Posted on 03/26/2007 2:41:17 AM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
A much-anticipated report from the largest and longest-running study of American child care has found that keeping a preschooler in a day care center for a year or more increased the likelihood that the child would become disruptive in class — and that the effect persisted through the sixth grade.
The finding held up regardless of the child's sex or family income, and regardless of the quality of the day care center. With more than 2 million U.S. preschoolers attending day care, the increased disruptiveness very likely contributes to the load on teachers who must manage large classrooms, the authors argue.
On the positive side, they also found that time spent in high-quality day care centers was correlated with higher vocabulary scores through elementary school.
The research, being reported today as part of the federally financed Study of Early Child Care and Youth Development, tracked more than 1,300 children in various arrangements, including staying home with a parent; being cared for by a nanny or a relative; or attending a large day care center. Once the subjects reached school, the study used teacher ratings of each child to assess behaviors like interrupting class, teasing and bullying.
The findings are certain to feed a long-running debate about day care, experts say.
"I have accused the study authors of doing everything they could to make this negative finding go away, but they couldn't do it," said Sharon Landesman Ramey, director of the Georgetown University Center on Health and Education. "They knew this would be disturbing news for parents ... if that's what you're finding, then you have to report it."
Past arguments
The debate reached a high pitch in the late 1980s, during the so-called day care wars, when social scientists questioned whether it was better for mothers to work or stay home. Day care workers and their clients, mostly working parents, argued it was the quality of the care that mattered and not the setting. But the new report affirms similar results from smaller studies in the past decade suggesting setting matters.
"This study makes it clear that it is not just quality that matters," said Jay Belsky, one of the study's principal authors, who helped set off the debate in 1986 with a paper suggesting that nonparental child care could cause developmental problems. Belsky was then at Pennsylvania State University and has since moved to the University of London.
That the troublesome behaviors lasted through at least sixth grade, he said, should raise a broader question: "So what happens in classrooms, schools, playgrounds and communities when more and more children, at younger and younger ages, spend more and more time in centers, many that are indisputably of limited quality?"
Report has its critics
Others experts were quick to question the results. The researchers could not randomly assign children to one kind of care or another; parents chose the care that suited them. That meant there was no control group, so determining cause and effect was not possible.
The study did not take into account employee turnover, a reality in many day care centers, said Marci Young, deputy director of the Center for the Child Care Workforce, which represents day care workers.
The study, a $200 million project financed by the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, recruited families in 10 cities from hospitals, after mothers gave birth. The researchers regularly contacted the mothers to find out where their children were being cared for, and visited those caregivers to see how attentive and how skilled they were.
Every year spent in day care centers for at least 10 hours per week was associated with a 1 percent higher score on a standardized assessment of problem behaviors completed by teachers, said Dr. Margaret Burchinal, a co-author of the study and a psychologist at the University of North Carolina.
I know exactly what you mean.
I was working from home when my daughter was born, and if I did have to go somewhere to meet with a client, I would bring her with me. Some people (not clients) found that practice strange, but generally it was just accepted.
I have a picture of me standing in the lobby of the Capitol Building in Dover, DE taken about36 hours before my daughter was born. I have a picture of me standing in the exact same place holding her exactly 1 year later. If I had a committee hearing to attend, the women that worked there all fought over who was going to keep my baby while I attended the hearing, they all loved the fact that I actually figured out a way to be both a full time mommy and continue working.
trying getting your kid somewhere once a week or so where you can be right there if you're rally needed, but out of sight. any community type thing is good; sports, reading time, if your church has a "nursery" or children's group, those are really good.
you could also see if there's a daycare nearby, find out when they goto the park and see if its ok to join them once a week or so.
Every once in awhile, I think this is a *good* thing! LOL! From the time my kids were 6 mos old until they were three, I put them both in daycare two days a month for five hours a day. On day one, I'd pay bills and do my monthly grocery shopping. (It was *much* easier without a cranky infant and a bouncy toddler running around.) On the 15th, I'd take 5 hours for myself. Lunch out with a friend, shopping for pleasure, or just go home and read quietly for a few hours.
I *highly* recommend it to anyone with small children!
But, I do agree with you. It's not a good thing on a daily basis.
The exceptions always exist. ;-)
My dad who is 82 years old told me that when his mother lost her husband, she was lost, they lived in Kansas. She had 4 children, 1 boy who was 10 yrs. old and two were in their teens or older and my Dad who was heading off to World War II. She was despondent and lost she didn't know how she was going to get by her family helped her but she had an emotionally hard time. She told my Dad to have his wife have a career so that all is not lost if the husband dies monetarily and emotionally. She had been a teacher before she married. She died not to far after her husband. Surprising words considering if she would be well over 100 yrs. old today. By the way my Mom is 79 years old and raised 5 children and worked full time. She is and was a wonderful mother.
Lot's of wisdom in your posting.
"I've been wondering how he will be able to transition to go to school."
There's a solution to that: don't send them to school (i.e., homeschool) until they are ready. Some kids take longer than others to get ready.
I'm wondering if it's even OK on a weekly basis (the article stated even 10 hrs/wk was associated with disruption).
But, I can see someone wanting to do this, for sure, even on a weekly basis. Get a break. But if you have the option, wouldn't it be better for the child to bond with a mother or sister in a "quiet" home enviornment than be thrown in with a bunch of other chaotic kids and a few strange adults?
I will say this for my friend - her husband is not much help. The few times he takes the child (who BTW is a very dear boy - my mother loves him, and she doesn't much like many kids "these days"!), he pesters her all the time calling on the cell phone. When the boy was a baby, she finally turned it off 1 "date" we had, and he got MAD in front of me when returning, saying how awful it was this mother shut him off when "there could be an EMERGENCY"! (Geez, I guess if there were no cell phones, she'd NEVER get to go out without the child.)
However, I do wish she'd give the nice boy to her mother more, instead of pawning him off most days to some strange place.
Thank goodness!!!!
I think that depends on the child. I keep nursery one Sunday a month at our church and it really depends on the child. Some kids you have to look in the eye and say good-bye. They cry for a few minutes then scamper off to play. Others need to have parents slink away out of their eyesight. Most, from my experience, do better when they watch the beloved parent leave. They cry, but do better after the tears dry up. But not all. Kids are frustratingly and delightfully individualistic.
I know my mother got plenty of attacks from "career" women who'd make snide remarks about how she "didn't work" or "didn't have a real job". Women my age - early twenties - are rebelling against the social pressures our mothers faced. Anecdotal evidence but most of the girls I went to college with had plans to work much less when they had kids than their mothers did.
I think the poor effects of daycare and latchkey kids are becoming more and more obvious, and so women are willing to make more sacrifices to ensure their own kids' happiness.
I agree with you that women should be educated and hopefully have worked for awhile before marrying, so they are ready to use their college educations to support themselves if the need arises. Both my daughters have this ability and it has served them well. Currently one is a stay-at-home with two small boys and the other works but there is always one parent at home when the children are.
You can't be serious.
Tax is such an ugly word. Those women who insist on career first would call it an "offset", that way they can neglect their kids but pay the government to take care of someone else's kids to make up for it.
You sound awfully sour.
It's sarcasm. Basically the same as Gore wasting energy but buying "offsets" which make it ok.
I don't think you know what you are talking about.
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