Against Daycare At Home

One common question most working parents must face when returning to work is where they are going to place their children for the day. Parents have a choice between organized daycare, which is a structured building with staff trained to take care of children and often involves little ones sharing an age-specific room with their peers. In-home care on the other hand is simply dropping the child off at someone’s house, whether they are a relative or someone the parent knows of. But which choice is the better option, one may ask? According to research, the benefits of daycare far outweigh those of in-home care for reasons including health, intelligence and even the well being of the parent. To begin with, daycare provides a child with a strengthened immune system. In daycare, children are constantly exposed to germs from the various children they will be playing with, giving them the exposure they need to prepare their body to fight off infections later in life. Julie Revelant from Fox News writes “children who were in large daycare groups before two and a half years of age had more respiratory and ear infections but were sick less often during elementary school than children who were cared for at home.” So,

When in daycare, a large part of a child’s day involves social interaction. This social interaction leads the child to learn not only how to behave around others, but also how to problem solve. Clinical psychologist Dr. Francine Lederer in quoted by Fox News “Studies show that children who are in daycare early on have higher intellectual abilities, especially because they have opportunities for observation, parallel play and socialization.” Daycare provides children a unique opportunity- to socialize with large groups of children around the same age as themselves on a frequent basis. This crucial learning opportunity simply cannot be replicated