Daycare on Children My Grandmother,

¶ … Daycare on Children

My grandmother, who is over 70 years old, claims she can always tell which child was raised in daycare and which was raised by hand (at home by a parent or grandparent). For one thing, she says, children raised in daycare don't understand that when they come to her house for a visit, there are things they are not allowed to touch. They grab whatever they want. She thinks this is because in a daycare facility everything is for the children. The facility is planned so that nothing is forbidden for the children to touch. So the children grow up not realizing other people have things that they don't want to share with children. A child that is raised at home by a parent or grandparent knows there are things he or she is not supposed to touch.

I don't know if what my grandmother says is true or not, but it is certainly true that the world has changed greatly for children. Before World War II, daycare was almost unknown. Now, nearly 2/3s of American children under the age of 6 years old attend daycare (Kay, 2005), about 21 million children (Weitzman, 2006). This essay is about what effects daycare has on children, the benefits and the drawbacks. I will argue that children need a parent, someone that loves them, to be with them most of the time and that children do better at home than in a program.

A research study was done in 2003, the Minnesota Study of Early Child Care, that found some benefits from attending daycare. Children in daycare learn to share with other children, they take turns with each other, and they learn to play together. The study said they showed "improved impulse control and improved language and problem-solving skills" (Weitzman, 2006, p. 379). But the study also showed that these benefits tend to disappear in larger groups where there are more children to compete with for attention and where children have to stay long hours per day in the daycare.

A lot depends on the quality of the daycare. A really good daycare may "meet the emotional and social needs of the children in their programs, or at least not cause damage..." (p. 380).

The quality of the care makes a huge difference in how children are affected by it.

Not all daycare programs are good. In fact, a study by the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development's Early Child Care Research Network states that 61% of daycare centers are either giving "poor" or "fair" care. Infants and toddlers get the worst care, according to the study (Zaslow, 2002). What makes a good daycare center? The surroundings should be clean and safe, of course. And there should be good equipment. But more important is the quality of the relationship the child has with the caregiver. Caregivers should be "warm, supportive, responsive, and cognitively stimulating. Stability of care is also important, as it is hard to form sustained relationships if caregivers come and go" (p. 49).

Research has found that children who go to daycare everyday and have to stay for long hours often become aggressive and don't mind adults well (Weitzman, 2006). They become uncooperative. Many of them get clingy because they are insecure. One author says that the children suffer "psychic distress" when they are constantly separated from their parents. Their health suffers because of so many children being all in one small space. Lice and ringworm are problems and other infectious diseases that children catch in daycare that they would not be exposed to at home. One study (Kay, 2005) showed stress levels are higher in daycare children who have higher levels of cortisol in their bloodstreams. There is also anecdotal evidence (like my grandmother's "evidence") that children in daycare bite each other in epidemic proportions. Biting is animal behavior. It implies a need for self-protection. Probably, children that bite don't feel safe, protected or secure. it's like they are on their own, and they have to survive somehow. They need to be with their parents. According to some experts, the increase of conditions like attention deficit disorder, separation anxiety disorder, oppositional defiant disorder, and conduct disorder are the result of being deprived of their parent's supervision and love. Both parents work all day and are too worn out to pay attention to their children. Some researchers feel that many of the problems young people have now are the result of lack of parental contact, problems such as "obesity, drug use, promiscuity, venereal disease, and poor scholastic performance" (p. 83).