The Full Day Learning Act passed in the Ontario Legislature Tuesday, paving the way for the province to roll out the first phase of its new kindergarten plan this fall.
Full-day junior and senior kindergarten starts at nearly 600 schools across the province this September.
List of schools included in phase one.
Extended programming will also be available before and after class. Parents will have to pay for the pre-and-post class care and subsidies will be available for low-income families.
Under the new system early childcare educators will be working alongside teachers. School boards will be able to use outside care providers to help with programming, but only until current contracts expire.
Boards will have to conduct the full-day learning with their own staff within two years.
The new program will be expanded across the entire province by 2015 at a cost of $1.5 billion a year.
On Tuesday the province announced it would provide funding to help daycare centres handle the shift of older children moving into full-day kindergarten school settings.
The government is offering $51 million to help stabilize child care centres during the implementation period. Another $12 million will be handed out over five years to help non-profit daycare centres make changes to accommodate younger children.