Stephanie became a family day care educator for her children

Stephanie became a family day care educator because she wanted to provide the best possible care to her own two children.

Closely mirroring a family-style atmosphere, qualified Family Day Care educators offer professional child care from their own homes.

Stephanie had previous experience running her own business and after researching the benefits of family day care, she decided to operate her own family day care so she could care for her children and others.

The small child to educator ratios in family day care was one of the biggest attractions for Stephanie. A family day care educator can care for no more than seven children under 13 years or four children of preschool age or under.

“As a family day care educator, you can provide a huge amount of individual attention to each child. I get to know the children on a very personal level because I care for them every time they come to care. It’s a very different scenario to a busier long day care environment where the children might be seeing multiple educators every day,” says Stephanie.

The small class sizes allow Stephanie to focus on individual learning programs within learning through play theme. “I choose monthly themes to explore based on what the children are interested in. For example, if a child is particularly fascinated by trains we might focus on transport,” she says.

Stephanie is diploma qualified educator and currently offers care four days per week.

“There is a real sense of bonding and a very close network of support within a family day care setting. It’s that individualised care that I wanted for my children and why parents also come to me for their children’s care,” she says.

Stephanie says she has also noticed that the children in her family day care do not tend to get sick. “So far I just have not had a lot of sickness amongst the children, possible because the smaller class numbers mean there is less exposure to illness,” she says.

For more information or to enrol visit here or call the Windermere Family Day Care team on 1300 946 337.