SASKATOON -- Daycares across the province reopened to the general public on Monday, but with many COVID-19 precautions in place.
The changes begin at drop-off. Parents are being asked to maintain physical distancing, as well as staggering entry to limit the number of people at the facility.
At John Lake Early Learning Centre in Saskatoon parents can only go as far as a health screening area to drop off their children, where they’re required to use hand sanitizer.
“Now they’re forced to the hallway areas and they have to do a health screen when they come in, sanitizing their hands before they enter,” Lindsey Robinet, director of early years programming at the centre, said. “Parents aren’t allowed in the rooms anymore.”
Parents or caregivers must also do daily illness checks with their children before bringing them in.
Robinet said if children have a cough or a fever, parents will be asked to keep them away.
“As soon as children become ill, if they do become ill at the daycare, they’re quarantined into a different room,” Robinet saif.
The provincial government has imposed a limit of 15 children per room, or 15 children per defined area at larger centres, an increase in the maximum number of eight that facilities had been following.
While daycares in Saskatchewan typically separate children by ages, staff are now being asked to keep sibling groups together no matter their age to limit the mixing of households, and physical distancing and minimizing physical contact will be encouraged.
“Potentially we’re looking at having school-aged children with infant aged children and so on,” said Robinet.
“It’s actually the same staff team and sibling groups together. So if you’re in Room A with eight children or 15 children, you’ll always be in that room if you’re a staff member here.”
A limit on the number of children allowed in a facility could make margins a little thinner for some centres.
“We’ve changed even our fee structure right now for the summer to make it more flexible for families,” said Robinet. “We’ve never offered part-time rates before, we are offering part-time this year, just for the summer, to help try and get those families back in at a budget they can afford, but then it also helps us to make sure we’re hitting our bottom line.”
Staff are expected to maintain cleaning schedules, disinfecting common touch areas and sanitizing items like bedding and toys.
In its full list of COVID-19-related guidelines for daycare facilities, the province also suggests ideas for non-contact play such as playing "shadow tag" and recommends using waves or "air fives" as go-to greetings.
