Equitas’ Play it Fair! program was recently featured in the newsletter of the English School Board of Montreal (ESBM). Equitas has been working with the ESMB since November 2013 to implement Play it Fair! activities into its Before and After School Enriched Daycare (B.A.S.E.) Program. The Play it Fair! program aims to teach children about human rights, respect for diversity and peaceful conflict resolution through games and discussions. “Play it Fair! was implemented last November to teach children about basic values,” said B.A.S.E. Advisor Jennifer De Freitas. “What’s great about it is that the children have fun with these games. They are really learning, but having fun at the same time.”
Laura Butler, Program Officer at Equitas agrees: “We see the importance around issues of diversity and inclusion coming up more and more and children are being expected to deal with quite serious issues around bullying and identity. I think it speaks to the importance of tools such as Play It Fair! which are holistic and can equip children with critical thinking skills and human rights based knowledge through which they can analyse the situations that are happening, whether it’s internationally or in their school and local community. They can learn to think about how they can take action themselves and take responsibility to make that community a better place.” So far 30 B.A.S.E. Program employees have been trained with more trainings planned in the spring. Read about the Play It Fair! pedagogical day at John Caboto Academy held last November 14.