The Language Nest in Hopedale is now running for over 20 years.
Which opened on March 9, 2001.
In approach to in the fight to save our Inuit language, the dialect of Inuktitut is down to only a handful of elderly speakers in several of Labrador’s Inuit Communities. They said if things go as planned several infants in Hopedale will have started their mother’s tongue.
The Language Nest is an idea that comes from the Maori people of New Zealand. They revived their native togue by pairing elders with infants.
In Hopedale, there were 3 babies under the age of one that spend 8 hours a day with two Inuit Speakers.
At that time, Catharine Andersen was the head of the program and said Inuktitut is being taught to students in primary school. However, that is not creating fluent speakers, because the school students are entering system with English as their first language.