Tips For Helping Your Child Transition To Child Care

If you are a working parent, chances are good that you are going to eventually need to go back to work after you have had your child. When your child is old enough to go to child care, this is probably an exciting and scary experience for both of you. You want to go back to work and be able to talk to adults again, but you also want to make sure that your child is fine. Here are some tips for making your child's transition to child care easier.

1. Visit With Your Child

Your first step is to visit with your child. You need to be sure that your child is comfortable with the child care providers, the teachers, and the building before he or she spends the first day there without you. This is critical because your child will be more likely to be willing to run off and play if he or she knows the people who are around him or her and, more importantly, if he or she knows what cool toys there are to play with. Have your child attend a few classes if there is going to be preschool as well and encourage him or her to hang out with the other kids and not spend time with you when you are visiting in order to make the visit truly effective.

2. Talk About School

Read books to your child about children who go to school, especially about children who are scared to go to all day school or to day care and eventually end up loving it. Talk about all of the cool things that your child will learn in school. Make school part of your daily conversation with your child regardless of his or her age so that he or she is comfortable with the idea. This will help aid the transition.

3. Make Sure Your Child is Taken Care of By People Other Than You Before Starting Day Care

Finally, if you have time, try to have other people watch your child other than his or her parents. This will allow him or her to adjust to having people take care of them that he or she might not be as familiar with and learn to deal with the emotions that might come up for him or her. This will make being in a strange place for an entire day without his or her parents much easier.

For more information, talk to a company that specializes in child care, such as The Cottage School.