Alberta has a history of recent catastrophic climate events including the 2013 flood in Calgary and High River and the 2016 fire in Fort McMurray. It also has a growing list of lessons learned – knowledge which is being gathered and shared as needed.
One of the responses of Alberta Health Services, in collaboration with many community partners in the Wood Buffalo area, has been to provide 49 Healthy Tools for Healthy Tots Kit and Education programs for pre-schools and kindergarten in areas affected by the fire. One of the results of the fire was that even if child care or education centers were not affected directly by the fire they were impacted by the smoke. Books and toys needed to be disposed of because of smoke damage.
With the Healthy Tools for Healthy Tots program, not only have bins of interactive activities been provided but also 15 workshops providing valuable information and links to promote healthy eating, active living and positive wellbeing. 133 child care staff participated in these workshops which included resources for helping children and families deal with residual anxiety and trauma as a result of the fire.
During the fire evacuation, many families were separated and were only reunited hours or days later. Given that experience, imagine what it was like for parents and children to resume the completely normal experience of parting company at the beginning of the day; parents to work and children to child care or school . . . potentially very anxiety producing.
The resources in the HTHT kit include tools and training around Mindfulness. The children are coached to pay attention to their breathing using a Breathing Ball or a Breathing Buddy in order to manage their anxiety and fear. Heart Math, a program which teaches practises of mindfulness and self-calming was also made available for the adults.
In reflecting on Healthy Tools for Health Tots , Caroline Evancio with AHS states , “HTHT started out as a recovery initiative, but has been successful in creating equality among all early learning facilities, increased resources, increased community capacity, and education that will forever change the health and wellness of young children in our municipalities.”
In further reflecting on lesson’s learned post climate events, Caroline commented,” Children are resilient and everyone’s time frame for recovery is unique”. She noted that Fort McMurray is not the same community it was before the fire, but it is closer.