Kids & Company Blog

Transitioning into the World of Child Care, School and University

There’s often a lot of emotions swirling around when you start dropping your babies off at child care. Sometimes it’s more likely for the parents to be more upset than the child. It’s an adjustment from being at home with your baby all the time to having to say goodbye on a daily basis and send your kids off to child care while you go off to work.

It’s important to remember that having your child in a social situation such as in a child care centre is highly beneficial for their development. I had all eight of my children in social environments at a very young age in order for them to develop their social skills and go through a far less intense period of separation anxiety.

Some children are more sensitive than others! My second son cried at "school drop off" every single day (for two minutes :)), from the
age of two - right up until grade 2. Was always a little difficult, especially because it lasted for 5 years! However, knowing that it only lasted a few minutes made it manageable.
Interestingly, he was the only one of my children that had real tears in his eyes when we dropped him off at University!

Right now, my household has gone down from eight kids to two! It’s very surreal and similar to when I said goodbye and sent them off to child care when they were younger. With three children working on their undergrad, one doing a post-grad law degree and two are living and working in downtown Toronto well into their careers, I’ve had to step back and let each of them develop as young adults. All of which I have found has been more beneficial for their success as strong independent individuals.

If you feel the drop off and pick up at child care is still too stressful for you, our guest blogger Mitali Ruths has written a great article, Handling Daily Transitions. Share some of your stories on how you and your child transitioned into child care!

Posted on: Monday October 17th, 2011

Posted by: Victoria Sopik