It was a Canadian version of the U.S. channel of the same name (now known as Discovery Family), which aired children's programming oriented towards nature, science, and technology subjects.

In December 2000, Corus Entertainment, on behalf of an organization to be incorporated, was granted approval by the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) to launch Discovery Kids, described as "a national English-language Category 2 specialty television service that offers children of all ages a fun, entertaining way to satisfy their natural curiosity with stimulating, imaginative programming that asks the questions of how?

"[1] The channel was launched on September 3, 2001,[2] with the Earth Science for Children episode "All About Fossils" being the first program to air on the network.

[3] The channel was replaced on most service providers on November 2 with a Canadian version of Nickelodeon, which however, operates under a licence originally intended for a "YTV OneWorld" network.

Because it operates under a separate licence, cable and satellite companies that carried Discovery Kids would not automatically receive the new channel unless they negotiated for carriage.