Day care

Day care

1. TYPES OF DAY CARE

   • Day nurseries
     • Average of between 26 and 40 children
     • Children divided into smaller groups according to age
       • 1 staff: 8 children 3-5 y/o
       • 1 staff: 4 children 2-3 y/o
       • 1 staff: 3 children under 2 y/o
     • Qualified staff with childcare qualifications
   • Childminders
     • Max. of 3 children
     • Children looked after in home environment (usually home of carer)
     • Not all childminders have childcare qualifcations
       • Regular checks by Ofsted

2. QUALITY OF DAY CARE

   • Features of good day care
     • Small ratio of staff to children
     • Low staff turnover
     • High quality physical provisions, such as enough toys, appropriate toys, space for play, facilities
     • Well-trained and dedicated staff
     • Wide variety of children recruited
   • PENELOPE LEACH ET AL. (1998)
     • Study involved 1200 children and their mothers
     • Mothers interviewed at various intervals when children were a particular age
     • Concluded that children looked after by mothers do significantly better developmentally compared to children cared for in nurseries or by childminders
     • Babies and toddlers fared worst when given day nursery care, compared to those cared by nannies or childminders
     • Found problems in the nurseries, such as high staff turnover and relatively high staff to child ratio

3. METHODOLOGY IN RESEARCH ABOUT EFFECTS OF DAY CARE

   • Ethical issues
     • Researchers cannot conduct experiment to randomly allocated children to conditions
       • Independent variable cannot be manipulated by researchers - not a controlled experiment
         • Cannot investigate effects of day care experimentally
   • Individual differences
     • It may be that mothers with certain characteristics will choose day care
       • Influences findings of study and social development of children