Posted on 04/10/2006 3:23:40 AM PDT by Clive
This is your brain. This is your brain on -- day care? While day-care activists insist that children thrive in day care, a new book challenges the notion that kids require formal child care.
Raising Babies -- Should Under 3s Go to Nursery? is the latest offering from Australian psychologist Steve Biddulph. He argues that day care is damaging to babies' brain chemistry.
Before you discount Biddulph in an attempt to ease your own guilty conscience, it should be noted that his contention is in line with leading academic work gathered in Canada, the U.S. and England.
Neurobiological research indicates that brain development in children under the age of two is best served with one-on-one care, claims Biddulph.
In addition, cortisol studies show that stress hormone levels are consistently higher in babies placed in long day care. This may lead to greater aggression and anxiety among older day-care kids.
So what does all of this mean?
Day-care workers and Liberal politicians need to stop pushing for a national child-care scheme.
If Prime Minister Harper does one thing during his entire time in Ottawa, let's hope he squashes national day care.
It isn't good for kids and it isn't good for Canada. The only people who are truly served by such a plan are day-care workers and politicians because it encourages more parents to work outside the home, thus giving government more money in income tax revenue.
New figures from Statistics Canada show the number of kids in some form of child care has risen dramatically.
Forty-two per cent of children age six months to five years were in child care in 1994-95. That number jumps to 54% in 2002-03.
Rather than throw more money at day care, Harper plans to help meet the needs of all parents by offering $1,200 per child.
Parents who send their kids to day care can use the money to help offset day-care costs.
Parents who have a relative look after the children can give Grandma some gas money and a bottle of Tylenol.
And parents who choose to stay home may feel a little less burdened.
The Conservative approach is fair and balanced. It addresses the needs of all parents. Hard to believe that the Liberals could find fault with it, but who said politics makes sense?
Sadly, this column will no doubt be lambasted by proponents of day care who feel the need to prove day care's worth through conjecture because the studies and stats aren't on their side.
To be clear, day care does have its place. There are families who absolutely must rely on day care. For single parents and the working poor, day care is a necessity.
Still, there are kids in day care right now who don't have to be. There are parents who can afford to stay home, either full or part-time. There are parents who can decide to work evenings or weekends instead of a 9 to 5 job. There are parents who can do occasional or seasonal work, at least while the kids are young.
Biddulph's book simply confirms what most of us already know to be true.
For the record, I don't stay home with our baby because we can afford to. I stay home with her because we can't afford not to.
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Maybe infants should have someone who cares for just them, or at least mostly them.
They used to call them "mothers", back in the olden days.
Institutionalizing children has been proven in a number of studies to be a terrible idea. They have no clear idea who their parents are and become emotionally distant. This is a clear pattern that has been documented by a number of different researchers and is evident in today's teens and 20-somethings who are emotionally detached and have strange concepts of what constitutes love and emotional attachment.
It takes a village to screw up a kid.
Well, DUH!!!
Way to go, L.L.!
The research referenced herein reminds me of the PTSD research at Emory Univ.
I have said this before on threads in the past, attention WOMEN, get out of the workforce and take care of the children you brought into the world, give up the 4 cars, 6 cellphones, tv's and cable in every room, fancy clothes, jewelry, etc. etc. etc. put the money toward raising your kids, if you gave up some of the nonsense in your lives you'd be able to afford to stay home and nurture your children. Motherhood does not mean spending 40 or more hours a week at a job. When the kids are old enough to attend school, a part time job would be in order.
You said it well! Amen
I am a stay at home mom raising the last of my five children. I have always been at home and I can say that none of my children are in jail, on drugs or welfare. They are responsible adults now...some with children of their own. We have had to scrimp on some things...we have no cell phone!! and we just recently got rid of cable TV...not so much for money's sake, but for the trash found on it. We have one vehicle used for my husbands work. If I need something, I walk to the store down the block.
My children learned early that money does not grow on trees and that just because the Jones' had it didn't automatically mean they were going to. They all got jobs as teens to buy whatever extra "necessities" they needed.
They all come home to visit, there are no battles between any of them. They respect one another as people and family. I let my yes be yes and my no be no when they were younger...I never dealt with "whiney, give me what you got let me have" children.
When 9 pm rolled around they were in their rooms, so that my husband and I could have some time to ourselves. They didn't have to sleep...but that had to be out of my hair.
All in all, despite the deprivations caused by my NOT going to work..I think they came out well.
Bump
I wish this would stop states from pushing for lower and lower compulsory attendance ages.
Thinking that day-care activists and/or the NEA care about the children is absurd.
We definitely reap what we have sown by dumping babies in day care when they get to school age and the behavior problems become painfully evident. Surviving day care twists some of these kids for life. It is not worth the second car or a bigger house than you need.
Very thoughtful post. My wife stayed at home with our daughter and she turned out rather well. I have to believe that the constant intellectual stimulation that she received had something to do with that. There is absolutely no substitute for the constant attention and supervision that a stay-at-home mom can provide. And, might I add, there is no substitute for a decent father who comes home every evening and provides the cement which holds the family together. Once upon a time we called this the "traditional family."
Not really.
I became a single Mom of twin girls when my ex and I divorced. My ex disappeared once he realized he was going to have to help support the children, so their care was left totally up to me.
I specifically took a job with an afternoon shift so I could spend the day with them. As they grew older, I had time to get them ready for school and attend school functions.
My Mother, who was on oxygen the last few years of her life, lived with us & cared for the girls while I was a work. I was very lucky to have her there to help. While everyone may not be as fortunate as I was, there is no reason someone can't manage to keep their kids out of 'institutionalized' daycare...they just have to be willing to arrange their life around their children.
Couldn't agree more. I too was a stay-at-home mom although I always worked part-time from home during those years. The past month I have been taking my college-bound daughter to the dentist in a strip shopping mall. The office is located right next to a "day care center". You can hear the kids screaming and crying through the wall in the waiting room. The cacophony alone is terrible and can't help but increase the stress.
The kids, most of them infants and toddlers, do go a for ride in a stroller. Picture a ride in a mall parking lot with a daycare worker pushing a stroller built for 12 kids strapped into hard plastic seats. I bet those walks are really intellectually stimulating (sarc). In the 15-20 minutes they are gone, a lot of the kids fall asleep, probably from sheer exhaustion or boredom. Then comes rousting them awake to load the next group for a walk.
I see the kids being dropped off. Too many come in flashy SUVs and sports cars. Their parents are often rushed, anxious to be on the road, and impatient with the kids. My heart breaks for them. Needless to say, this has given me a lot of chance to reinforce with my daughter her resolve to avoid daycare for her own kids.
I believe studies have shown the kids have concentration problems, bonding problems, competition problems which then disrupt normal schooling. Add to that a type of learning fatigue or burnout a few years into elementary school and you have todays kids.
This basic concept is an issue for older children too. While older children and teens certainly don't require "one on one" care, it is utterly biologically abnormal for them to be thrown into the massive mob scenes that most of our nation's schools (public and private) are. Even the Dept. of Education's own statistics show that schools with over 1000 students are much more prone to in-school shootings. And multiple studies have shown that small school size, not small class size, correlates strongly with higher academic achievement. But school districts keep building these behemoths, to "save money", so they can keep spending wildly on all sorts of frills, mainly sports-related.
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