New data show that a growing percentage of children, especially children from well-off households, attend center-based care in the year before they attend kindergarten. In fact, only 21 percent of children now spend the year before kindergarten in parent-only care, though that percentage jumps to 35 percent among children from lower-income families.
The report, which was produced by a think tank, American Institutes for Research (AIR), for the U.S. Department of Education’s National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) based on a broad sample of children entering kindergarten, also shows that center-based care provides children with a boost in math and reading skills. That phenomenon is documented separately by Daphna Bassok at the University of Virginia’s Curry School of Education in the latest issue of “Child Development.”
For a complete review of the new data, the National Center for Education Statistics has produced this handy video:
Graphic courtesy of National Center for Education Statistics.