85 Replies
Just from my view point, If no financial issue and if its possible, best to have mum to take care first till 18 or 30 months.. Next wld be infant care, however do your research when selecting one, observe teachers communication and handling, also be prepared your child might fall ill more often as he/she is exposed to more children esp those large infant care or many infant care chn. The school may also face shortage of infant teachers & they are really tied down with many responsibilities and babies to take care, its not easy on them too..so dont put so high expectation on the hygiene and safety. Expect biting or bumps. But the good part is your baby will be more meaningfully engaged & learning at infant school, then just being with a maid. Well it depends your maid ability to engage and communicate well to your infants aside from just providing care.
Personal preference is for infant to stay home, looked after by helper and hopefully someone else at home to supervise if possible. Main concern is that infant's immune system is not as developed and more prone to illness. As infants, they also can't take strong medications or the medications are contraindicated for infants. End up u have a sick baby and you have to continually take leave to deal with it. This is what happened to several colleagues and 1 pulled her baby out of infant care and her in laws helped to take care. Another continued with infant care and hired on a helper to deal with the recurring illnesses.
Im still working as infant educarer and 20weeks preggy. I personally think tht sending babies to infant care will be good as they are expose to diff environment and ppl around them. And they will be more independent when they are transit to PG. yes Ecda child ratio is 1:5, but tht depends on centre. For my centre infant ratio is 1:3. So there will be 2-3 infants to per educarer. Enquiry about the child ration in the school first! Like ask them how many children and teachers are there. But if you are the kind of parents who prefer 1to1 care, better to get a helper. Hope this helps!
I was a infant educarer and I resigned to take care of my girl . Personally , I would never send my child to infant because of the teacher child ratio (1:5). The child might be "neglected" in the sense that only the basic needs are met when the teachers are busy and trust me, they definitely will be. And all it takes is one educarer who takes shortcuts for something to go very wrong. The best bet would be your mom or MIL.
Was very against infant care at 1st as there were many feedback that child will fall sick frequently. Was also worried about the lack of 1-1 care. Had helper and it was really a crazy experience. No choice but sent child to infant care. She cried like crazy at 1st but is used to it after a while. Loves going to sch. Have not fell sick before. 🤞🏻I also feel that she has learnt many things from sch which surprises us.
We had exactly the same question and I ended up with a helper because of a few reasons: 1. the costs works out to be roughly the same 2. relieving us of household chores allows us more time with our baby However, as we’re not comfortable with letting the helper take care completely, we are blessed to have family members to be the main caregiver while we’re at work and we take over after work. Hope that helps! :)
I will choose helper, trust me, teachers in infant care are certified in taking care of children. Not too much on academic. I rather teach my children myself after coming back from work or on the weekends. And with the virus ard, so many irresponsible parents who still insist on sending their children who are having cough and runny nose. So yeah, still so young. I rather have my children at home.
INFANT CARE!! I used to have dilemma too. but we decided to put infant care. even sometimes it is very rush for me to pick baby. but overall im very happy.. teachers will monitor him, teach him some basic stuff, do evalution, and most important he got to socialise.. i feel this is important.. cause reyan is very open to strangers. he even play and smile to strangers 😀😀😀
If you can find a good helper, it's better to let the helper take care of baby. Our helper loves our son so much. So she does her best to help him develop in every ways. My son is now 18 months he speaks well and friendly. He's active and he don't have a screen time at all. I believe 1 to 1 care from her helped him a lot.
Helper.. Cos infant care teacher has alot of baby to look after. And they will overlook their small things.. My sis baby is in infant care and his cheeks is always red.. Due to saliva always on cheek and teacher don't bother to clean and keep his hygiene well. If nv go infant care, his cheeks can recover
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