Head Start gives children heads up in school career

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In 1994, Lethbridge became one of two Alberta cities to pilot a program called Native Head Start. Since that time, said team leader and Blackfoot teacher, Charlotte White Quills, the program has increased in popularity. Native Head Start, held four days a week, September through June, is aimed at both pre-school aged children and their parents.

If parents don't feel comfortable in the mainstream school system, said White Quills, then their children also have a hard time succeeding.

"It's very important for the parents to feel comfortable. If a child attends a [mainstream] school and a problem arises, it's hard for parents to know who to talk to or what to do. We encourage [parents] to be visible in the school. It really helps the children with their self-esteem.

"They're happy to see their parents in the school."

White Quills calls Native Head Start an intervention program. During the summer, children and parents who want to participate in the course are evaluated. Part of the evaluation is to see if the children need to be referred to other agencies in the city; another part of the evaluation is to line up workshops for the parents.

The program teaches social skills to three-year-old children, while preparing four- and five-year-old children for kindergarten. But perhaps, more importantly, Native Head Start teaches children to have pride in their heritage and this, said White Quills, goes a long way in promoting self-esteem.

Dancing, drumming and time with the Elders is an important part of the program. If the youngsters are talking about fire safety, said teacher Edna Prairie Chicken, they'll take a field trip out to the nearby Blood reserve and visit the fire department there.

"It's important for the kids to know there are Native role models," she said.

The program runs with 50 children. It's full to capacity and there's a waiting list. When Native Head Start began five years ago, there were 12 children. The majority of students are from the city itself, with two or three coming in from the nearby Blackfoot Confederacy reserves of Peigan and Blood. However, noted White Quills, the Blood reserve started a Head Start program this fall, working with three year old children.

Down the road, White Quills would like to see the program offered in its own location so it can accommodate more students. Presently it's held in the basement of the Lethbridge Native Women's Transition House. She'd also like to see a program for three-year-olds taught entirely in the Blackfoot language.

"A lot of our parents are young. They don't even know Blackfoot," said White Quills, who notes there are programs offered in Lethbridge to teach adults Blackfoot. The mainstream school system also offers Blackfoot courses in school, but there's a gap of three or four years between the children leaving the Native Head Start program and then taking Blackfoot in Lethbridge schools.

"We're in the process of tracking our children," said White Quills." . . . teachers we've spoken to feel there is a difference with students who've taken Native Head Start."

"Parents I've talked to are really happy their kids took Head Start," adds Prairie Chicken.