Identity and Socialization of Children
in the Daycare Environment
By
Abstract
This paper takes a look at how children
construct personal and group identity as well as how they socialize with other
children and adults outside of their family, the world around them, and the day
care environment. The purpose of the paper was to see how children construct
gender roles, the concepts of power, and how they reconstruct family structure
as a form of a coping method to deal with a sense of abandonment and separation
from their families.
Introduction
The
purpose of my research was to find how children identify and socialize
themselves with in the daycare environment. Children learn self and group
identity and social skills with the help of exposure to the daycare
environment. However, for many children being introduced to daycare can be a
traumatic experience. Many children suffer withdrawal and abandonment issues
and have problems making friends or being apart of a group. Several of the children
that attend the Mountain Area Child and Family Center, where I conducted the
majority of my research still have great difficulties saying goodbye to their
parent(s) during morning drop off despite the length of time they have been
attending daycare.
Ella
is one of the toddlers I observed with this condition. She is small for her
age, with short dirty blonde hair, her mouth permanently agape, and a
semi-permanent look of stern loneliness on her face. Ella has been coming to
MACFC on Tuesdays and Thursdays regularly since its doors opened late last year
(2000). Ella’s mother does the morning drop off routine that was established
that first day she brought Ella to MACFC. Ella’s morning ritual begins by
clinging to her mother’s side, being carried by her mother while she socializes
with the workers, or following closely behind her mother as she says good
morning to the other children. When the time comes for her mother to leave for
work Ella begins to cry and call for her mother. As her mother backs out of the
front door saying, “I love you, and “See you later today”, Ella’s cries become
uncontrollable. The teachers/workers in the toddler room attempt to soothe Ella
by holding her or reading her stories. She has a picture of her family that she
carries around with her whenever she becomes lonely or sad. When Ella’s crying
fails to cease she is placed in a special corner, designated the “cozy corner,”
that is supplied with toys and pillows to lie on. When Ella is placed in the
cozy corner she becomes even more frustrated to the point of shaking. This take
on the “time out” theory varies from the original because Ella is not isolated
from contact with the other children or the teachers. Ella is instructed to
take deep calming breaths and to think about the activities of the day. It
takes Ella about twenty minutes to fully calm down, and by that point many of
the other children have arrived. Periodically Ella will begin to cry, seek out
her picture, and/or the workers, or her cousin Joy who also attends MACFC to
soothe her. Many of the other children go through this behavior in the morning,
but not to the extent to which Ella exhibits.
My
interest in seeing how children develop social skills, learn to adapt to the
environment outside their homes, and socialize with people outside their family
groups developed from watching children like Ella go through the experience of
separation and the feelings of isolation in populated places. My research was
mainly conducted at the Mountain Area Child and Family Center; it provides an
alternate style to daycare and was created by faculty and staff of the
Education Department at Warren Wilson College.
My
original intention was to research the structure of families that have children
with Muscular Dystrophy. I was looking for differences in family structure
between families with children who had a physical disability and families that
do not. However as I got deeper into the research I found that it had become
impossible to conduct. The resources and literature were not substantial enough
to support my theories. I still wanted to look at how children socialize
themselves with their families and their communities at large. It so happened
that my class entitled The Family was
scheduled to observe a daycare center built and run by the college that I
attend (Warren Wilson College). The class met early in the morning at the
center and we were given a full tour of the small facility. In this initial
observation I noticed the children’s reactions to departing from their parents
and how they interacted with the other children, workers, and the classroom.
With my initial research in mind, I decided to look at the way children are
socialized and socialize themselves and their families within the fluctuating
daycare environment.
I
began to frequent the Mountain Area Child and Family Center three times a week
at alternate times during the day: morning shift, naptime, and end of the day
pick up. I mainly observed the toddler room (ages one to three) that has a
fluctuating number of children daily. There is no commitment to bring the child
into the center and often some of the children only come on alternating days.
This fluctuation greatly affects the dynamics of the room and the interactions
of the children. I observed that the children have grown attachments to one
another and often depend on one another for support. These early social
networks help to build socialization skills as the children move into the
school systems.
During
my visits to the center I also contributed to building the Family Center, a
conference type room, which has been established to help parents and children
adjust to the daycare environment. The center is stocked with pamphlets, toys,
and other reading material that gives information on the adjustment, types of
care, and classes for improving child rearing and even education classes for
the parents. In working with building this room, I created a short survey that
asked the parents what types of services would they prefer the Mountain Area
Child and Family Center (MACFC) provide. I discovered that the majority of
parent responses requested classes on alternative ways of parenting and child
rearing. Many of the parents commented on classes to teach specific coping
methods for both parents and their children for the adjustment to the daycare
environment. The entirety of MACFC is dedicated to making its environment
suitable for the children and parents.
History of Daycare: The Emergence of
Daycare Programs
In
the past daycare has been provided by family and social networks. Women have
been the main providers of that care and subsequently the formation of the
domestic sphere came from that role.
American middle class families used social networking and family ties as
important resources as women entered the work force. As mothers worked, care
was provided by those unable to work, such as the elderly, or by those not of
age to work (i.e. siblings or cousins). As women consistently entered the work
force, the demand for help outside the family structure became greater. Several
issues concerning the family surrounded the entrance of women into the work
force. One of the issues was affordable daycare and the other was the issue of
the mother entering the work force itself. This affected family structure and
child care in a way that it helped to institute daycare programs. Class and
race are two issues that heavily influenced the emergence of women in the work
force and subsequently affected the emergence of daycare. Lillian Rubin in her
1995 research stated:
…But when a mother goes to work it’s big news. Newspapers publish article after article about the numbers of married women with young children in the labor force; social scientists study the situation; politicians wring their hands in alarm and worry about the impact on the family. Yet poor women have always held paid jobs outside the home…Class plays its part. In 1972 it was poor and working-class families who needed a working wife to pay the bills (Rubin, 1995:69).
It was
not until World War II that institutional daycare was formulated as an
alternative form of childcare. As the men were heading off to Europe and the
Pacific to fight in the war, women were replacing them in their jobs. That left
many American families turning even more to their extended families, close social
networks, or governmental daycare to watch over the safety of their children
while they tried to provide an income to sustain their living conditions. This
caused many problems within the immediate family structures. The social
constructions of gender roles and family identity were shifting because of the
entrance of women into the work force. The dominant belief for family structure
developed into an ideal model of the way a family should function. The ideal
model was retaliated against the temporary entrance of women in the work force.
The ideal model took root in the 1950’s and was constructed to place the mother
at home as the care provider and the father as the primary economic source. The
1960’s brought about a break from the ideal model with the second wave of the
Feminist Movement. Women broke away from the “Ozzie and Harriet” ideals and
struck out to redefine gender roles, thus affecting the lives of their
families, especially their children.
Coontz says, on the subject of the ideal family:
It is an ahistorical amalgam of structures, values, and behaviors that never coexisted in the same time and place. The notion that traditional families fostered intense intimacy between husbands and wives while creating mothers who were totally available to their children, fro example, is an idea that combines some characteristics of white, middle-class family in the mid-nineteenth century and some of a rival family ideal first articulated in the 1920s (Coontz, 1992:27)
The entrance of daycare programs as an alternative
to interdependence on family for childcare appeared out of the social issues
surrounding family changes. The programs that cropped up in the 1940’s to help
families whose mothers were now working have carried into the present. However,
these programs were flawed and unfortunately became the norm in America. One of
the problems with daycare programs in the past has been the lack of service for
poorer families, such as African-American families, whose mothers had gone to
work. Even when an African-American child was accepted into one of the daycare
programs, the price for the daycare was almost too much for the maintenance of
the family unit. “Rosie the Riveter” is a film that provides the stories of
several women, most being African-American, who struggled to support their
families during WWII despite opportunities in the job market because of sexual
and racial discrimination. Race, class, and socioeconomic status have always
marginalized daycare. These factors contribute to the way the daycare services
are run in today’s society.
It
has been a trend in institutionalized daycare that low-income families place
their children in a facility that is low quality and affordable for their
incomes, or they rely on kin networks for child-care and rearing. In Carol
Stack’s book All Our Kin (1974)
relays the importance of kin networks and the provision of daycare for working
mothers. Stack states in the section of her book entitled Child-Keeping,
Gimme a Little Sugar, “Close kin may fully cooperate in child care and
domestic activities during times when they do not live together. On the other
hand, kin may actively assume parental right in children, insisting on joining
a household in order to help in child care” (Stack, 1972:4). Stack conducted
her research in the later part of the 1960’s in a small community outside of
Chicago (the name of the area was changed in order to protect its residents).
The 60’s were a time when again more women were entering the work force, but
the jobs that most women, like those living in the Flats, were unstable,
low-paying, manual labor jobs. They could barely support themselves on their
weekly salary, let alone a child or other family member. This is where child
swapping and the concepts of reciprocity come into play, as it was traditionally
before the materialization of standardized daycare. Because no regulated
governmental daycare was provided through the ADFC program, and because most
mothers worked one to two full time jobs, the concept of child swapping as an
extended form of daycare emerged. In the Flats a child could be passed around
from household to household for several months before returning to live with
their mother or father. The division of children, goods, and services among the
kin networks and the community at large replace the absence of affordable,
dependable, and convenient daycare.
The
1980’s sparked a hot bed of issues concerning childcare and daycare programs.
After the Second Wave of the Feminist Movement in the 1970’s, women had become
active members of the job market and economy. Although the jobs allotted to
women were lower paying jobs, the fact that women had entered the work force
drove up the concern for childcare. Many new daycare programs and centers began
to spring up in the 80’s, many of them were subsidized childcare programs that
had long waiting lists and lacked in quality of daycare.
There may or may not be enough love to go around. But there certainly is not enough child care. One of the most tragic indications of the lack of adequate child care services involves the 1987 death of two boys aged three and four in Florida. They were left alone while their mother was at work. They crawled into a clothes dryer and closed the door. The heat cycle automatically activated. They died in the machine. The child care arrangements their mother had made had fallen through. The boys had been in a waiting list for admission to a publicly subsidized child care program for at least a year and a half (Miller 1990:1)
Due to
the lack of affordable and safe daycare many American children were left alone,
in the hands of someone who not qualified in the daycare field, or were placed
in daycare programs that could potentially cause more harm than good in the
future.
The
idea of the Latchkey child became a widespread phenomenon in the 1980’s. Many
children, both preschool and school aged, were left in the homes to provide
their own care. These children lost something valuable they lost the
opportunity for early socialization and a place to develop both self and group
identity. The largest leaps in child development occur in their preschool
years. Children learn to identify themselves and the world around them through
observing and interpreting the behaviors of others they come into contact with,
and how they react themselves to those situations.
Today
childcare is still not unregulated nationwide. The laws for each state vary to
such great degrees that it is hard for daycare workers to move positions from
state to state. Communities and private homeowners have instituted many daycare
centers and programs privately. Without regulations many of these services are
inadequate and often dangerous for children. This creates a situation that can
stifle social development, confidence, and identity of children. Other
facilities, like that of MACFC, are specifically designed to accommodate
children’s developmental, emotional, and individual needs.
Setting
The
Mountain Area Child and Family Center is one of the rarely built “ideal”
buildings and is an easily accessible location. MACFC is in between the city of
Asheville and the rural area Swannanoa, North Carolina. It was built with the
help of raised money from Warren Wilson College, private donations, and
government funding. The building is situated on a small hill and is surrounded
by woods and it faces a large pasture. The center was built to accommodate
Buncombe County residents most of which are low-income families with at risk
children. The Family Center section of the center itself was established to
educate parents and children and provide specific services that fulfill the
needs of the both parties. MACFC was designed by the workers in a collage of
styles taken from European school. There is an art room, a large indoor
playroom, two infant rooms, two toddler rooms, and two preschool rooms. Only
one of each is operational right now, because the building is so new. The staff
of MACFC is made up entirely of women. The only exposure the children have to
older males are the fathers who come to drop off/pick up their children, the workers
building the playground outside, and male members of the education classes that
come to observe the center. This exposure to a mainly female populated
environment creates a centered space of female authority; reaffirming the bonds
small children make with their mother as the chief provider, care taker, and
authority.
The
center is extremely well lit, with wide sweeping hallways. There are several
small windows of varying heights that have been placed into the walls of the
rooms and offices. This is done so that all the children may watch and observe
each other, helping them to socialize themselves to the concepts of their
coming school years. Each classroom was built for it’s accommodating age
group.
The toddler room, like the others, is a large room, with
several large windows that face the playground and another classroom. The space
is completely open and there is a small loft that is used as the reading area.
The furniture is designed for small children; there are mini couches, chairs,
cubbies, tables, a sink, and two toilets. The bathroom is equipped with two
mini flushing toilets and a changing station. The bathroom is located in the
far front left side of the classroom. The door to the bathroom is half the
normal size and is fitted with a large window so other children may observe the
children using the potty; this is done to encourage toilet training. Like in
the hallways and other classrooms, the toddler room has a small sink where
children wash their hands before and after eating, going to the bathroom,
coming in from outside, or doing a messy activity. MACFC stresses the
importance of clean hands in order to prevent illness.
The
toys that have been provided for MACFC’s toddler room, for the most part, come
from the old Early Learning Center on Warren Wilson College. The other toys
have either been donated by the community, or purchased by MACFC. In the
toddler room the toys are varied from anatomically correct baby dolls to a
wooden train set, blocks, and lots of dress up clothing. Besides books, those
are the main toys coveted by the children. Reading is a big deal for the
toddlers, when they are upset, lonely, sleepy, hyper, happy, angry, or any
other emotion they almost always insist on having an adult read to them. The
interaction of reading socializes children to this learned behavior as well
associating children with the school environment. MACFC is set up like a small
preschool, although it chooses not to use that terminology. The children that
attend MACFC are receiving alternative day care services that have stemmed from
past dilemma’s in the daycare environment in the past.
Literature Review
The topic of gender roles in the day care
environment and how they affect both self and groups identity is best
summarized in Angela Browne Miller’s book The
Day Care Dilemma (1990). The book is based on several studies conducted in
the 1980s looking a problems surrounding daycare. She researched several sites
of varied forms of daycare. Her conclusions stated that children develop a
sense of self and learn social skills in the early part of their lives, and
with exposure to safe and nurturing environments children can grow into
socially functional adults. Rubin’s take on middle-class families concludes
that gender roles shape children’s identities and family structure. Her book Families on the Fault Line summarizes
how the demystification of the ideal family model has changed the societal
constructions of identity and group ties. Stephanie Coontz, in her book The Way We Never Were, also sheds light
on the problems of the ideal family model. The effects of the demystification
are the emergence of women in the work force, a call for better day care, and
the opportunities for children to develop their own socializations and
identities within the daycare environment.
The family unit as a whole shapes the way
in which children construct identity, socializes with others, and can determine
what type of childcare service can be provided to them. Coontz, Rubin, Miller,
and R.C. Ainslie’s The Child in the Day
Care Setting gives background to family structure’s history and how family
structure effects child development. The family is the initial place and
environment where children learn social skills, self identification, and
learning habits. Alison Clarke-Stewart’s book entitled Daycare, in the Developing child series, gives different
perspectives on how the family plays into child care outside of the home. The
studies in her book explain feelings of abandonment and separation of children
from their parents.
Identity
is also constructed through power struggles and socialization of different
groups, how they interact, and the effects dynamics and continuity among the
group. Robin Lynn Leavitt’s book Power
and emotion in Infant-Toddler Day Care addresses the concerns of children
struggling for personal and group identity in the day care environment as well
as looking at how children react to workers, the day care environment itself,
and the children they associate with. Many power struggles relate back to gender
identity and how those constructs play into the lives of children. Sherry
Ortner’s article “Is Female to Male as Nature is to Culture?” discusses the
controversy of nature verses nurture and male influence vs. female influence.
These struggles affect children because they witness the tensions that gender
roles, power plays, and the dominant culture have on family structure.
In the
context of family structure, children often place family identity onto the
workers and other children in the daycare environment. Children form
attachments to the workers, often exhibiting the same behaviors they would
toward their mothers. In forming bonds with the other children they are setting
the stage to perform associations that resemble family life. Role playing is
apart of this set up, by playing house or playing with baby dolls children
emulate what goes on in their home. Again Sherry Ortner’s article is useful for
this example in that it discusses whether it is nature or culture that
determines adult behavior. Also the book Exploring
Careers in Child Care Services by Jean Ipsa gives insight into how to deal
with child attachment, social grouping of children (that may result in rivalry
or cliquish behavior), and the feelings of separation children may have.
Analysis and Methods of Data
Gender
and Identity
Gender
is not only one of the main ways in which humans identify and socialize
themselves’ it is also one of the first ways. Through the construction and
behavioral carrying out of gender roles children learn how society expects them
to relate to one another and world around them. The children I observed at
MACFC are between the ages of one and three years old. This is the primary time
when children discover the biological differences between themselves, and when
they are taught how to behave according to the societal constructions of
gender.
Children
that are at the toddler age are just beginning to learn to vocalize feelings
and thoughts; they develop social patterns through play techniques. Some of the
more popular games that a toddler plays is dress up and playing house. These
games have traditionally perpetuated gender roles exhibited by the society and
culture of the children. In America, playing dress up and playing house have
marked a clear distinctions between the separation of roles for boys and girls.
If a little boy wants to play dress up he is given a cowboy costume, or perhaps
a police uniform, or a construction worker’s outfit; anything that can be
identified as a male role is used in play dress up for boys. Little girls are
given dresses, heals, make-up, anything that can be distinguished as being
“feminine”. Behavior that crosses these boundaries is typically punished. For
example, a little boy that wants to wear a dress and a tiara will be told that
is not what little boys do, and the adults in their society make girls that
exhibit “tomboy” qualities to play with dolls. My observations at MACFC were
somewhat different. The teachers do not enforce the dominant culture’s
construction of gender. When Micajeh asked if he can wear his hair in a
ponytail and plays dress up with a cheerleading skirt and his doll Dolphin, the
teachers do not scold him and tell him that that is not what little boys do.
Instead they allow him to explore his own forms of identity and do not
discourage his behavior by clearly stating it is not appropriate for his sex to
behave in that manner. I have observed, with my interactions with Micajeh, that
he identifies others around him as individuals and not as a gendered group.
In one instance Micajeh was in the middle of
playing house he stopped and wandered over to me, and told me that he was “pretty”. Our gendered language
typically constructs this word as feminine. In Micajeh's case he did not make
that connection. I later asked Micajeh who else he thought was pretty, and he
responded by identifying Kelsey, Cameron, Rebecca, and all the other children
as being pretty. The development of language for children of Micajah’s age is
important in constructing gender. Words are used not only to identify
characteristics that are gendered in individuals, but also used in identifying
the world around the children. The primary source of this kind of socialization
stems from the family then is perpetuated or dispelled in the daycare
environment. At MACFC, the majority of teachers and parents focus on the child
as an individual rather than a sex-typed person. Even when the children are at
play, the issues of gender and division of behavior between the sexes is not
distinguished. Many of the toddler boys prefer playing house, (i.e. pretending
to cook, clean, take care of babies, and dress up), than the toddler girls.
This behavior might be linked to their strong bonds with their mothers, and
through emulating a mother’s duties the little boys feel less unattached from
their mothers. On the other hand, many of the young girls prefer playing with
the train station, toy tools, and general rough housing to playing with
dolls/house. These behaviors are a way for the children to learn to share and
develop their own habits of play and communication with peers and adults.
Early
one morning when only a handful of children had arrived at MACFC, Rebecca told
me she had to use the potty. The bathroom in the toddler classroom is
specifically designed for the children. The toilets are small and low to the
ground. The door to the bathroom is half the normal size making it easy for
children to open, and there is a window cut into the door so the other children
can observe the potty goer. This window is a technique to help children
socialize using the potty as a positive behavior, rather than wearing diapers.
While Rebecca was using the potty, she looked up at me and told me that she did
not have a penis because she sits down when she pee, and that she was a girl.
Rebecca proceeded to tell me that little boys have penises and little girls are
different from little boys. I asked Rebecca who had told her that information
and she said her mommy and daddy did. Rebecca’s statements struck me as unusual
because when toddlers are learning to use the toilet both boys and girls sit
down while going to the bathroom. It was Rebecca’s parents that had influenced
her thinking about the differences between boys and girls, not her own
observations. “In group daycare,
infants are exposed to a social environment composed of more types and numbers
of people available for interaction than traditionally found in the home”
(Ainslie, 1984:133). It is the daycare environment that helps springboard children
into being socialized adults, but it is the family who initiates developing
behavior.
I
asked in my interviewing process the workers how they felt about the
construction of gender roles children who attend MACFC. Nikki responded, “They
definitely have them. This is the age when they begin to realize what the world
around them is like. They watch their parents and others and emulate their
behaviors. You can watch all the little girls vie for the babies (referring to
the dolls) and the boys want to play with the trains”. When I inquired how she
felt about Micajah and him wanting to dress in the cheerleading skirt and have
a ponytail in his hair she responded, “Well, even though they can distinguish
the differences between what boys and girls they still explore. At this age the
children are concerned with fulfilling their own needs, and exploration is a
vehicle for that”. Through role playing children can relate to the behaviors
and attitudes of their parents (families).
Family
and Identity
Historically, the family has provided the earliest human environment within which the child’s character is shaped (Kardiner, 1947). It is here that early patterns of compliance with authority are established. It is here that the child learns to curb his impulses and to adapt culturally appropriate ways of the journey from an immature, self-centered organism to a mature, socialized adult (Ainslie, 1984:67)
The
family is the most influential source for the development of a young child’s
mental and social health. During the early stages of childhood development, a child’s
family may be the only contact they have with the dominant culture and the
society they have been born into. Strong attachments develop between the mother
and child, making entering daycare a problem for most toddlers. As I mentioned
earlier in this paper, many of the children that attend daycare struggle with
being separated from their parent(s). The story of Ella and her troubles with
coping with being separated from her family is common, although her severity is
unique. Cameron, age two and a half, also had difficulty relinquishing his
routine with his family in order to enter daycare. Cameron cried until he had
worn himself out for the first two months of being at MACFC. The workers did
their best to sooth him, but he only stirred up the other children. Due to
Cameron’s and Ella’s lack of coping skills, the cozy corner was established in
order to teach the children that their behavior was not acceptable. Due to the difficulty of children adjusting
to the daycare environment, they either form attachments to one another (close
friendships) or to the daycare workers themselves. Children often use the
family structure to identify and socialize workers as having family roles.
Children often see the workers as alternative mothers, and that the nurturing
aspect of their job is taken as the nurturing aspect of their mothers. For
example, Kelsey is a toddler who’s mother is a worker in MACFC’s kitchen. As
her mother drops off Kelsey, and she goes to the kitchen to work, Kelsey
immediately turns to Laurie (one of the toddler room teachers) for comfort. She
is held by Laurie, read to, and carried around the room until she feels
comfortable enough to play with the other children. Kelsey exhibits the same
behaviors towards Laurie as Ella and Cameron exhibit towards their mothers.
The
fear of rejection, separation anxiety, lack of socialization, and abandonment
have all been issues surrounding the daycare environment. The quality of care
provided in the day care environment is crucial to a child’s development. If they
are not receiving proper stimulation than the child may suffer from anxiety,
feelings of abandonment, become introverted, and lack social/verbal skills that
are needed for their futures as adults. Tying back in with the history of day
care, Tamara Anderson and Beth Vail state, “Because women are responsible for
child care in most families, and because they earn less than men, they are
under tremendous pressure to find an exploitable, cheap labor force to care for
their children” (Anderson and Vail, 1995:). The quality of care determines the
forms of identity and socializations that come into play in the children’s
later lives.
In my
observations of MACFC, I noticed that the children displayed patterns of
socialization by repeatedly playing at the same activities with the same
children. This is a way of bonding among the children that establishes
behaviors such as sharing, verbal communication, and emotional dependence.
Emotional dependence in children starts with their families. They are
associated the thoughts, feelings, emotions, and the continuity of their
personal family structure from birth. Leavitt states in her book entitled Power and Emotion in Infant-Toddler Day Care
states, “Consequently, the overwhelming concern in the day care research to
date has been the effects of disrupting the mother-child bond, as mothers go to
work outside the home” (Leavitt, 1994:9).
In the case of Ella her attachment is so
strong that she carries around a photograph of her family as consultation
whenever she has feelings of withdrawal. Other children at MACFC have small
picture galleries of their family and friends placed at their eye level.
Children who are related to one another often exhibit stronger bonds. Joy and
Ella are cousins and frequently play with one another exclusively as well as
console, council, and consult one another. Another form of consultation for the
children is when parents either stay and eat breakfast with them, or come
during lunch. Many parents do this in order to help children deal with their feelings
of separation and abandonment. I observed that the parents not only comfort
their own children, but those who their child socializes with. They also help
in letting the children define their gender roles by letting them play dress
up, house, or with the toy train. When a mother or father comes to eat, or
spend time with their child they help to break their child’s identification of
the workers as mother figures. Many children, due to their feelings of loss
and/or abandonment, will reconstruct their family structure within the day care
environment. I have heard the children slip and call one of the workers mommy
several times. Often when dropped off by a parent, the child will cling to one
of the workers in the same manner as they did with the leaving parent drops
them off. The reconstruction of their own personal family structure must be
modified since there are no male workers at MACFC and that the workers are of
different racial backgrounds than from they are from. This does not affect
authority of the workers. They use techniques that ensure that the child knows
they have done a wrong action, but without isolated, humiliating or physically
harming the child. There are several phrases the workers use to discourage
improper behavior: phrases such as, “We do not hit our friends”, “That hurt our
friend, we do not hurt our friends”, “Please put that down, we are not playing
with that today”, and the use of “No” either comes before or after the phrases.
The workers do not raise their voices and have not hit a child for wrong
actions. These phrases, calm use of a disciplinary voice, and exhibit of power
is constructed in a way that the children learn to trust the
workers and not resist punishment.
Such
actions and behavior management reconstructs family roles of parental authority
with the day care workers. Young children have the tendency to ignore outside
authority and disregard punishment from adults other than their parents. The
phrases that the MACFC workers use are techniques to communicate with the
children who are misbehaving on a level that they can understand and interpret
easily.
Identity
through Socialization: Power struggles
The ability to predict landmarks of
normal growth and development has limited utility in that every individual
develops at his or her own rate. Any form of care, especially group care, which
fails to take into account an individual’s unique characteristics of
development risks the omission of crucial responses to the individual’s needs
(Miller, 1990:103).
The
role of caregivers in the daycare environment is an important and highly
influential role in a child’s life. From the caregiver children receive
affection, positive reinforcement, encouragement, and physical and mental
skills needed for a future life in society. Children place the same
characteristics of their families on the workers. This causes several problems
and power struggles between the workers and children. Although children
recognize the workers as authority figures they may rebel against punishment.
This is due to several factors such as exposure to outside authority figures,
their self absorption of basic need fulfillment, and coping methods for being
separated from their families. Children at the toddler age are just beginning
to form their identities and often feel constrained when told they are not
allowed to something because they are trying to satisfy their needs. When they
are told no, they are being denied the desired emotional need that is expressed
through the action they want to carry out. When a child wishes to play with a
doll that another child is playing with they do not think about whether the
doll can be shared they simply express the need to make the doll their own. To
own the doll would complete the emotional cycle of wanting and possessing. In
denying a child the completion of this cycle problems concerning authority
appear. I noticed one day that Alexa, a three year old, wanted to play with
everyone else’s dolls. She was not satisfied with possessing her own doll, but
wanted control over the other children’s toys. When Laurie repeatedly told her
to stop taking the other children’s toys and stating, “You already have you own
baby to play with, the other children would like to play with theirs” and Alexa
not heading to Laurie’s warnings about being placed in time out, Alexa still
continued to attempt to have all the baby dolls. She was eventually placed in
time out after she pushed Lena down and took her doll. I inquired after how
Laurie felt about Alexa’s refusal to listen to her authority and how she felt
about punishing Alexa. Laurie stated:
Well, it’s always difficult to punish a child that is not your own. Even verbally having to discipline them can be difficult. You become frustrated when they don’t pay attention to what you are saying, and it is hard to separate a child from the group, because it can change your relationship with that child. There is a thin line between being friends with the children and also acting as authority figure. You have to build trust while keeping your distance because you are not their mother.
Resistance is a large concern for the day
care workers. Some children do not respond to the authority of the workers even
after punishment. The workers are often faced with a child that refuses to
listen and be conditioned to the constructs of right and wrong. The workers at
MACFC focus in on this problem and when it is recognized in a child, extra
attention and diversion tactics go into effect towards the child. They are
shown that their actions are inappropriate and that their behavior will lead to
the revocation of certain privileges. They do this in a manner that allows the
child to understand their actions and the actions being put on them. Leavitt
uses the perspectives of other social theorists to explain this point. She
says, “Foucault (1998) posited that power is not completely controlling, that
there is always the possibility of resistance in the relations of power (p.
12). Likewise, Goffman also believed that persons simultaneously embrace and
resist institutional rules and expectations” (Leavitt, 1994:38). Children at
the toddler age are taught and restricted to certain behaviors that acquaint
them with the society and its customs that surrounds their developing lives.
Conclusions
Through my research I
found that it is extremely important for children to have access to adults
outside of their families and have exposure to other children of their own peer
group. This exposure results in the development of self and groups identity, as
well socializing skills that are important to build before a child reaches
school age. With alternative programs like that of MACFC children become
prepared to enter the larger world and the environment outside of their home.
They build verbal communication skills, learn to form friendships and build
trust, gain motor skills, a sense of the world around them, and learn to obey
the authority of people outside their families. At MACFC I discovered that
gender roles are constructed through the parents first, and then the children
are allowed to explore their own interpretations of those roles. I found that
they identify themselves spatially with the environment of the day care
facility and home. I discovered that children tend to place maternal roles onto
the day care workers, and that their authority is constructed out of these
ideas. An individual child will struggle for control over their activities and
possessions not only with other children but also with the day care workers.
Also, there is a call for affordable, reliable, safe, and high quality day care
in America. Too many children in America are not receiving the care they need
for proper development mentally, psychologically, and physically. It is centers
like that of the Mountain Area Child and Family Center that will provide solid
foundations for child development in personal and group identity as well as
skills necessary for socialization with the societies and cultures that
surround children.