiry, cultural practice and partnership, centering Indigenous knowledges in ways appropriate to them is becoming new ways of governance, new pathways for equity and (Indigenous) leadership and new venues for innovation and change.
BC Aboriginal Child Care Society
BCACCS Resource Centre’s collection is focused on materials with Indigenous content. It promotes learning and information sharing among parents, child care students and professionals, educators, academics, researchers, policymakers and anyone interested in Indigenous early learning and child care.
First Nations Early Learning and Child Care Framework
Creating a First Nations-specific Framework for a system of early learning and child care (ELCC) is one step toward addressing the Truth and Reconciliation Commission Calls to Action and toward realizing First Nations inherent responsibilities within the framework of the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.
Indigenous Early Learning and Child Care Framework
This framework represents the Government of Canada and Indigenous people’s work to co-develop a transformative Indigenous framework that reflects the unique cultures, aspirations and needs of First Nations, Inuit and Métis children, families and communities.
An environmental scan of the policy environment in the province of British Columbia, A Cold Wind Blows stresses the need for the systemic and structural change that the national framework has been developed to address.
Early Learning and Child Care
The Investigating Quality (IQ) Early Learning Environments Project 2005–2009 worked to broaden and deepen discussions on ‘quality’ in the field of early childhood care and development (ECCD) at local, provincial, federal and international levels. This overview outlines the activities and research that took place during the last phase of the Project.
Pedagogical Facilitation Project
The Community Early Learning and Child Care Facilitators Pilot Project drew on the foundation created by the Investigating Quality (IQ) Project, delivered in British Columbia with funding from the Ministry of Children and Family Development. This 2017 report evaluates the sixth year of the project and offers recommendations.
British Columbia Early Learning Framework
The 2019 edition of this Framework is the culmination of a collaborative process that included early childhood educators, primary teachers, academics, Indigenous organizations, Elders, government, and other professionals.
Indigenous Authorities and Organizations
Following individual Nation’s inherent rights and traditional law, certain authorities and documents are particularly relevant to the rightful development of Indigenous early learning and child care.
First Nations Early Learning and Child Care Framework
Creating a First Nations-specific Framework for a system of early learning and child care (ELCC) is one step toward addressing the Truth and Reconciliation Commission Calls to Action and toward realizing First Nations inherent responsibilities within the framework of the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.
Ownership, Control, Access and Possession (OCAP®): The Path to First Nations Information Governance
Established by the First Nations Information Governance Centre as the standard to conduct research with First Nations’ partners, OCAP® stands for ownership, control, access, and possession. These principles mean that First Nations control data collection processes in their communities and that First Nations own, protect and control how their information is used.
First Nations Health Authority
The FNHA is responsible for planning, designing, and funding the delivery of First Nations health programs across British Columbia including maternal, child, and family health.
First Nations Education Steering Committee
The First Nations Education Steering Committee (FNESC) is a policy and advocacy organization that represents and works on behalf of First Nations in British Columbia. FNESC has a mandate to support First Nations students and advance First Nations education in BC.
Canadian Authorities
Report of the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples
The final report of the RCAP concerns government policy with respect to the original historical nations of Canada. Issued in 1996 it set out a 20-year agenda of change for the betterment of Indigenous peoples in Canada. The importance of early childhood is recognized throughout the report and detailed in Volume 3, section 3. The Child.
Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada: Calls to Action
The Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada’s Call to Action 43 describes the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples as the ‘framework for reconciliation’ for all levels of Government in Canada. Call 12 explicitly refers to the need ‘to develop culturally appropriate early childhood education programs for Aboriginal families’, and the Call to Action no. 63 (iv) mentions the need to “identify teacher-training needs” related to the residential school system.
What We Have Learned: Principles of Truth and Reconciliation
The first Principle points us to the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples as the ‘framework for reconciliation’ of Canada. The ‘school experience’ and failure of the residential school system are described.
Bill 41-2019: Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Act
Unanimously passed on November 2019, Bill 41 was jointly developed between the BC government and the BC First Nations Leadership Council. It requires consistency of provincial laws with the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP) and the implementation of actions to achieve the Declaration’s objectives.
International Authorities
Convention on the Rights of the Child
The Convention was the first human rights treaty to include specific references to Indigenous children in a number of provisions. General Comment No. 11 outlines such provisions.
United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples
Consistent with the First Nations ELCC framework, as mandated by the leadership organizations of the First Nations Leadership Council, and subject foremost to specific First Nations authorities, the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples is pertinent to First Nations ELCC in many ways, including for self-determination, autonomy in establishment and control of social and educational institutions and state obligations of concrete support for the realization of Indigenous rights, as “minimum standards for the dignity for the survival, dignity and well-being of the Indigenous peoples of the world.”
Indigenous & Tribal People Convention Art. 169
Adopted in 1989 by the International Labour Organization (ILO), the Convention outlined the minimum standards of the rights of Indigenous peoples and paved the way for the adoption of the UNDRIP.
