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Hello Everyone,
Can anyone tell me the age definitions of an infant, a toddler, a preschooler and school-age? I have in my ads that I take infants/toddlers/preschoolers/school-agers, but I do not take children before 11/12 months old so would that be considered a toddler or an infant? :unsure: Thanks for any help :)
Everyone definces them differently .... in 'centre' care for licensing requirements they were defined as follows
A Infant is 0-18 months
A Toddler is 18-30 months
A preschooler is 30-60 months
A kindergarten child is 4- 6 years old
A school age child is 6-12 years
BTW if you have a 'must be' age you would like to serve I would define it exactly like that ~ 'Our daycare is currently looking for a new child to join our group ~ ideal candidate must be OVER X months of age or up to X years of age"
That way persecptive clients are not wasting your time with their definition of 'infant' and so forth .... and sadly even when you DO clarify a 'must have' you will still get wee infants calling you with remarks like 'my babe is really independent will you considering taking him even though he is not 12 months'!
Probably in your case I would drop the infant from your options in the sense that that to most means a child under a year. Toddler for me is 12m to walking alone and feeding self with utensils, using cup) Preschool is basically 2 1/2 (30 months) till they start school. Pretty much the same as centre care but use the toddler title for anything from 12 months as it makes it easier to deal with one year mat leaves that way where I used to consider it 15 months but it seems silly to make a distinction for 3 months. I charge the same for all ages so that part doesn't matter and being private I can have any age mix so the titles don't really mean anything. I usually put infant/toddler in my ads leaving out the preschool part since I don't really want to start a child over 2 1/2 and have them only for one year before going to school. In your case I would start with toddler and leave out the infant word but then in your writeup let it be known that you will take a child starting at 12 months so parents know what toddler means to you.
I agree with playfelt that I consider an infant to be up to about a year old, then a toddler is walking and done with bottles and is eating table food. I guess a preschooler is the year before school starts. I don't think age should be a consideration.
I charge the same amount for all ages because babies may be more work in one way but the parents are providing all of the food until the children start eating the food I serve at my daycare, which is usually before the age of 1. I encourage parents to start their children on table food so they can feed themselves by about 9-10 months of age and I find most parents agree with that. I have a higher profit margin if the parents are sending the baby food but I find it a real pain.
I don't advertise for any age group either as playfelt also stated, just that I have a space available. Most of the children who start at my daycare are around age 1 with the Mom going back to work from her mat leave. I find it more expensive to have older children in care because they eat more and craft more so I can't figure out why people charge a higher rate for babies.