Health Canada Environmental Health Awareness and Learning Toolkit (EHALT)
Healthy Environments in Early Childhood Education Workshop
The Early Learning and Child Care Act and Regulation mandate that childcare programs must ensure that a healthy and safe environment is provided at all times to support the safety, security, and well-being of children. Additionally, Flight: Alberta’s Early Learning and Care Framework highlights the importance of healthy environments in achieving the Holistic Goal of Well-being of children, ensuring their participation in safe and caring environments where their vitality, health, well-being, and sense of belonging and identity are protected and nurtured.
In light of this, in partnership with Health Canada’s Alberta Environmental Health Program, this workshop is developed to educate Early Childhood Educators (ECEs) about chemicals and pollutants in the environment and the potential adverse impacts of these chemicals and pollutants on human health, especially for children in their care. The workshop will focus on various aspects such as air quality, radon, and chemical awareness and management. It will increase ECEs’ awareness of environmental health risks and provide them with mitigation strategies. The workshop will also include the actions that ECEs can take to protect the health and safety of themselves and the children in their care against these chemicals and pollutants. As a result, knowledge gained by ECEs will be transferred to children in their care as well as their families in ensuring healthy environments.
Learning Outcomes
- Recognize health exposure issues related to chemical substances, radon and air quality in their environment including potential hazards to themselves and children in their care.
- Identify and take actions to prevent and reduce health risks, to themselves and children in their care, from exposure to chemicals and pollutants in the environment.
- Utilize Health Canada’s tools, products, and resources to increase their awareness of health impacts related to environmental health factors, including chemical management, radon, and air quality.
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