Edmonton daycare worker pleads guilty to aggravated assault of 4-year-old boy

A former employee of an Edmonton daycare pleaded guilty Friday to an assault on a four-year-old boy who attended the facility, and the child's family is renewing calls to strengthen provincial oversight.

Amanjeet Kaur, a former employee at Learn-N-Share Daycare, pleaded guilty to aggravated assault in the Court of King’s Bench of Alberta on Friday as the boy’s family and a representative from the Métis Nation of Alberta watched from the gallery.

According to an agreed statement of facts, on May 16, 2025, Kaur lifted the boy up with both hands and slammed him down onto a mat after he refused to sleep on it.

Kaur fractured the boy’s collarbone.

The assault was recorded by a camera at the daycare. Kaur will be sentenced at a future date.

CBC News is not naming the family in order to protect the child’s identity.

“It is hard to imagine that you would be working in a daycare and have so little self-control that you would do that to a child,” the victim’s grandmother said in an interview with CBC News following the proceedings.

Kaur’s lawyer said his client wanted to take accountability for her actions. Proceedings were delayed because she was pregnant.

“My client expressed remorse for what happened,” defence lawyer Jatin Sahni told CBC News in an interview Friday. “She has taken steps to better herself. She wanted to make things right.”

Concerns raised about oversight of Alberta’s daycare system

The victim's family members say they want to push for stronger safeguards to ensure children are protected at Alberta daycares.

“Parents need to know right away whether their child is at risk,” the boy’s grandmother said.

Currently, under provincial rules, it is the responsibility of the daycare to inform parents of an incident and decide on the language to describe it.

CBC News has viewed an email sent to parents by Learn-N-Share Daycare, which shows it took the facility 10 days to notify families about the assault that Kaur was later convicted of.

“On this day, a child was injured by a teacher who has since been immediately terminated from Learn-N-Share and is being handled by police authorities and daycare licensing officials,” Learn-N-Share’s Dima Al-Tawil  wrote in an email to parents on May 26, 2025.

“I would like to apologize for the scare some of you may have had earlier today when a message was sent to you about the incident.”

Text messages viewed by CBC News show Learn-N-Share notified parents after the boy’s family shared details of the assault with other families.

“These other children witnessed an assault, and if it was my child, I would want to make sure that they were OK,” the victim’s grandmother said Friday.

“Parents need to know right away and there needs to be someone specifically responsible for that.”

Learn-N-Share had not responded  to CBC News’ request for comment as of publication. CBC News also reached out to the office of Education and Childcare Minister Demetrios Nicolaides but had not received a response as of publication.

Last year, Nicolaides directed his staff to review provincial rules following similar complaints made by other parents.

In September, parents of children attending Willowbrae Academy Mill Creek publicly complained about provincial regulations following the alleged sexual assault of two young children.

They said it took nearly two months before they learned of the initial allegations against a former worker who, by then, had fled the country.

The seriousness of the allegations were only fully revealed when the mother of the initial complainant spoke up at a town-hall meeting.

Afterwards, a second child and their family came forward to authorities.

The former employee is wanted on two counts each of sexual assault, sexual contact and sexual counsel.

In the case involving Kaur, the victim’s grandmother and mother said they were told by Learn-N-Share Daycare on May 16, 2025 that the boy had slept in an awkward position and complained of arm pain.

The evening of the incident, the boy's grandmother texted Al-Tawil to request a meeting because he was crying, still in pain, and told them “his teacher hurt him ... put him down hard.”

Over the following days, they say the pain persisted and he developed yellowish bruising near his collarbone.

On May 23, 2025, X-rays confirmed he had a fractured collarbone, consistent with a significant use of force.

The boy is now in trauma therapy.