Early Years Are Learning Years

Millions of children spend a part of the day in childcare while their parents work. These settings-in centers and in homes-are places where children can learn and grow. In 1989, the President and the nation's governors developed a set of national education goals to improve the quality of education in America. Although the first goal focused on school readiness, childcare has often been viewed as falling outside that picture. The tenth anniversary of the goals is an important opportunity to redefine education and recognize that quality childcare is part of a system of learning that affects child development.

We know that children's language and cognitive skills thrive in quality childcare programs, with responsive caregivers who are adequately trained and supported. In poor quality programs, opportunities to stimulate development are lost or squandered. In large groups with few trained staff; in centers and homes where children have few opportunities to be read to, to be listened to, to be held; and in programs where television or isolation replace human interaction and communication, children learn that they have little affect on their environment-precisely the wrong message to promote readiness and school success.

Traditionally, three "places" have been seen to affect a child's education: family, school and community. Childcare is part of all three. Childcare is a family support. Not only do relatives and other family members often provide childcare, but also from the perspective of the child as well as the family, childcare is often an extension of the home. Childcare provides many opportunities to help parents succeed as "first teachers."

For young children, childcare is school; just listen to any group of 3- and 4-year-olds talking about "my teacher." They have demystified the dichotomy that has fractured the early childhood field for so long. They know it is not childcare and education-childcare is education. Research clearly tells us that early experiences matter. It doesn't matter where it happens or what the building is called, what matters is what happens once the children arrive.

More recently, we have come to appreciate the importance of the community to child development-both the climate in a community and the services provided. Childcare is an important part of the community. For school-age children, childcare is the "new neighborhood," whether sponsored by schools or by any of a wide-range of community-based organizations.

People are often reluctant to talk about childcare as education. We worry that the term education is too limiting. We believe that somehow childcare is more than education-that it is child development, that it includes health, that it should be supportive of families and their working schedules. These beliefs are not part of the traditional purpose of education, although this too is changing. Also, since childcare includes babies and toddlers, traditional education terms don't seem to fit.

Despite these concerns, if we are to improve childcare, it must be seen as a service for children as well as their parents-it must be seen as education and more. We must step up efforts to ensure that funding is provided to improve the quality of those places where children go before they enter school or at the end of the school day. That means providing some funds directly to child care programs to improve their educational services-funding for accreditation, teacher training, and increased compensation.

Improving child care also means enhancing family child care networks, providing home visiting and literacy programs to kith-and-kin providers as well as parents, and ensuring that care that goes on after school is connected programmatically to what goes on during the school day. We must also keep up our efforts to bring health resources into child care-particularly health consultants who can help ensure health and safety as well as health promotion. Education for young children begins with health, and these links must continue into adolescence.

This year, states and communities will develop new plans for child care and continue their education reform efforts. By July, state child care agencies must submit a two-year plan for their share of the Child Care and Development Fund. New funds have been added that target quality. Every state must hold hearings on their state plan. At the same time, many states are expanding their preschool efforts and implementing new child-health initiatives. Additional state, federal, and private funds are needed to ensure more improvements and make child care more affordable for more families.

This is the time to take every available opportunity-from the classroom and the living room to the hearing room and the board room-to bring these efforts together in order to provide safe, healthy learning environments. Parents should be encouraged to join in this effort. We have to send a message to decision makers that while parents work, we must make sure that child care works for children.

© © 1999 by the National Association for the Education of Young ChildrenNational Parent Information Network

Credits: N.A.E.Y.C.