Child Care

[Azat]

On my way to work this morning I heard a special segment on NPR that talked about Child Care. Gayane, when you get a chance, can you listen/read and comment.

 

From what I understood, there were positive and negative things about children in child care. They found that children who spend more than 30 hours a week in day care at an early age tend to be more aggressive, especially toward their peers. "Not only were these children more likely to engage in assertive, defiant and even disobedient activities," said the researchers, "but they were also more likely to bully, fight with or act mean to other children."

 

NPR also mentioned that successful executives and leaders are also these child care children. I believe it is because of the fact that they are more outgoing and are less shy.

 

Click here to listen to the segment. http://www.npr.org/ramfiles/totn/20010424.totn.02.ram

 

Click here to read an article from LA Times http://www.latimes.com/news/comment/200104...t000034492.html

[Gayane]

Thank you, Azat

 

First, I'd like to observe that the radio talk show host was not only severely biased, but rather cognitively slow at that, so the discussion was tilted in ways that it shouldn't have been, thoroughly misrepresenting the researchers and their findings. The LA Times article (also somewhat biased) was a bit more rational, and brought up some of the criticisms of the study that I was going to make in the first place.

 

One thing about the study: it's deeply flawed. Having designed and implemented a research study I can spot this right away. The flaws inherent in the study render the findings almost useless (as the article hints at).

 

However, the study does raise issues that need to be addressed, not only at large, but in the Armenian community as well. This issue needs to be looked at as more and more Armenian women opt to have careers and face the issue of childcare. I believe that beginning with my generation, armenian women will have to look to child care for their children's care and not rely on their mothers or their husband's mothers as much. Think about it. My mother works. (let's say) My mother-in-law works. I work. Who in the world is going to raise my child? Child care is more of an issue than we (myself included) would like to admit.

 

This is admittedly a very touchy topic for me. I have no idea how I'm going to deal with this one when the time comes for me to deal with it.

 

That's by way of preface. I'll continue this later.

[Azat]

Juan Williams from NPR is usually a much better interviewer than this, but he did have many minor problems during this show. But for someone like me it was very informative.

 

I believe the research is going to be published in one of the big medical journals. I will try to find a link and post the link to the direct research.

[Gayane]

(cont'd)

 

I do think that early intervention programs are critical to a child's development. I'm not one for neurobiology, but I've always found the neurological developmental patterns of young children fascinating. Children build upon existing pathways and create an astounding number of new pathways in their early years. That's why it's so crucial to use the right tools to educate children in those early years since you're not only educating, but also building an entire foundation on which later development will be based.

 

This is where child care comes in. As they correctly pointed out during the interview, QUALITY child care can make a great deal of difference in how firm of a foundation a child acquires. In this respect, I think child care supersedes home care by the parents since the parents aren't always well informed on the issue (the parents on this forum I find to be the exception).

 

I don't think (in fact I'm certain of it) that child care alone can be blamed for the rise in behaviors or even "smarts" in any given child. There are just too many factors playing into the equation for anyone to be able to deduce anything like that. As I said, this study is flawed. I know there are others making a similar claim. From what I know of research, researchers will do anything to get published, including smooth over conflicting data, so I don't trust these studies too much (or any study for that matter).

 

Here's how I see it.

 

Advantages of out of home child care for the child:

-improved social and self help skills

-better chance of normal functioning among peers in the future

-greater discipline and time management (most child care tends to be rather structured)

-greater reliance on independent functioning

-facilitated acquisition of most academic material

 

Disadvantages:

-time away from the parents (yes, Mikey, the parents, not just the mother )

-new, and therefore stressful environment

-picking up bad habits (important, believe it or not)

-(with greater independence) some resistance to parental authority

-SOME loss of identity and development of groupthink mentality (perhaps important to culturally minded parents)

 

I think placing their child in child care is a difficult concept for some armenian women (neither my sister nor I were ever put in child care, not even kindergarten!). Most Armenian women tend to rely on family networks for the childcare needs of their kids. Yet, as I mentioned above, I see this reliance on family becoming impossible within one or two generations in the diaspora. More and more armenian women are becoming professionals (or at least devoting their time to some sort of a career). The implications of this change seem to include the necessity (not just preference) for child care for Armenian families. I don't know all the answers here, but the topic is something I've put thought into and haven't come up with anything I'm comfortable with yet!

 

Anyway, this is turning into a thesis. I'll yield the floor

[Azat]

Here is the link to the actual study from the JAMA (Journal of the American Medical Association) http://jama.ama-assn.org/issues/current/ab...s/joc01746.html

 

I don't have any kids, but if I did I would have a hard time taking my kid to an Armenian day care. The day care centers that all my little cousins went were VERY poorly managed and I don't think they got much out of it.

[Gayane]

Azat, isk inchne kez partadrum yerexayin hayeri xnamkin handznelun? Personally, I don't think we should equate substandard care with its Armenian genesis, nor should we equate quality care with its non-Armenian origins. I would look for quality first, not "armenianness"

[Azat]

Gayane, I would be the last one to base my decision of child care on weather it is Armenian or not. I would make sure my kid gets the best care I could afford($20 a month is all I got )

 

The reason why I mentioned that is because so many of us do take our kids to Armenian substandard child care services.