EarlyON Ottawa

Welcome to the central repository of all the EarlyON playgroups in Ottawa! Finally, a place where parents can find details about all the EarlyON playgroups in the city. EarlyON offers weekday and weekend playgroups. There are even some evening playgroups listed!

Are you looking for free activities for babies, toddlers or young children? Explore our comprehensive list of EarlyON playgroups near you!

Do you have feedback? Are you interested in volunteering to help keep this website up to date? Did you notice an error in the playgroups listed? I'd be happy to hear from you! This tool was built by Claudie Larouche with lots of help from ChatGPT, feel free to connect on Facebook or LinkedIn!

Now that I have some good data to play with, I've started making a few charts. :)

Roadmap

Scroll to the bottom of the screen or click this link to see what's coming soon!

Filters

Select Date:

Select Area(s):

Central

East

South

West

Select Age Group:

Show all Show baby playgroups only Show kids playgroups only

Select Schedule:

Show all times Show evenings and weekends only Show weekday AM and PM only

Select Language(s):

Arabic

English

French

Mandarin

Other options

Show only playgroups with a baby scale

Data

The data from this table was taken from the various Ottawa EarlyON playgroups posted on the Ottawa.ca website.

EarlyON Contacts

If you notice an error in the table below, please let me know at [email protected].

Stay up to date!

Coming soon!

• Add a column to indicate if the playgroup is taking place Indoors or Outdoors
• Add a column to indicate if the playgroup provides snacks
• Add a column to indicate if the playgroup provides coffee for parents :)
• Fix the column visibility appearance (right now when you click on the button, the column to choose are hiding the "column visibility" button)
• Almost all done: Add a table to list all the EarlyON organizations' URL, Facebook page, Eventbrite page, Email address and Phone Number
• Make area more specific (add Kanata, Barrhaven, Nepean, Orleans and Vanier as options)
• Add ability to view playgroups on a map (Don't hold your breath, because I am using free hosting on Github Pages, this is not currently possible)
• Add lots more charts on the charts page
• ... and maybe more! :)

Completed Tasks

Here are a few of the things I did, in no particular order:

• Highlight a row in red instead of deleting it when a playgroup is cancelled
• Allow people to control the filter through the URL (want to try it? Try claudielarouche.com/earlyon.html?search=east to see only playgroups in the East end)
• Turn area filter into checkboxes instead of a drop down
• Add language filter
• Add a message allowing people to easily clear filter if the table returns no data
• Use a consistent format for playgroup time (HH:MM - HH:MM in 24 hours clock)
• Add a charts page
• Create a formula in Google Sheet to automatically populate the time of day (morning, afternoon, evening) based on the hour
• Create a formula in Google Sheet to automatically populate the day of week based on the date
• Create a Google sheet script to automatically push the data from Google Sheet to Github pages in CSV format nightly (or on demand)
• Add a sign-up form for people to stay up to date with the EarlyON website and my future projects :)
• Create a button to let people view today's playgroups quickly
• Add a "Report a problem" button so that people can notify me more easily if a playgroup is incorrect
• Merge the URL and Playgroup Name columns (turn the Playgroup Name into the link to click)

Other resources for parents of young children in Ottawa/Gatineau

Other playgroups

• Children’s Village of Ottawa-Carleton Resource Centre have free playgroups
• Baby Café and Shine Through Shadows, free playgroups by Rooted Family Wellness Centre

Breastfeeding

• La Leche League offers multiple meetings in person and virtually.

Other things to do with kids

• The Ottawa library offers tons of fun programs
• The Nepean Museum has special activities like weekend crafts
• Did you know that you can get free dental screenings in various neighbourhood clinics around the city?