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Question about in-home DCPs - how many kids?
Sorry for all the questions this morning but we're just starting to look at in-home and I'm unsure about it. I'm looking forward to DS having more individualized care, but I'm also wondering how one person can handle so many kids - I find it hard with just DS! Using the MD Locate service I saw that the in-homes have a capacity of up to 8 kids and that scares me a bit so I'm wondering what the norm is.
If you do in-home, how many kids does your provider have? (ages would be helpful too)
Do you feel that's too many, just right, or they could handle one or two more?
TIA!
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Re: Question about in-home DCPs - how many kids?
We're in Arlington, which has a 3 kids (under 2) to 1 adult ratio. Our DCP has 3 adults, so up to 9 kids, ranging from 3 months to 3ish. I think in MoCo the ratio is 4:1, so the in homes with 8 kids have 2 adults.
I think the people who have daycares are the ones who are able to handle lots of little ones. I couldn't do it, but the women at our DC are just the kind of people who light up around babies. Also, while infants might need quite a bit of holding, the older kids want to play and run around with their friends more. So I think at in-homes, with more mixed age groups, the providers spend more one-on-one time holding the babies while supervising the older ones.
Actually, in MD it's more like you can have up to eight kids total (even with only one DCP), but less than four can be under two years old. I looked it up recently because our DCP had a mess of kids and I was curious what the rules were.
C didn't start daycare until he was 13 mos, so big enough to express his needs and get attention if he needed it. DCP had five kids then and he was the youngest. I probably would have thought harder about the ratio if he had been an infant.
Our DCP has 3 babies the same age as DS and one other baby (who happens to be our neighbor's baby who is one day younger than DS) who comes part-time.
I'm happy with 3 babies and one part-time. I would be less happy if there were 4 full-time. But I don't think our DCP would do that. She's older and doesn't depend on her DC for their income.
There was a time when it was just two babies.
I love that there is such a small number and that they are all the same age. To me it makes it more like a nanny share than an in-home DC. Less germs and more attention. Everyone is similar in development so she can do the same games or whatnot.
Our DCP I think prefers babies so we will probably move to a center when DS turns 2.
Off to the beach
DS 7/18/2010
Handy 2.0 Due Early August
2011/2012 Races
12/17/2011 Christmas Caper 10K
2/11/2012 Have a Heart 5K
3/17/2012 DC RNR Half Marathon
4/22/2012 10M Parkway Classic
10/28/2012 Marine Corps Marathon
Wow - that sounds like a lot for one person!
i'm not sure what the rule is in VA, but our DCP is licensed for up to 10 kids, i think. they are an in-home/center hybrid, but licensed as an in-home. there are two main providers and one assistant with PT hours.
right now, audrey is their youngest at 9 months. they also have 4 other babies between 11 months and 14 months. usually, they only have 1-2 babies at time. they also have 5 older kids (20 mos - 4.5).
i don't think they could handle one more baby who wasn't yet walking. three of the babies (including Audrey) are on the verge of walking, but not quite there yet.
Yeah. I think it really depends on the age of the kids though, like you said. There are up to 8 kids at DCP some days, but C is still the youngest (I think there may be an infant that comes part time) so it's almost like a preschool class. A few of the kids are pretty self-sufficient 4 year olds.
Our provider is licensed for 8, with her and one assistant. There's a limit on how many she can take under 2.
She seems to have everything under control. When we visited other daycares, I wasn't satisfied with the level of control. I think it's really important to visit a few places.
We hire our DCP through Monday Morning Moms. It's more expensive, but they have been great to work with. They check in on her periodically, and arrange back-up care if she's unable to work (sick, vacation, etc.)
our dcp has 2 assistants + herself. There is one baby about 6 months, 3 (including Sprout) approaching 1 year, and like 3 or 4 kids that are around 3 years old.
pp is right...every time I've come, the older kids are mostly playing amongst themselves the smallest baby is being held & the 3 in Sprout's cohort are dividing the attention of the other adults.
fwiw, i really love the mixed ages in one room. as it turns out, sprout vastly prefers playing with the older kids (when they let him!). he's also gotten gentler being around a smaller baby (clearly he's tried to claw at him like he does us but they've managed to tame that into more of a gentle pat).