A Day in the Life

e h t n i A DAY  LIFE REFLECTIONS OF CHILD CARE PROVIDERS, EDUCATORS

& PARENTS

Your

STORIES

Our COMMITMENT

BEHIND PARENT THE CAFÉBRAN M

ost of us know that being a parent isn’t going to be easy, but few of us realized exactly how hard it would be. Having a child fundamentally changes our lives.

Sure, children are cute; those tiny toothless grins, adorable baby talk, and pint sized bundles of joy melt our hearts. But parenthood isn't all child's play.

Let’s face it, some challenges are to be expected, like the sleepless nights and tantrums. But few of us are prepared for how many issues and stressful situations we will face over the years - from the baby and toddler stage and throughout a child's school life; and into young adulthood.

We know that behind every developing child is a developing parent; the Parent Cafés are one way that the Child Care Council supports families. The Cafés, with dinner, discussion and play, offer a forum for parents to share their own experiences and locally available resources in support of literacy, along with a number of additional strength based themes that are known to positively impact learning.

It turns out that Parent Cafés are as meaningful to children as they are to their grown-ups. Two-yearold Eva attends monthly Cafés with her mother and brother. Eva is learning how to be part of a social group and she takes this responsibility very seriously. Upon arrival she signs-in at the registration table; making a name badge for herself and for her mother. Eva makes her usual inquiry about the dinner menu. She seeks out Miss Lisa, her favorite child care provider, and offers an invitation to dine with her family.

In partnership, Lisa and Eva’s mother spark mealtime conversation that will encourage social interaction between the adults and children. Eva’s mom is learning that the fond family memories of childhood are

often made at the dinner table. Eva and her brother are learning that they can count on their mother to provide support and advice as they navigate life. The predictable structure of the evening has helped Eva and her family form secure attachments with each other and to form important relationships with others in their community.

For many of our family engagement workshops we are at local libraries. These locations are the neighborhood’s natural gathering places; comfortable, familiar and trusted. It is in these spaces that parents can begin to address their worries and share their dreams. Eva’s mother confides that being a single parent is hard. She worries about saying this out loud because of the shame imposed on single moms. “We can’t say it’s hard. We can’t cry over the pressure. We are supposed to grin and bear it. It’s no wonder so many snap, so many are depressed, so many take this pent-up rage and resentment out on their kids.”

Throughout the year Eva’s mother and many like her have focused on building adult resilience. They keep journals that are designed to support their strength and determination. Through reflective readings, activities, journaling, and written responses, the journals uncover strategies for strengthening how families engage in long-lasting relationships, clarify internal beliefs, strengthen the ability to make positive choices, and support the ability to express themselves.

Eva and her family never miss a Parent Café; they value the community support and benefit from the time spent together. Eva’s mother has learned how to bring up strong and healthy children; and you can see it in their cute smiling faces.

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Bridget, 4 years old

CORRIE C

orrie is an owner, director, and teacher at a small child care center that she opened in her rural upstate New York hamlet. The need for quality childcare in her 677 person town and the surrounding areas is great; but it has been difficult for Corrie to consistently enroll enough children to be able to hire the number of qualified staff she finds necessary for providing excellent child care to the families she serves. She has found it particularly difficult to staff her infant room with full-time caregivers who are knowledgeable of early childhood development and experienced in infant care. There has been high turn-over in this position. Most recently Corrie has decided to fill one of the infant caregiver positions herself in order to ensure some consistency for the families and babies in her care.

Corrie met Region 4 Infant Toddler Specialist, Kathleen Harland at an infant and toddler training. Much of the work that Corrie and Kathleen have done together revolves around creating engaging environments for infant development and well-being. Schedules have been considered to better meet the feeding and sleeping needs of individual children, low shelves and bins with sensory materials have been added to provide the infants with choices, open spaces with interesting textures are in place for non-mobile babies to lay and explore, and purposeful, connecting interactions and language have become the norm during caregiving routines.

Recently Corrie asked Kathleen for advice and support around a six month old infant who was having trouble sleeping in a crib. A swing or in arms seem to be the only way they could get him to calm down and fall asleep. He seemed unable to sooth himself and would cry for hours when upset. The caregivers were struggling with how to help him and with how to talk to his parents about it. They too were struggling at home and emotions and defenses were high.

Kathleen shared the Ages & Stages Questionnaires-3 and the Ages & Stages Questionnaires: Social Emotional-2 tools with Corrie and the infant caregivers. These questions not only helped them to better understand infant development and the developmental stages of the child they were concerned about but they gave them tools to help them discuss this with his parents.

These teacher support visits have helped educate and empower Corrie and her caregiving staff. They have expressed that the visits have impacted them and the families they work with in lasting positive ways.

What Corrie has now learned and experienced firsthand is that responsive caregiving is vital to infant development. Ideally she would hire two more infant caregivers to insure that all physical and emotional needs are met but as an owner and director she knows that it is out of her financial possibility. She strives for best practice with the resources that she is afforded.

Chris, 4 years old

Madilyn, 2 years old

HAVE CAR, WILL T

he employees at the Child Care Council who monitor, inspect, and enroll family child care and school age programs are on the go. In fact, in 2017 they traveled 21,157 miles across Albany, Schenectady, and Rensselaer Counties; conducting 1,264 inspections.

They don’t mind the travel because they believe that strong licensing regulations and a commitment to routine inspections helps ensure that child care programs are following the State’s rules for protecting children’s health and safety.

Each day, 33,514 children across the Child Care Council’s service delivery area spend time in the regulated child care programs. Child care providers, families, and children rely on the careful adherence to child care regulations as an important component to quality care. It is clear that the eight staff members who do this work at the Child Care Council make it their priority.

They understand that the job they do will have a direct impact on the daily conditions the child encounters.

This is a powerful motivator. Armed with a laptop, tape measure, camera, checklist, and telephone, they set out across the community protecting each child’s right to a safe and healthy learning experience. Sometimes this means rising early in the morning to “stakeout” unlicensed child care providers; interviewing neighbors and parents about the illegal operation.

They sift through court records, assist child protective investigations, and evaluate criminal records. All of this while remaining fair to the child care provider, parents, and children in care.

However, even licensed child care facilities can have dangerous conditions. Last year, inadequate supervision was cited 35 times in school age programs and 45 family child care homes had fire protection concerns such as blocked paths of egress or lack of an operational smoke detector. To address these concerns our regulators form collaborative partnerships with child care providers to work together to promote quality care. For example, when a family child care provider needed assistance developing a fire evacuation plan for infants in her care, the registrar worked with her to practice the evacuation plan using dolls. This mock fire drill helped the provider and the registrar work together to address potential safety concerns and to ensure that the plan met New York’s standards.

Lucas, 4 years old

TRAVEL

Calla, 2 years old

T

essa loves working with babies. With a degree in early childhood education and experience working with infants in a private child care setting; Tessa felt well suited to the challenge. As an infant teacher, Tessa valued the role that she played in contributing to the infants’ developing view of the world. She loved partnering with parents in shared responsibility for loving and nurturing their children.

Recently, Tessa was hired as head of group in a preschool classroom in a well-established publically funded program. Although she has always wanted to be a teacher, after only a few months in the preschool classroom, Tessa was lost. Perhaps teaching was not for her.

She had been struggling with the challenging behavior of one particular child in her classroom.

Naomi had a difficult time adjusting to the preschool program and has a difficult life outside of school.

Tessa knows that three-year-olds can act out. But the rage-filled reaction, triggered when Naomi wouldn't allow another child to play with a toy, stunned Tessa. Then, time and time again, Tessa saw Naomi throwing classroom furniture. Bookcases, chairs, tables — all were flung around the room.

Naomi’s behavior was having an impact on other children in the classroom. In fear or frustration some children bit classmates, leaving teeth marks on hands. Some children threatened to hit or kick Tessa. Other children, dubbed “runners,” darted out of the classroom and down the central hallway; Tessa frantically running after them. Tessa and co-teacher Emily were exhausted and they began to see Naomi as a troublemaker. They needed help.

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FLIP-IT

After learning of the classroom situation from the Program Director, Kindness Project Social Worker, Kim Polstein visited Tessa and Emily in their classroom.

Tessa had given up. When Naomi or other children acted out she withdrew from the classroom; consumed with a desire for quitting time. Emily was angry; given to frantically warning children about their bad behavior.

Over the course of a few weeks Kim helped the team to implement FLIP-IT! a strategy for responding positively to challenging behaviors. Kim knew that by teaching Tessa and Emily the four steps embodied in FLIP-IT!, a mnemonic, which stands for F – Feelings, L – Limits, I – Inquiries, and P – Prompts children would begin to regulate their emotions more successfully; and most importantly, Tessa and Emily would have the tools needed to support them.

Tessa began to gently talk with the Naomi about her feelings to help identify the root feelings causing the behavior. Rather than “checking” out during stressful classroom transitions, Tessa and Emily remind the children of the positive limits and expectations for behavior. Now loving and simple limits help surround children with a sense of consistency, safety and trust.

After a violent outburst from Naomi, Tessa now asks questions that promote problem-solving and healthy coping skills. “Your face looks really angry. Even when we are angry, throwing toys is not ok in our classroom.

What will you do to get your angry out?”

While the strategies that Kim shared are not magic or for that matter anything new, they did help to transform Tessa’s classroom and renewed her love of teaching.

Let the child be the scriptwriter, the director and the actor in his own play.

MAGDA GERBER

Adin, 5 years old

BREASTFEEDING Friendly Communities A

twenty-seven year old mother of two confesses; “I always knew I wanted to breastfeed. I didn’t have the first idea about how to do it; but it just seemed right for me. I read everything I could about breastfeeding before the birth of my first daughter; I knew that it could be hard work.” What many mothers don’t know is that that breastfeeding can test every insecurity and every last nerve. They are caught off guard by how controversial feeding baby can be in our society. New mothers are bombarded with the expectation that the new born baby pee before discharge from the hospital, that they produce enough milk, and that baby not go hungry. They are pressured to supplement with formula; over-filling baby’s stomach.

Once the bottle is introduced; mothers are needlessly filled with anxiety that their baby will prefer formula over breast. They pump in hopes of being able to bottle feed breast milk. Consequently the mother’s milk production is reduced. Baby cries. Mother cries.

Erica worked with a Group Family Child Care Provider from Schenectady, New York who believes breastfeeding is best. She nursed both of her daughters for varied lengths of time. With one daughter she struggled to return to work, pump, and store breastmilk. Consequently she stopped breastfeeding before she would have liked. As a Child Care Provider, through the CBFC grant and training with Erica, she is prepared to give nursing mothers the support that she did not have as a new parent. She proudly displays a variety of breastfeeding information in her program. She has a glider chair for mom’s to relax and nurse at the same time they can talk through that their challenges and concerns. Nursing takes time. This time together allows mom’s to talk and troubleshoot with an educated breastfeeding advocate, their own care provider.

We live in a culture with an outdated outlook on breastfeeding. Well-meaning family members and medical staff perpetuate all sorts of lies about breastfeeding leaving many mothers to rely on formula.

Dietitian Erica Houghton understands the plight of nursing mothers. She has been working on a project called Creating Breastfeeding Friendly Communities (CBFC) designed to normalize breastfeeding and provide welcoming space for moms to nurse at their child care program. Most American moms return to work just a few weeks after giving birth, and the decision to continue breastfeeding usually means they will need to pump. Pumping can be intimidating and overwhelming.

Sidney, 4 years old

Morgan, 4 years old

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MARIA R

esearch indicates that poor quality early childhood education and care can be detrimental to the development of children as it could lead to poor social, emotional, learning, and health outcomes; and that higher teacher qualifications are significantly correlated with higher quality early childhood education and care.

It was not research however, that lead Schenectady County Family Child Care Provider, Maria Rodriquez to seek the Child Development Associate Credential (CDA).

It was her passion. Her passion for excellence, selfachievement, and commitment to children and families that motivated Maria to enroll in the class. Maria is one of fourteen CDA candidates to recently receive her credential and one of five of those who speak Spanish as a first language.

Raquel Saddlemire, CDA Educator and Advisor, describes Maria as a star student; tremendously dedicated to the pursuit of quality early education. It shows. Maria spent the nine month CDA program examining her policies, practices, and environment. She used the Family Child Care Environment Rating Scale (FCCERS-R) to measure her practice against the

The best teacher in the world is someone who loves what he or she does, and just loves it in front of you.

FRED ROGERS

national benchmark for quality. She made changes; small and large. She labeled cubbies with each child’s name and photo, defined areas in the environment for quiet and active play, added a parent information bulletin board, and created a visual schedule.

Maria revised her policies related to health and safety; creating a sanitation bucket for mouth toys and separating cribs to reduce the spread of infectious disease. One of her crowning accomplishment was the establishment of a reading area equipped with soft furniture, a cozy area rug, and durable developmentally appropriate books attractively displayed on open selves.

Most importantly Maria is committed to serving families from diverse socioeconomic backgrounds. She feels that by giving young children from different communities the chance to learn and grow together, they are working to bridge divisions between communities often segregated by race and/or socioeconomic status.

Maria works tirelessly to make sure the children’s days are filled with engaging, hands-on activities that teach them about science, numeracy, and literacy. Her goal is to ensure that all the children in their care have the emotional, physical, and intellectual foundations they need to succeed in school and in life.

Lily, 3 years old

SPECIAL NEEDS Health Care Plan M

any parents have something that is worrisome: something they work especially hard to protect their children from. As a family that spends a good deal of time outdoors for me and my husband it was tick bites and sun burn. We did our best to control what we could— we slathered our sons with sunscreen and bug repellant and then bathed them afterward to protect against chemical contamination. Sometimes something unexpected happens and prevention is not possible.

This happened to a family who was working with health care consultants Jean Wiseman and Barbara Vickery. Out of the blue, a six-year-old enrolled at a school-age program was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes.

The program staff and parents had grown increasingly uneasy with the child’s increased urgency to use the bathroom. He had a low energy level, lost weight and he had an insatiable thirst. His parents searched the internet for answers and diabetes kept popping up.

Sure the symptoms were right in front of them, but maybe the child was in growth spirt; maybe the full day of summer play was causing fatigue. Maybe everything would be fine.

Finally, the family visited their pediatrician. The diagnosis process was simple. After testing, they found sugar in the child’s urine and his glucose level was near 500—more than five times what a typical reading should be. Next they were on their way to the hospital.

The child was admitted to the hospital to control his blood sugar and to learn about type 1 diabetes and the glucose testing, carbohydrate counting, and use of the insulin pump; a regimen that was required at least three times daily.

By the time the program director called Jean, both Mom and staff were anxious. Jean understands why a type 1 diabetes diagnosis is so scary. Diabetes can kill someone quickly, through severe low blood sugar caused by the insulin. Or it can kill someone slowly, through heart disease, kidney failure, or one of the many other conditions that type 1 diabetes can cause.

But with careful management diabetics can live long, healthy lives.

Jean helped support the parents, program staff, and child to make a special needs health care plan, get the training they needed, and learn how to document procedures and monitoring. This child has now been placed on a Dexcom monitor that continuously checks the child blood glucose. Program staff had a great deal of anxiety about this new machine, the need to use an iPad for the child, the accuracy and safety of the device, and the guidelines that they would need to followed to be in compliance with OCFS. After much discussion, clarification, and reassurance the program again handled the situation and the child continues to happily enjoy his after school experience.

Parents don’t make mistakes because they don’t care, but because they care so deeply.

BERRY BRAZELTON

Finnigan, 5 years old

BEHIND THE BRAN

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The principle goal of education is not to increase the amount of knowledge, but create the possibilities for a child to invent and discover, to create men who are capable of doing new things.

JEAN PIAGET

P

iaget’s theories are in perfect alignment with the reason we decided to change the way we communicate and visually represent our commitment to child development. As time progresses, it is imperative to evaluate and make necessary changes (do “new things”) in order to stay current and stand apart. Change is exciting and refreshing, a risk worth taking.

As we reflected on the Council’s values and examined other like-missioned agencies, it was clear that we needed to put the same thought and meaningful oomph behind our brand as we do our spirited dedication to children’s growth and development.

With vibrant children in mind, we set forth with a powerful brand identity that screams childhood development: children’s artwork! It is familiar, emotional and serious; yet playful. With the visual graphics of the brand in motion, we began collecting artwork from nieces, nephews, friends, and children in the community and implemented it in our materials instantly. Everything else (a new name, logo, and website) will follow suit.

The community responded positively as they compared the old materials with the new, further justifying this new path. We are building a library of meaningful photography taken in the community. We look different.

We have a new voice of authenticity and expertise; weaving into conversations our analysis of how a single scribbled line represents the inner workings of a child’s mind and body, it is crystal clear that children’s artwork perfectly represents our core values.

STAGES OF DEVELOPMENT We learn about the child and her stage of development through observations of art. The experimental, random scribbles of an 18 month old represent the child’s physical development with light and heavy strokes, dots, lines, and circles. The boldness of the lines drawn by a toddler demonstrate how the child has adjusted her own behavior to accommodate the crayon; gaining understanding of its effect on paper. This differs greatly from earlier drawings with limited motor control and cursory understanding of cause and effect.

IMAGINATION & PLAYFULNESS Children’s art illustrates pleasure in kinesthetic movement and the creation and use of symbols as a means of communication. The simple and combined forms may represent a dog jumping over the moon or a family. Heavy overlapping circles may represent “dizzy mommy, spinning very fast;” a mental image of motion communicated symbolically on paper. Through our observations we have seen children’s art transition from scribble to recognizable representations of “tadpole figures;” delightful in childish perspective and interpretation.

UNIVERSAL Artwork (sans lettering) is the same in all languages.

It represents the voice of all children, regardless of demographics. Artwork reminds of a child's ability to wonder. It is the belief that there are "multiple ways of seeing and multiple ways of being.”

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RELATABLE & PERSONAL One afternoon as we hung our collection of children’s artwork in the front hallway of the Council, a woman entered the building and stopped in her tracks with a huge smile on her face. She said she loved how welcoming and warm it made her feel. “It feels so familiar; it feels like home,” she said as she scaled the hallway, carefully examining each piece. She shared with us how she taught her granddaughter the alphabet and how to spell and write her own name. It was evident just how meaningful that time was that she spent with this little girl. Her authentic, emotional reaction to meaningful memories was exactly the response and feeling we were hoping for.

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Albeit the fear of change was hanging over our heads, the interaction with this woman was confirmation that we made the right choice and the risk of doing this “new thing” was absolutely worth taking. It is not just the Council’s brand, it belongs to child care professionals, parents and the community; and we all stand behind it for one valuable and very serious thing: children’s growth and development.

We look different. We have a new voice of authenticity and expertise;weaving into conversations our analysis of how a single scribbled line represents the inner workings of a child’s mind and body,it is crystal clear that children’s artwork perfectly represents our core values.

Dog Jumping Over the Moon Quinn, 1.5 years old

Hannah, age 10

CAPITAL DISTRICT CHILD CARE COUNCIL’S 2017 ANNUAL REPORT Bridget, 5 years old