Justifying Day Care

[C-Mac]

http://featuresblogs.chicagotribune....justify_d.html
Justifying day care
"As if I don’t already feel guilty for putting my son in day care at the tender age of three months, a new study shows that the more time children spend in center-based care before kindergarten, the more likely they’ll fight, disobey and argue, according to their 6th grade teachers.

The increase in problem behavior was slight, but studies like this inspire me to look for the silver lining. And I always return to the same thing: "the hygiene hypothesis," or the belief that early exposure to germs helps the immune system develop properly.

While most children get six to eight infections a year, children in day care bring home twice that number, or about one a month. Day-care settings --or petri dishes, as my pediatrician calls them-- have high levels of indoor allergens and have been shown to incubate and spread antibiotic resistant bacteria.

This sounds like a no-brainer: Keep your children at home! But since most of us don't have that option--63 percent of U.S. children under the age of five spend 37 hours a week in child care--I manage to get through the work day by reminding myself my kids might turn out healthier in the long run.

Some research bears this out. A 2005 study in the British Medical Journal showed that children who attended day care in the first few months of life are less likely to develop leukemia than children who do not, most likely because they were protected from exposure to common infections. Similar associations have been reported for Type 1diabetes and allergies and asthma in children.

Still, even if they have stronger immune systems, is it worth sending them to day care if they’re going to have behavioral issues that persist at least until 6th grade? That, according to the research, published in the March/April issue of "Child Development," is up to the parents.

The researchers involved with the longest and most comprehensive study of child care in the U.S. cautioned that parenting quality was a much more important predictor of child development than the type, quantity or quality of child care.

Ultimately, while quality day care is important, a quality home environment matters more."



We had to do without some things obviuosly but the wife and I both agreed that her being at home while the children were young, was far more important than her having a career or us having a new car or house. We now get compliments all the time about our kids and their behavior and I truly feel that this is one of the main reasons why. I do understand that not everyone's situation allows mom to stay home(especially single moms), but I do think that there are many cases that if they just tried to live a little simpler, they could pull it off.

[crazycoffey]

Originally Posted by wutamess

If that's the case... why wouldn't it be more beneficial for the child to have an equal dosage of both parents than an overabundance of one? Especially when it comes to boys? Mother can't teach a boy how to be a boy/man.

Not judging just wondering.

well I don't fit in this category anyway, so not feeling judged.....

I'd say - again, my belief is about Balance, a key word I use for many major life decisions - but I hear what you are saying. Again it would be the back's against the wall and the choice is majority of time with a babysitter or one of the parents.

but I also suspect there is a level of learning "how to be a man" by the boy too, because he will grow up to understand his dad sacrificed alot to make sure he was taken care of by mom? - pure speculation, because if there is one thing I have come to understand about kids, and wives...... You could give them a gold brick and they would complain about the shape.

[crazycoffey]

Originally Posted by Mr. Plow

What about lesbian relationships? Who stays home? Who teaches the boy to be a man?

well, the dike - D'uh.....

[KingPriest2]

It has been proven that children who go to preschool perform better academically and get along better with other kids.

It is great that parents can stay home but it benifits the child more if they do go to preschool.

[Mr. Plow]

Anymore, it seems if you don't put your kids into preschool they are behind when they start kindergarten.

My oldest went to 2 years of preschool before starting kindergarten. I'll be sending the others as well when they are old enough.

[crazycoffey]

Originally Posted by KingPriest2

It has been proven that children who go to preschool perform better academically and get along better with other kids.

It is great that parents can stay home but it benifits the child more if they do go to preschool.

I agree again most of the poster opposing daycare also claimed for balance as the overall driving force. I even suggested the same thing you are saying, but the main arguement against daycare was for the parents that put the kids into daycare at 6 months of age, you lose alot of connection time, touch, love, etc.

But I also understand everyone is different and you have to make the choice you can live with. I won't do it...... I will stay home if I have to, but I'm not putting a 6 month old into daycare for 8+ hours a day, won't let it happen, that's me....

But what you just said, yes, an education program 1-2 years prior to starting public education, gets the kids ready to interact with other children and prepares them to be learners, I'm on board for that too.

=

BALANCED......

[KC Kings]

Originally Posted by wutamess

So you guys that claim "not missing the firsts" is so important, will work OT for little to no weekly interaction with the kid(s) just so the mother can have all interaction with the kids?

Doesn't make very much sense to me

Also, what if you're a single parent?
Are they the worst if they have to work to support their family?

"Missing the firsts" isn't the point of the article. If you are interested in child behavior for single parent stats, there are a ton available with a google search. Again, the article this post is about is the effect day care has on your child. A single parent has no choice, unless they wan't to be a stay at homeless parent.

Is it better for kids to be with both parents? Yes, but I would rather my kids to share all mpst their growing up with a parent rather than a day care worker. My wife was a nanny type babysitter for 2 years in VA Beach. She went to their house at 8am, and left at 6pm. If we were in port I usually worked 9-3 so I would drop off the wife. The kids she watched were very well behaved, but both of the kids (4 and 1) were more exicted to see my wife in the morning, than they were to see their parents get home at night. The parents had high paying jobs, drove nice cars and had a huge house, and they didn't seem to mind the kids liking my wife more. My wife loved them and took good care of them, so in the long run does it matter who the kids are loving or loved by, as long as they are being loved? I don't know, but seeing that had a big impact on our decision to have my wife stay at home.

[listopencil]

I think you have to distinguish between a daycare center and a preschool. All of our kids went to preschool for two years before kindergarten. Mon-Fri for three to five hours a day. They hit the ground running when they entered first grade and didn't have any glitches in academics until after Elementary School.

[listopencil]

BTW, my wife and I switched jobs and got our schedules screwed around so we wouldn't have to use a daycare. Having less money sucks. Not having as much time for our marriage sucks. But we love our kids and we do what we have to do.

[BucEyedPea]

Originally Posted by Mr. Plow

Anymore, it seems if you don't put your kids into preschool they are behind when they start kindergarten.

My oldest went to 2 years of preschool before starting kindergarten. I'll be sending the others as well when they are old enough.

I'm not sayin' you're completely wrong here. I just know that those parents who taught their kids how to read very, very early like age 3 can still lose ground after a certain number of years in school.

There is strong evidence that those who learn to read starting at a later age learn it faster and it's less difficult to teach. I've seen this and was told this by a friend of mine who is a teacher and taught his kids to read very early. What seems to be the pattern is the others who start later catch up by age ten to the others. Now from that point on, things can change again.

Per my kid's school, they have graphs using the CA Achievement Tests that show how it averages off by age 10. Then it can change. In this school the kids start reading in pre-school. So the the graph shows them well ahead in the first grades after. Then it averages, with them being just slightly ahead bu age 10. However by 15 their graph changes showing them significantly ahead. Their curriculum is so rich, and they do a lot more work that by age 15 they are done with HS...in relation to standard public schools. Some even get entrance into college full time. That is in relation to the CA Achievement Test. So the school's program also matters, not just the age or preschool or so it seems to me.

BTW Isaac Newton hated school and didn't do that well. It was a tutor later in life, think it was age 12, who got him excited in intellectual pursuits which took hold of him then. Einstein didn't even talk to age 5. People, then, thought, he was dumb. There's more than a few stories like that. In fact some of our most renowned geniouses had a non-conventional education path. Schools today are a cookie-cutter approach and don't necessarily align with the child's interests or abilities.