"If you haven't been there, you don't know what it's like": Life at Enchanted Gate from the inside

Abstract

Child care researchers and experts connect the quality of child with the quality of teacher-caregivers providing child care. However, attention directed toward teacher-caregivers rarely goes beyond identifying how they influence the type of care children receive. Thus, we know very little about the lived experience of teacher-caregivers in day care centers.

Day care is about real people in real places. Day care is a world of interactions, a coming together of individuals who learn to accommodate and resist the constant, sometimes conflictual, demands in an environment marked by close, daily contact with others. However, this world is not easily known. The perspectives of those at the heart of the day care experience--children, families, and teacher-caregivers--are rarely included in the research studies on day care.

This study attempts to address this gap in our knowledge of day care by providing a detailed, rich description of a day in the life of one day care center, listening to four teacher-caregivers talk about their daily experiences, and understanding the adult world of one center. The goal is to grasp the meanings of teaching and caregiving, to see beyond the immediate impression, and to create a picture of day care grounded in real life experiences and concrete practices.

The four teacher-caregivers in this study, Holly, Abby, Nancy, and Ann work in an environment over which they have minimal control. Program and parent expectations, children's needs and demands, licensing regulations, and working conditions are four constraints teacher-caregivers face. The responses, behaviors, and activities of these four individuals indicate the ways in which they attempt to find control while working within these constraints, and, thus, make sense of their lived experience as teacher-caregivers. Understanding how these individuals make sense of their lived experience expands our knowledge of day care.