♪ [theme]
When kids act out, their families suffer.
When, kids grow up misbehaving, we all pay.
When my son did the killing, why did my son do that?
What is truly amazing, though, is the power of early intervention.
A child who, before when they got upset, might throw something.
Now, substitutes language and says, "I'm mad."
Now they don't have to act out all their feelings.
Spending a little now gets huge payouts down the road.
We had less mental health problems, less addictions, less criminal involvement.
We know enough to act right now.
I'm Ann-Marie MacDonald.
Doc Zone looks at 'Angry Kids and Stressed Out Parents.'
[screams]
Karen: I, who would never thought I would shake a baby,
there were times when I was holding her I was going,
"What is the matter?" [Jilliane cries]
Narrator: For the first time in North American history,
children now suffer more from mental health conditions,
than physical ones.
Parents are coping with staggering levels
of anger and aggression.
Experts say kids who don't master self-control
are at risk of growing up overwhelmed by mental illness,
substance abuse and criminality.
Society pays the price in pain and dollars.
But it doesn't have to be this way.
Jim: They never thought about self-control
as something you could teach.
Narrator: This early childhood education program
in Winnipeg helps do just that.
It targets kids most at risk.
Kelson: Went to jail, did a lot of time in jail.
had a lot of friends killed.
Y'know, I don't want that for my kids.
Narrator: Other programs help all families.
Are you going to stop or do you want to go to your room?
Jilliane: Stop. Do you want to stop?
Dad: Good girl. Thank you.
Narrator: Deceptively simple programs that could save us
billions and help a nation of...
Narrator: Angry kids and stressed out parents.
♪ ♪
♪ ♪
[gun shots]
Narrator: The grainy images are imprinted on our national consciousness.
Frantic first responders,
blood-stained sheets on stretchers,
faces of students frozen in shock and horror.
École Polytechnique on December sixth, 1989,
the day Marc Lépine killed 14 young women
before turning the gun on himself.
Every December Canada stops to remember
the murdered young women.
But only one woman stops to reflect on the murderer.
And it's only when my son did the killing
of these 14 women
that's when I start doing a retrospective,
why did my son do that?
Narrator: In the quarter century since Lépine's
murderous rampage...
Well hi there, baby girl!
Narrator: There's been a revolution in our understanding
of early childhood development.
Science has proven the more nurture and stimulation
a child has before the age of six, the greater chance
she'll succeed in life.
Marc Lépine, known as Gamil Gharbi as a young child,
had a trauma-filled childhood because his father
was a violent man. Monique: In his mind,
he had to beat his wife at least once a day.
He was violent with my son.
And when he hit him in his face, it last for a week, you know,
these marks.
I hated him you know, oh yes, desperately.
Narrator: When Marc was six and his younger sister
Nadia four, Monique left her husband.
The children had no further contact with their father.
So therefore I was the only support.
And I had to work.
Narrator: With working full time and going to school,
Monique thought it best the children board
with other families and visit with her on weekends.
When Marc hit adolescence, he and Nadia returned
to live with their mother.
Needing a strong male role model for Marc, Monique signed him up
with Big Brothers.
Monique: My son really liked him, really liked.
I think he was going better then.
But all of a sudden the police came to my place to tell me
that the guy was in jail
because he had done sexual assault on little boys.
Bob: What had the potential to being perhaps a literally
life saving type of intervention for this young boy
turns out to be exactly the opposite.
It's just one more betrayal
in trust that he's put in another adult in his life.
Monique: And then he started changing.
Narrator: A lifetime of instability and trauma
took its toll.
Bob: A series of events that are so negative each of which
is traumatic in and of itself but which cumulatively
must have just been catastrophic.
If it had been possible to intervene with this child
and his family earlier on, then maybe the outcome
would have been very different.
♪ ♪
It's today that I see the consequences
of these behaviour, you know. Only today.
I would like to start all over again
and be different. Be a loving mother.
♪ ♪
Narrator: No one can put a price on the pain and suffering
caused by Marc Lépine's murderous rampage.
But it's possible to stop potentially destructive
behaviours before they spiral out of control.
Announcer: They are participating in a pre-school
experiment designed to assess the impact...
Narrator: Back in the early 1960s, faced with record numbers
of poor black children failing at school,
Michigan researchers created an intense early learning program
called the Perry Pre-School.
That first group of Perry-preschoolers
has been followed for 40 years.
Kids who attended the program were 46 percent less likely
to serve prison time,
they had 33 per cent fewer arrests for violent crime,
50 percent fewer teen pregnancies
and almost a 50 percent higher graduation rate.
Researchers aren't surprised by those findings
because brain scans show us the stress of grinding poverty
can be just as damaging to the child's developing brain,
as abuse and neglect.
A big problem, because a growing percentage of kids today
is being raised in poverty.
Children from lower socio-economic status
communities have different functional characteristics
of the forebrain the pre-frontal cortex
that lies here at the front of the brain.
Narrator: This is the brain scan of the pre-frontal cortex
of a child from a high-income family.
The deep green shows intensity of response to stimulation.
And this is the scan of a child from a poor home.
Much less response.
There are systemic differences in how those
children use the prefrontal cortex to do things
like control their attention, control their impulsivity,
think about decision making and so on.
[cries]
Narrator: And it's not just poor kids having trouble
controlling their impulsivity. Parents across all incomes
are struggling with increased behaviour problems.
Parents are busy in their own stressful and chaotic lives,
and there's very little time that children have where people
are present with them just to be with them,
just to play, just to read a book.
And those circumstances, those quiet times
in which they get lots of language input
really help them to learn how to regulate their behaviour.
Narrator: Displaying aggression and acting out
are normal behaviours for most three year olds.
What's not normal, is the number of children
who aren't 'growing out of it', by learning self-control.
The teachers will say that children have much poorer
attention spans and poorer self-regulation abilities
than they did ten or 20 years ago.
Now, I actually believe that this is true.
This is not just a phenomenon that people complain about.
Smita: On the count of go.
One, two, three, go!
Narrator: To test a child's ability to maintain
self-control, or self-regulation as experts call it,
researchers perform a battery of tests.
Smita: You didn't wait for 'go'.
Narrator: To see whether they can follow instructions.
You tap one.
Great.
Narrator: Stay on task, and wait for rewards.
Smita: I have to go wrap your gift right now,
but no peeking, okay? All right.
Narrator: Forty years of this kind of research
proves the more children can control themselves...
[paper crinkles] Smita: No peeking.
I'm not.
Narrator: The less they explode in anger
and frustration, the more successful they are in life.
Smita: Thank you, Adree, for your hard work.
Great job. High five!
Narrator: Too many kids are not able to do what Adree did,
simply control themselves.
So what we're seeing is that over time
with younger children is higher rates of inattention
and hyperactivity and conduct problems.
Narrator: That's one of the reasons parents all over Canada
are signing up for evidenced- based programs like Triple P.
That's the Positive Parenting Program developed in Australia
30 years ago, shown in dozens of peer-reviewed studies
to work on the most disruptive behaviour problems.
Karen: Sometimes she just snaps.
Like she can't do something and she just snaps.
[screams]
Narrator: Three-year-old Jilliane's temper tantrums
sometimes go on for hours.
Some days it's from the beginning to the end
and that's how the day goes.
Then some days it's like she's a different child
and I have an angel on my hands and nobody would ever believe me
that she ever had a temper tantrum.
Hi!
Narrator: Karen de Montigney's maternity leave for baby Joaquin
is just about up.
Karen: Come here. Want to say hi to your baby?
Jillian: Yeah. Karen: Yeah.
Karen: She's always been very, very good with him.
Dad: Hey, buddy. Very gentle.
When I came back from the hospital
we had a really rough patch for about six weeks.
She didn't talk to me for two weeks when we came back.
But she always was very good with him.
She always loved him and was very gentle.
Narrator: Karen wants to put a stop to Jilliane's tantrums
before she returns to work.
Karen: She's like a little ball of fire.
She's got a little temper and she's persistent.
I like to use that word versus stubborn.
[screams]
Narrator: Three-year-old Jackson flat out refuses
to do what his mother asks.
The more she persists, the more violent he gets.
Pam: He physically abuses me and it aggravates you even more.
Then you want to get more... [laughs]
Narrator: Pam's part time job means she's home more than
her husband so the job of teaching Jackson self-control,
falls largely on her shoulders.
Pam: Put your toys away. Jackson: No.
Pam: I know that I've got to tell him we're gonna have a bath
oh, it's gonna be a fight. Now we're gonna brush our teeth,
it's going to be a fight. Wipe your face.
Jackson: Uh-uh.
I can't blame him
and make him feel bad for person he that he is,
We just to hopefully change the few bad behaviours
and then he will be the greatest little kid ever.
Luke: No! Kiona: Here you go.
No!
Narrator: And five-year-old
Luke's misbehaving has pushed single mom Kiona Hartl
to her limit.
You know an easy baby until about three years old.
Here, look at your movie. Luke: No.
Okay, then go to your room. No!
Then he was this little person
that could actually talk to me.
Go outside? No.
Kiona: And my reaction to him not doing exactly as I said
um, was...
explosion.
[Luke whines] Aw, come on, Luke.
Come on!
Then I noticed it wasn't actually doing
anything constructive.
When you're applying any of these strategies...
Narrator: All three moms have signed up for the Triple P
Program offered in different Vancouver area communities.
Triple P teaches parents how to train their kids
in self-control.
The whole focus is on positive interactions,
developing a positive relationship with our children.
Narrator: Triple P teaches strategies, that if used
consistently, will stop bad behaviour.
Beginning by doing what seems to me the most challenging
to parents, slowing down enough to pay attention.
Kiona: Yeah, yeah.
I will often times give him half of my attention.
Out, out! Uh-uh.
Kiona: And from the first session at Triple P,
stop what you are doing and give your child
100 percent attention. Sorry but I have to go.
I'll call you back. Bye.
What are you doing sitting there?
Kim: Children often only need two, five,
ten seconds of your attention. Their needs are met.
They're done.
The kiss monster is here. [Luke laughs]
That has been a huge aha moment for me
which has practically, single-handedly
changed our relationship.
I hate this. Kiona: What?
I'm kidding. Kiona: Oh my gosh.
Narrator: Then Triple P teaches a series of techniques
designed to diminish negative interactions.
Kim: Praise is always our first line of defence.
That's our reward that we do first and foremost
and over and over and over again.
It's free, it's easy and kids get more out of that
than anything else we can do for our children.
That was awesome for taking the elevator.
Good sharing, thank you.
Hey, stop and wait for Mom.
Good job.
That's how we listen.
And the other thing that was really important
that I learnt from last week is count to eight.
Where does it go after? [Jilliane mumbles]
And the number of times I've told her to do something
and I've counted to eight and around seven or eight
she does it.
Good job, thank you. [Jilliane laughs]
I'm thinking all this time I would have repeated it
two or three times by then and already be frustrated
she's not doing it, when really, she was doing it
she just was processing what I said.
I do feel a little bit guilty about that.
[cat meows]
Kiona: Okay. All right, Luke.
What did I say about throwing balls in the house?
What's the rule? [Luke laughs]
Luke: No throwing balls in the house.
Kiona: Okay, you have to go sit on your chair.
Narrator: And then when misbehaviour happens,
Triple P teaches parents how to discipline
without escalating aggression.
Kim: Quiet time is a strategy that Triple P uses
to help with child who has just exhibited a minor misbehaviour.
Quiet time allows the child to stay in the area
in which the misbehaviour occurred but takes them away
from that specific spot.
And they're are allowed to have some time sitting,
calming themselves, finding a way to regulate their behaviour
and control their behaviour.
Kiona: We used something called the naughty chair before
and it made him actually feel bad.
And I didn't know how to manage it myself.
But when I do planned ignoring on the quiet time chair
it seems to work effectively.
You were quiet for three minutes, Luke,
you did really well. It's ready.
Narrator: Key to success, is delivering logical consequences
for misbehaviour and sticking to them.
Karen: Okay, Jilliane, there won't be time
for a book tonight. [Jilliane screams]
Karen: I think for me what's been essential
is for me to stay calm.
For me to keep it together and then focus on helping her
to stay calm, whereas I couldn't do that before
and she would get upset because I was upset.
[Jilliane cries] Jilliane, you are screaming
and it is hurting my ears. [screams]
If you don't stop screaming you are going to need
to go to your room to scream because I don't want
to hear you scream. [cries]
Do you want to stop or do you want to go to your room?
Jilliane: Stop. Do you want to stop?
Dad: Good girl. Thank you.
Thank you for listening, and thank you for calming your body.
Kim: These parents are doing a great job.
They are in the thick of it right now but they're still
using praise, they're still trying to get their child
to manage even though she's in the middle of a tantrum.
It's really hard when our children are at that point
especially when, in the past,
we're used to escalating with them.
Narrator: But Jilliane loses her temper again,
so she goes to bed without her bedtime story.
[screams] Bob: It's really remarkable
is that if you can hang in there long enough with those
temper tantrums at some point the light bulb goes on
with these kids, you can almost literally see
the dawning of awareness and they suddenly realize
oh, this is not working any more.
And from that point on what you see is a really rapid decrease
in that temper tantrum. It doesn't go away completely
because they're always going to try just to see
if it's gonna work, and that's why consistency
is so important on the part of the parent.
Pam: Let's go. [slap]
Narrator: Pam's convinced that consistency
is how she'll help Jackson master self-control.
Pam: Feet to yourself. Quiet time.
Narrator: But Jackson won't stop kicking and hitting.
Sit! Time out.
Narrator: With quiet time not working,
Pam's moves to time out.
All the preconditions are all set up the same
but they're in a different area. It's still a very short
period of time only used as a last resort
when everything else has failed.
[Jackson screams]
Pam: I used to yell and I used to scream
and get in his face and it just would make him
even more aggressive than what he already is.
Time out. Yeah, you got to go to time out.
Okay, time out.
[timer beeps]
You ready? [Jackson whines]
Narrator: By teaching parents to deliver discipline
without escalating their own anger or aggression
Triple P helps prevent the development of the worst
behaviour problem: conduct disorder.
Conduct disordered kids use violence and aggression
to get what they want. They hurt others,
show cruelty to animals, set fires and lie and steal.
A sub-group of kids who develop conduct disorder
before the age of ten go on to commit 50 percent
of all violent offences.
It's important to note that not all children
who get a diagnosis of conduct disorder
go on as teenagers or as adults to engage in criminal behaviour
but compared to other people in the population
there's an increased risk for that.
Narrator: But what about when an entire population
suffers a high risk borne of generations of disadvantage?
Kelson: Went to jail, did a lot of time in jail.
Had a lot of friends killed.
Y'know, I don't want that for my kids.
Narrator: When we return, an innovative preschool
promises Kelson's kids the best chance of escaping
their father's fate.
And as the kids amp up the bad behaviour,
will parents be able to stick with Triple P?
Pam: I can't give in, because I haven't given in
the in the last, I would say, week and a half or so
that I don't want to go back to that so I'll fight it.
♪ ♪
♪ [theme]
Narrator: Manitoba is on the cusp of a crisis.
Right now a record number of children
are growing up disadvantaged.
Leanne: The number of First Nations children
under the age of ten is growing rapidly,
and in Winnipeg it'll be, it is, I guess, pretty much now
at 25 percent and growing.
Narrator: Unless things change dramatically,
those kids face a bleak future.
Seventy percent of those living on reserves
are high school dropouts.
♪ ♪
Eighty-seven percent of youth in custody in Manitoba
are First Nations.
♪ ♪
And Aboriginal youth are up to six times more likely
to commit suicide. All those troubling statistics
translate into huge social costs.
And Daddy likes running, eh?
The failure to act, the cost of the status quo,
is hugely enormous.
It's over 50 billion dollars for Manitoba
given that one in four of all Manitoba children
is vulnerable in kindergarten.
Narrator: So Manitoba has taken extraordinary measures,
spending millions on early interventions,
proven to dramatically improve the outcome
for the most vulnerable kids.
If we don't start early in providing those kinds
of resources so that can happen, we will not have a society
in which any of us are happy, safe and productive.
Narrator: Lord Selkirk Park, a mostly First Nations
neighbourhood plagued by high crime and unemployment.
Jennifer and Kelson are parents to six children.
Three of them, under the age of two,
are enrolled in the Abecedarian Childcare Centre,
the only one of its kind in Canada.
Abecedarian was invented for children who are not likely
to be very successful in school.
Say, hey Colby. Call your brother.
Joe: This is the only program literally in the world
that begins at birth.
Narrator: The idea behind Abecedarian,
is the earlier learning begins, the better.
This is the only pre-school to take babies.
[speaks native language] My name is Thunderbird woman.
And I drink this water and bless.
Narrator: The day begins with a blessing
from a respected Elder. A room full of toddlers
and babies is completely silent,
remarkable for a child care centre.
Elder: It doesn't matter what nationality you are,
you all are my grandchildren.
And you smudge your ears so you hear the good things in life.
And you smudge your mouth so the good things
come out of your mouth.
Boy: I'm done. Are you?
You could clean up then. Okay.
Narrator: With one caregiver for every three toddlers,
the program mirrors intense parent-like interactions.
Residential schools robbed many First Nations families
of this parenting knowledge because children
were ripped from their families at an early age
and grew up never knowing what good parents did.
I don't want to be like those people,
like the way my parents raised me.
I don't want to be like that and have my kids raised like that.
I think you should say. I want to change myself.
Exactly, there you go, you want to change yourself
because you went down the wrong path.
Yes, I went down the wrong path.
And I realize it now because now I see my little ones.
I don't want my little ones doing what I did, you know,
go where I went because I went the wrong way,
I went completely wrong.
He went the gang life way and now he learned.
Yeah, I went the gang life way and went to jail,
did a lot of time in jail, had a lot of friends killed.
Y'know, I don't want that for my kids.
It fell down, let's try again.
Narrator: If follow-up data from the original Abecedarian
Early Childhood Project is any indication,
Kelson's kids will do much better.
Kids who attended the program in the 1970s
at the Frank Porter Graham Child Development Institute
in North Carolina, at age 30, were four times more likely
to be university graduates.
Feel that one. How does it feel?
Narrator: Fifty percent more likely to be
full-timed employed,
and 84 percent less likely to receive social assistance.
Eight, nine, ten.
Ten, you're right. There are ten cookies.
Narrator: Key to all that success:
a focus on early language development.
Good! Good.
We knew that language was often the thing
that kids were furthest behind in.
Narrator: In fact, children raised in welfare-supported
homes hear only 600 words an hour.
Working class kids hear 1,200 words an hour.
But children raised in professional homes
hear 2,100 words an hour.
Look at all your fingers, all the paint on your fingers.
Narrator: So the Abecedarian model imbeds learning language
into everything.
Carly: Can you count them?
Devon: One, two, three.
Carly: Yeah, there's three. I think there's five fingers,
What's the next thing we do, after we rinse?
When I was getting the child to wash his hands after painting,
I was incorporating the one component, was enriched
care giving which was talking to him about washing his hands,
getting the soap off his hands. The second component
was language priority which was extending his vocabulary,
his language, getting him to talk to me.
Asking him, "What do we do next?"
And where does the paper towel go?
What's this called? Devon: The garbage!
Carly: The garbage. Perfect.
So he's getting his vocabulary out.
and he's telling me what he is doing.
Generally in child care centres you'll see staff
just stand there and just supervise.
Where is the puppy?
Is the puppy under the blanket?
Narrator: In the Abecedarian model,
kids aren't simply read to.
It's the whole inter-exchange between
the caregiver and the child.
Show me the fish. Where is the fish?
Carolyn: So she's asking the child,
"Do you see this?" and she's going on the child's cue
of what the child is looking at. So that is sort of
conversational reading and that's done throughout the day
many times in a day.
Meow, meow!
Joe: I would challenge you to go to 100 child care centres
and see how many times you see a book read to one child.
Mortimer be... Quiet!
Mortimer shook his head, "Yes, yes."
Narrator: It's this intensive use of language
that helps the Abecedarian kids master self-control.
A child who before when they got upset might throw something.
Now substitutes language and says, "I'm mad,"
instead of throwing something. This is a big change
in development because now they don't have to act out
all their feelings.
Narrator: The program works best when parents make language
a priority at home too.
That's why Debbie Urbanski, the program's home visitor,
brings the same learning games to parents
that kids are playing at school.
Debbie: I've got some toys, some blocks this time
for Let's Build Together.
Now the lending books, how are those working out?
We've read them all actually. Kelson: Yeah.
Yeah, that saying they say, they're like little sponges,
that is so true. Where's the kitty cat?
Kitty cat. Kelson: Kitty cat, very good.
All they need to do is watch, then one day they'll get up
and they'll try it themselves.
Jennifer: They need an extra push though, too.
If a parent doesn't help them and explain things to them
or talk to them, they're not going to learn.
Are you ready for home yet?
Joe: The world doesn't have to be classist.
Just because groups have not done well in the past
doesn't mean they can't do well in the future.
Daycare worker: You zipped up your jacket all by yourself.
Emily: I zipped my jacket! I zipped my jacket!
Ha ha!
Kelson: Say, "Bye, daycare, be back tomorrow."
Bye! Be back tomorrow.
Narrator: While the Abecedarian program targets
the most at-risk kids in Manitoba,
the Pax Good Behaviour Game, another Manitoba
evidence-based approach, promises a better future
for all kids who play it.
The game begins now. [timer beeps]
Narrator: The game's origin goes back to 1967,
when a young American teacher confronted with the classroom
from hell, had a flash of brilliance.
I wonder what would happen
if we made being good into a game.
Narrator: Each class is divided into teams.
The teams compete to see which can behave the best
for the longest period of time.
When a child acts out it's called a spleem.
Dennis: We call them that silly name
because we want people to kind of smile when they say it
and not get all worked up like they're gonna have a hissy fit.
The winning teams get to walk around and hoot like a monkey.
And the 'prizes' are the things that kids love to do anyway,
like a giggle-fest, a roll on the floor.
♪ ♪
[harmonica blows]
Teacher: There's the timer. Okay, we need to calm down.
Leanne: So the self-regulation around starting and stopping,
stopping and starting, is key to the brain rewiring
into we can work, we can have fun,
we can socialize, but we know how to start something
and stop it and that really is the basis of self-regulation
and the basis of learning.
Teacher: Okay, the Pax game is almost done
and I have no spleems yet. Give yourself a pat on the back.
Yes? Are you gonna like do
the running game after our Pax?
Boy: He's not allowed, he yelled.
Teacher: Do you think we should give you a second chance?
Raise you hand if you think we should give him a second chance.
Narrator: Pax is also effective at reducing bullying.
Dennis: It helps the children learn to support one another
and not to exclude or diss or shame the other kid,
because if they did that, that would be a spleem
for their team as well.
Narrator: Playing the Good Behaviour Game not only
reduces bullying but results in fewer behaviour disorders.
And the kicker, the kids who were most at risk
are the ones who benefit the most.
Those findings are staggering, you have this
very simple intervention, that almost seemed
too good to be true.
You know you had less special education,
you had them more likely to graduate high school,
you had less mental health problems,
less addictions,
less criminal involvement based on incarceration records
and probably most powerfully it was one of the only approaches
that had shown any impact in reducing the odds of kids
thinking about or attempting to kill themselves,
suicide prevention.
Narrator: Great results, but how to cash-strapped governments
pay for programs like this?
And later, some successes.
Karen: Can you take a deep breath, please.
[deep inhale]
And some setbacks.
No!
♪ ♪
♪ [theme]
Karen: Jilliane, two minutes. Okay?
Two minutes then we are going to turn off Sesame Street.
Narrator: Three months ago, these three moms
signed up for the Triple P parenting program
to learn how to help manage problem behaviours.
Pam: Two minute time out. Narrator: They diligently
stuck with the program. And the results are impressive.
Pam: Come here.
♪ ♪
Okay, time to clean up your toys, go put it in your toy box.
Good job, babe. Let's go.
Narrator: Jackson is a changed boy.
Pam: Yeah, this is so good.
Get your soccer ball.
Things on a daily basis have changed.
He will do a lot more that I ask of him.
Are you gonna put Curious George away?
Good job!
Getting him dressed yesterday was a great day.
I'll show you how. It was great.
We got to get out of the house in less than an hour.
And he'll be all excited because he got dressed all by himself
and it's fun.
♪ ♪
Narrator: Kiona's son Luke has stopped
his attention-seeking behaviour.
Kiona: What's the rule around burping?
What do we say? Luke: Excuse me.
Okay, good job. I always felt like
I was with Luke a lot, and still didn't feel
like I gave him my all.
But with Triple P, I was actually 100 percent with him.
There's been that shift for us
in that we are actually playing together a lot.
I like him. What about this one?
Karen: Bye, school bus.
Narrator: Karen has returned to work
with Jilliane's temper tantrums greatly diminished.
And a discovery.
Jilliane has a speech problem called apraxia,
a condition where her brain isn't sending signals
to the small muscles in her mouth.
Which explains so much.
So it's very frustrating for her because she can't
get across her needs, her wants, her thoughts.
When we go to speech therapy she really tries.
So when I positive reinforce her, I think it makes
a huge difference for her because she feels good
about herself versus always feeling bad about herself.
Good job, you knew what to do!
Don't forget these pieces.
Karen: I want to raise a girl who's going to be able
to control herself well and as she grows up
and is able to manage herself and manage her emotions,
then I think she'll have something to be proud of.
Narrator: The investment these parents have made
in their children should pay off in reduced social spending
down the road.
But it's the 'down the road' part that's problematic
for governments balancing budgets today
and heading for election tomorrow.
It's estimated that every dollar invested now
will return up to 17 dollars in reduced costs.
But where do cash-strapped government departments
find the dollars for that initial investment?
Children don't live in little silos.
Departments are silos, right? So this department does this
and that department does that
and children live in a horizontal world.
So we have multiple people serving this one child
within this one family within this one, you know.
So if we structured it differently, could we result,
could we provide better outcomes and could we also potentially
not be spending money on doing things two or three times over
by different departments? Could we get them connected?
Narrator: In Manitoba, with poverty and crime escalating,
there was an urgent need to act.
The province created the Healthy Child Committee of Cabinet,
charged with putting the needs of kids first.
[mingled voices]
Leanne: At the fundamental level that causes
a culture shift. It causes the Minister
of Justice to be equally comfortable talking about
early childhood as the Early Childhood Minister talking about
why do we have so many people ending up in jail.
Narrator: Three government departments pulled together
to pay for the Abecedarian playschool.
But not all intervention programs have to be paid for
by the public. The private sector
is investing in early childhood too.
♪ ♪
In Utah, in this high crime Salt Lake City neighbourhood,
they're taking the idea of early intervention to the bank
with a pilot program to fund early childhood education
through something called a social impact bond.
♪ Aa, aa, aa ♪
♪ B for bounce ♪
Narrator: Investment giants Goldman Sachs and JB Pritzker
fronted seven million dollars to pay for at-risk kids
to attend this special pre-school program.
♪ D for dig Dig, dig, dig ♪
Narrator: These are the kids most likely to cost the state
millions in additional special education services.
If those children who are statistically very likely
to end up in special education without any kind of intervention
end up staying out of special education,
the investor will receive a percent of those savings.
♪ Going on a word hunt ♪
Narrator: And the investment is already paying off,
kids who graduate from this pre-school program
use fewer special education services in later grades.
We are cutting it twentyish down to five percent.
That's a pretty nice cut,
savings to our state, savings to our district.
[mingled voices]
Narrator: The loan will be paid off in six years.
So far, the savings in special-ed costs
add up to more than 1.8 million dollars.
Teacher: That will work, yeah.
However conservative you are,
however business oriented you might be,
if you compare the rate of return to investment
in early childhood to something like investing in the equities
market, what you're finding that the rate of return
is as high. And that's the part about
the early childhood program that gets missed
in the political discussion.
The other thing is that it drives quality.
And really, only high quality programs get these kinds
of outcomes for kids.
Great, good job, Katelyn.
Funds will flow to the programs that have
the highest impact and we can be more efficient
with tax payer dollars. And at the same time
improve outcomes for low income children,
and for society as a whole.
Narrator: Jim Heckman warns of a bleak future
if we don't, literally, invest in the kids.
[mingled voices]
I mean I think we're gonna see continuing problems,
and the problems would take the form of higher crime,
worse health.
Narrator: When we return, intervening early
doesn't just change behaviour,
it changes our biology too.
And if Marc Lépine's mother had it to do over.
Monique: If I would've been able to go
outside of my own problem by then,
I would've seen a lot of fear in his eyes.
♪ ♪
♪ [theme]
♪ [group sings]
Narrator: Intervening early doesn't just change
a child's future, there's evidence that
it actually affects the DNA.
Dr Michael Meaney made this startling discovery
studying mother rats and their young.
So literally pups, rat pups that are licked more frequently
are calmer and have a more modest response to stress.
Rat pups that are licked less are more reactive to stressors.
And what occurs is that the mother's licking
changes the activity in brain cells,
and that's registered through these epigenetic marks,
including epigenetic marks that regulate the genes
that control the way we respond to stress.
Narrator: An epigenetic mark is an actual mark
placed on top of DNA by various life events,
good and bad.
The mark acts like a kind of dimmer switch,
enhancing the effectiveness of some genes,
diminishing others.
Next Meaney studied human brains stored at the Montreal
Brain Bank, matching biographical information
with those visible marks on top of DNA.
Michael: In much the same region of the genome
that we'd studied in the rat, we could associate
the epigenetic mark to the history of childhood abuse.
Narrator: Which lead researchers to wonder...
Michael: If we talk about an individual who's gone
through abuse, to what extent is that reversible?
Narrator: Can the damage be undone?
New epigenetic research suggests yes.
In this freezer at a UBC research lab,
tantalizing evidence from Meaney's team.
These are DNA samples from adult children
of young high-risk mothers.
Some had the benefit of parenting programs.
Others did not.
The epigenetic marks on the genes of the children
whose moms received the intervention are different.
The children of the mothers who had the intervention,
also went on to more successful lives.
♪ ♪
If epigenetic damage can be undone,
then interventions like this Abecedarian playschool
may actually protect these children
from the kinds of social problems that have plagued
so many First Nations generations
and protect their physical health as well.
If you look at that history, if you combine it with
the epigenetics research which shows these intergenerational
effects of trauma, of toxic stress,
which has been the signature experience for too many
of the First Nations peoples in the history of the country.
You've got toxic stressors transforming the brain
for the worse, preparing it for a predatory,
dangerous, unpredictable world,
you get problems like addictions, mental health,
because that's the kind of world that those conditions
have prepared the developing brain for.
Kelson: Which way are you gonna go?
Which way? The stairs?
Rob: We have to think forward in time to what we are going to
tell every one of those children if we don't act today.
We know enough to act right now.
[laughs]
♪ ♪
Narrator: Today, the mother of the man who committed
the Montreal Massacre, Monique Lépine is convinced
a history of childhood abuse turned her son into a killer,
beginning right from birth when he was deprived
of his mother's touch.
Monique Lépine's husband would not allow it.
Monique: He didn't even want me to take them in my arm,
you know, when they were crying.
He just forbid me, you know.
Because he was saying that they would be spoiled,
can you imagine?
And what do the child needs?
Love.
He needs his mother.
I'd like the parents who will listen to me to understand that.
Because we cannot focus on the behaviour,
we have to focus on the pain
that is in the heart of the child.
♪ ♪
You can always see our documentaries at cbc.ca/doczone.
I'm Ann-Marie MacDonald. Thanks for watching.
♪ [theme]
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