Inspirational and Empowering Child Care Business Owners To Build Successful Child Care Businesses

Posts tagged ‘quality childcare’

5 Steps to Providing High Quality & Safe Infant/Toddler Care

As I prepared the Module 6 and Week 28 eCourse Lesson for the member of the Family Home Child Care Empowerment Club, I was inspired to share some of the tips with you!

The topic of week 28 eCourse Lesson was: How to provide a healthy & Safe environment for infant/toddlers. The tips were provided in the form of a health & safety checklist, because I believe that the best way to improve your childcare program is through self assessment.

Today I am going to share 5 steps to Providing High Quality & Safe Infant/Toddler Care:

1. Maintain Ratio. Be sure that there is no more than  four infant/toddlers to a care giver. It can be quite demanding for one caregiver to care for too many infant/toddlers. Moreover, infant/toddlers need lots of loving care and it is almost impossible for one caregiver to meet the needs of more than  four infant/toddlers at any given time. ** In some cases, it is recommended that the ratios are 1-t0-3.

2. Be Alert of the Health/Safety Needs of the Children. For example: It is important that you or your staff know who feels well and who does not. Are the children adequately supervised? Know where the adventurous toddlers are, at all times,etc. Being aware of the health & safety needs of the children is a vital part of providing quality infant/toddler care.

3. Smoke Free Home or Center. You can almost assume that caregivers will be considerate and not smoke around children, however, it is very important that parents know that you have a smoke free facility!

I suggest that you post a SMOKE FREE ZONE sign. Cigarette smoke is very toxic to a child. Moreover, if you have smokers on staff, it is also a good idea to require that they wash their hands after smoking. Furthermore, if  your staff member(s) smell like smoke after a break; require that they change their clothes, before handling the infants/toddlers.

Home Providers: Require that family members smoke outdoors during the hours of childcare.

4. Post the number to Poison Control. You may have already removed all medications and cleaning supplies out of the reach of the children. However, what if a parent fails to tell you that there is medication in a diaper bag and a toddler gets a hold of it?  That’s right…you will need to call Poison control right away!

So be sure to post your local poison control number near your phone. Here is the national number to poison control: 1-800-222-1222. ***Moreover, check diaper bags daily for medication,etc.

5. Small Toys Can Be a Choking Hazard!! If a small toy can fit through the opening of a toilet tissue tube, than it is a choking hazard for an infant/toddler. Be sure that toys that are 1  1/2 inches in diameter are kept out of the reach of young children (preferably under the age of 3).

Infant/toddler learn about their world by putting things in their mouth and this is why you must be mindful of the toys that are within the reach of infant/toddlers.

In summary, I hope that you have found this blog post to be helpful to you. Most importantly, My hope is that you create a High Quality and Safe place for infant/toddlers.

For more information about how to build a high quality family home childcare business (click here) or a Child Care Center (click here).

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With Quality Infant/Toddler Care in Mind,

Shiketa

Follow my Inspirational & Business tweets @shiketamorgan 

@ccarebusiness

Category:

Health/Safety, Infant/Toddler Care

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How to Create a Quality Preschool Classroom In Your Home Daycare

After completing the college class, Introduction to early childhood in 2002, I was inspired to make changes to my preschool environment in my home.

In fact, I made majored changes to my preschool program and changed the name of my business. The former name of my daycare was, Morgan Daycare and in 2001 I decided to change the name to Learning Days.

I was also inspired to create this post, because many home providers have submitted the question, ” How do I set-up a preschool environment in my home daycare.”

Setting up centers or play areas in my home daycare was the start of a new experience for the preschoolers in my program. Moreover, after I set-up a quality preschool environment, I noticed that parents would refer to my program as a  ” school” instead of daycare.

In this post I am going to share with you the centers that I created for the children in my home, what I used to set-up the centers and the materials that was added to each area. Please do not feel as if you must go out and spend thousands of dollars to create a preschool classroom. In fact, you may already have what you need. Just keep this in mind, “It’s not what you have, it’s what you do with what you have.

The Art Center

You will need a shelf that is child height that includes the following items: construction paper, paint, crayons, scissors, markers, white paper, yarn, scraps, glue, paint smocks or old shirts, play doh and newspaper/magazines for cutting.

Science Center

The science area could be set-up on a table, a shelf or even in crate. The following items are great to add to the science center: rocks, leaves, soil, magnifying glass, feathers, tree branches, plant to water, photos of the weather, etc.

Dramatic Play

This is the most popular center among children.  You will need a shelf  or Cubby drawers for this area. Add the following items to your dramatic play area to assure an enriching  experience: Dress up clothes, dress up shoes, dolls, play food or real food boxes, canned goods, table, small chairs, telephone, cook books, aprons, used kitchen play set, etc. Many items that you add to the dramatic play area are already in your home or you can pick-up at a garage sale.

Reading Corner

Be sure to make this a cozy quiet place for kids to look at books and relax. You will need a book shelf or use crates to display books. Add puppets, an area rug, bean bags and pillows.

Math or Manipulative

This center is a must to assure that children develop fine motor and math skills. You will need a table or shelf. In this area, add a few puzzles, table toys, lacing toys, table blocks, peg boards, home-made games, board games,etc.

Block Area

The block area also is a very popular center in the preschool world. You will need a shelf to display wooden, plastic and cardboard blocks. Add a run in front of the shelf. You may want to add cars, toy people, road signs, trucks to enhance the block play.

Sensory Play

This is one of my favorite center, because it gets messy, lol!  You can go out and buy a sensory table at your local walmart or use two dish pails to fill with water or sand. After you fill the table with water or sand, be sure to add large bowls, spoons and cups to encourage the children to scoop, dig, pour and measure. If you choose to use dish pails, simply place them on a child size table and explore the water or the sand.

I recommend that you add one center at a time and introduce each center, by talking about it with the preschoolers at group time. You must encourage the children to help you to keep the centers organized by cleaning up before moving on to another center. Be sure to plan to rotate and add new materials to each center every other week to prevent the children from getting bored with the materials.

If you are concerned about space, only set-up 3-5 center choices at a time and rotate the centers that are available throughout the day.

Moreover, it is vital that you  define each center, by adding a label on the wall near the play area or on the shelf/table. Download signs, here.

I look forward to hearing your feedback about this blog post and your progress with setting-up your centers in your home daycare!

Shiketa

Category:

Family Child Care, How To, preschool, Quality Care

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