Preschool vs Daycare Wars

[Anonymous]

A daycare can be a preschool, but a preschool is not a daycare.

[Anonymous]

People who have used a “preschool” are the ones that seem to care.
We have used both and I have preferred some teachers at the “daycare” (they are teachers with degrees) to some teachers at the “preschool”.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So there is a big difference, op, and I’m not sure why you would want to keep misnaming it. Pre school isn’t really set up covering childcare during working hours at all. Pre school (half days) generally starts out at 2 days a week for 2 year olds, 3 days a week for 3 yo, etc and is focused on early socialization and skills. If you use pre school you still need child care for most of the day. It generally requires potty trained kids and doesn’t stat before 3. It’s more like supplemental places like my gym, music classes, mothers morning out, or coop pre schools.

Daycare is group childcare that is obviously structured around dual working parent hours. I have done both. There’s some evidence that the less hours/younger age for group care is healthier for kids in the long but obviously is a big financial sacrifice for any family to sah or get a nanny for the bulk of care through those years and what’s best for each family is different. But I think it’s confusing to say you are using pre school when you are doing daycare, because it does imply you are either not working or have a nanny/family caring for your child most of the time. So yes I would clarify that with you if we met on the playground and started talking about childcare.

Only people on DCUM actually care about the difference. To the majority of the world, the two are interchangeable. It is true that for those under 3, it's all daycare. But for anyone of preschool age (3+ or possibly 4+) most people use the terms interchangeably and I can't think of any adult who would make an issue of the use of the terms.

You, PP, have some weird bug. You must be a SAHM who is proud that she doesn't have to work, so she can educate her young children at a "preschool" and not need "daycare".

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I don't really care about daycare vs preschool, but the actual job titles of the people who take care of my 3 year old and teach him a preschool curriculum are "teacher" and "assistant teachers," and I feel like it would be actually insulting to them to insist that we cannot call them that. I know preschool teachers as well, the qualifications for teaching at a church half day are not different!

+1 I would not associate with someone who puts down others by diminishing their job titles.

[Anonymous]

I only find it weird when people use the term “preschool” for a kid under 3 who is clearly going to daycare. I always get the vibe that they’re self conscious that their kid is going to daycare so they rebrand it as “school.” I say this as someone with a kid in daycare—it’s not school and it’s not supposed to be.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You know there are working parents who enroll their kids in preschool, right?

They would call that a daycare. If you need it for childcare- it's daycare. If you're just sending your kids to it so that they get socialized and learn things- it's preschool.

Um, I need school for my 9 year old’s childcare.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I only find it weird when people use the term “preschool” for a kid under 3 who is clearly going to daycare. I always get the vibe that they’re self conscious that their kid is going to daycare so they rebrand it as “school.” I say this as someone with a kid in daycare—it’s not school and it’s not supposed to be.

From 18mo+ my kids were in a full year, full day program with a Reggio curriculum where all the teachers had 4 yr education degrees and many had masters degrees. 3yr+ they ate family style in a cafeteria and went to separate rooms in the building for library, music, and art.
What do you call that? I call it preschool, because the name of the school includes the word “preschool” and that’s the word the teachers use with the children.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I only find it weird when people use the term “preschool” for a kid under 3 who is clearly going to daycare. I always get the vibe that they’re self conscious that their kid is going to daycare so they rebrand it as “school.” I say this as someone with a kid in daycare—it’s not school and it’s not supposed to be.

From 18mo+ my kids were in a full year, full day program with a Reggio curriculum where all the teachers had 4 yr education degrees and many had masters degrees. 3yr+ they ate family style in a cafeteria and went to separate rooms in the building for library, music, and art.
What do you call that? I call it preschool, because the name of the school includes the word “preschool” and that’s the word the teachers use with the children.

+1

Are you supposed to say “oh my child goes to Falls Church Preschool but it’s daycare” just to cater to the people who are invested in this distinction? How do the people who have opinions about this cope with things like “day school” or “Montessori school”?

I really think this is a made up DCUM problem perpetuated by the poster who always comes on to belittle preschool teachers/daycare providers as uneducated.

[Anonymous]

There is a difference. Daycare is childcare for parents’ working hours, and something I consider is for infants/ babies/ young toddlers. A preschool program is… not that. Though a daycare could have a preschool program for their age 3+ learners! Also, I have no problem calling any of the daycare workers teachers (I’m sure they’re teaching the alphabet/ counting/ social skills etc.), but to the pp that said someone with a degree in early childhood development is a teacher, that’s a very different program than early childhood education (where they learn curriculum & instruction, pedagogy, the science of reading, etc.). In my experience, friends that sent their 9 month olds to daycare and called it school just wanted to feel better about sending their kids to daycare. Ps- there’s nothing wrong with daycare!! It’s not a bad thing! Just silly to act like your young baby is learning a curriculum and it’s not just childcare.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I would never correct someone in real life but I do always have the fleeting thought that it’s a bit pathetic when parents of daycare-age kids call it “school.” Makes me think they are in denial about sending kids to daycare, which I think is ridiculous because I fully support women working. It’s just the dishonesty that bothers me.

My question is what makes one a daycare and one a preschool if they are both teaching? My friend sends her kid to a daycare but they are taught the same things kids in preschool are taught. So its a combo preschool and daycare (open year round and until 6pm). So yes, its a daycare. But they also do a ton of teaching.

Do the teachers at a preschool have different qualifications?

[Anonymous]

I’ve done both.
One of the nice things about preschool was that the kids are dropped off and picked up at the sametime, you meet and chat with other parents.
Also, the kids are in the same class for that whole school year and make good friend connections.
At a daycare center, rarely did I see other parents with kids in my kids class because drop off was between 7-9am. The kids get moved up to the next group though based on age, and new kids come in…… it’s very different.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There is a difference. Daycare is childcare for parents’ working hours, and something I consider is for infants/ babies/ young toddlers. A preschool program is… not that. Though a daycare could have a preschool program for their age 3+ learners! Also, I have no problem calling any of the daycare workers teachers (I’m sure they’re teaching the alphabet/ counting/ social skills etc.), but to the pp that said someone with a degree in early childhood development is a teacher, that’s a very different program than early childhood education (where they learn curriculum & instruction, pedagogy, the science of reading, etc.). In my experience, friends that sent their 9 month olds to daycare and called it school just wanted to feel better about sending their kids to daycare. Ps- there’s nothing wrong with daycare!! It’s not a bad thing! Just silly to act like your young baby is learning a curriculum and it’s not just childcare.

I’m the poster you referenced. I didn’t say someone with a degree in early childhood development is a teacher— I said it’s disrespectful to call them something else if they call themselves a teacher, the school calls them teachers, the students call them teachers, it’s disrespectful to say oh actually you’re a “daycare worker”.

And to be really pedantic, having a degree in education doesn’t make you a teacher either. Teaching does. Plenty of my teachers growing up had teaching certificates but their degrees were in their subjects. This again is why I think this is a fake distinction.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There is a difference. Daycare is childcare for parents’ working hours, and something I consider is for infants/ babies/ young toddlers. A preschool program is… not that. Though a daycare could have a preschool program for their age 3+ learners! Also, I have no problem calling any of the daycare workers teachers (I’m sure they’re teaching the alphabet/ counting/ social skills etc.), but to the pp that said someone with a degree in early childhood development is a teacher, that’s a very different program than early childhood education (where they learn curriculum & instruction, pedagogy, the science of reading, etc.). In my experience, friends that sent their 9 month olds to daycare and called it school just wanted to feel better about sending their kids to daycare. Ps- there’s nothing wrong with daycare!! It’s not a bad thing! Just silly to act like your young baby is learning a curriculum and it’s not just childcare.

Why do you care so much?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There is a difference. Daycare is childcare for parents’ working hours, and something I consider is for infants/ babies/ young toddlers. A preschool program is… not that. Though a daycare could have a preschool program for their age 3+ learners! Also, I have no problem calling any of the daycare workers teachers (I’m sure they’re teaching the alphabet/ counting/ social skills etc.), but to the pp that said someone with a degree in early childhood development is a teacher, that’s a very different program than early childhood education (where they learn curriculum & instruction, pedagogy, the science of reading, etc.). In my experience, friends that sent their 9 month olds to daycare and called it school just wanted to feel better about sending their kids to daycare. Ps- there’s nothing wrong with daycare!! It’s not a bad thing! Just silly to act like your young baby is learning a curriculum and it’s not just childcare.

What do you call a preschool with a full day option? Does that make it a daycare as well?

[Anonymous]

it's a silly distinction. I would say my kid is in both simultaneously. He goes to preschool at a Preschool through 8 private school but we chose an option with a 4:00 pickup to match the older kid's pickup schedule.