Parents often say raising kids is exhausting but rewarding work. Now we know moms and dads with kids under age 6 spend more than five hours a day on secondary child care alone, according to a new survey.

Overall, parents spend, on average, 5.6 hours on secondary child care, which is when they have a child in their care while also doing something else, such as housework, the Labor Department’s American Time Use Survey found. These moms and dads also spend roughly two hours a day on primary childcare, which includes physical care and story time.

While the study summary doesn’t offer broad interpretations of these findings at least parents know why they are so tired by 9 p.m. And I am sure a wave of magazine articles are coming about the modern mom and dad.

(Thanks to the Wall Street Journal blog The Juggle for highlighting this survey.)

New Tunes: It is summer and if you want a break from early learning research reports and legislative debates check out the new album from Recess Monkey.

One of the hardest working and best kindie rock bands around, the Seattle-based trio released their eighth album, “The Final Funktier,” last week.

While I have only heard a couple of tracks, these three grade school teachers consistently put out albums that kids and their parents enjoy, full of upbeat songs with a Beatles influence. (If you want a proven album, check out “Tabby Road.”)

You can buy “Final Funktier”at the Recess Monkey Town website , Sonic Boom, CD Baby and Amazon.com.

Summer vacation is starting for many students and that means many parents are reviewing their television-watching rules.

It turns out their rules matter, a new study says. Children with parents who set consistent rules about watching the tube were less likely to stare at it for more than the one to two hours a day recommended by the American Academy of Pediatrics.

Unfortunately, only roughly half of parents, 49 percent, said they often or very often put limits on how much time their kids spend watching TV, according to the study published online today by Pediatrics,  the journal of the American Academy of Pediatrics. More than a quarter of kids in the study, 27 percent, watched more television than the AAP recommends.

Now the study focused on kids aged 9 to 15 years, but there are lessons for parents who have preschoolers.  (The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends no screen time for kids age two and under.) Perhaps the best lesson from this study is that parents’ rules work.

Our study results suggest that programs that focus on the development of parental limits and that promote physical activity may lead to decreased screen time among youth aged 9 to 15 years. Programs to reduce screen time must address the roles of parents and parental rules, target age, and socioeconomic characteristics of families. Programs might best be focused on educating parents about recommended limits and the importance of consistent rules. – “Influence of Limit-Setting and Participation in Physical Activity on Youth Screen Time.”

The study also said kids who were physically active on sports teams and in other activities were less likely to watch more than the recommended amount of TV.

Poverty Rising: We wrote about the 2010 Child and Youth Well-Being Index report last week, but Early Ed Watch highlighted another key and depressing finding:

“The percentage of children living in “extreme poverty” (50 percent below the poverty line) is projected to climb to 10.1 percent (7.41 million kids) in 2010.” – How the Great Recession is Affecting Kids. 6/14/10.

With time running out in the Washington State legislative session, a cut in child care subsidies for poor families remains a $30-million part of a House plan to balance the budget, though the Senate appears to support more funding.

The House budget plan now has a smaller version of Gov. Christine Gregoire’s proposed cut to the Working Connections Child Care program – a move that would force thousands of poor families from the program that provides child care subsidies and support, according to interest groups.

But, over in the Senate, the budget blueprint would preserve funding for the program.

Supporters argue that working but still poor parents would have a far harder time pulling their families out of poverty without this help with often hefty child care bills.

Without work supports such as WCCC, maintaining employment can be difficult if not impossible. According to the state Department of Early Learning, the average cost of a child care center for two children is about $1,177 per month. (Assuming one toddler and one school-age child.) As shown in the graph below, that is over half of the total monthly income for a family earning $24,000 per year. – “Important Work Support in Jeopardy,” Washington State Budget and Policy Center.

While it isn’t clear what will happen to the program, something should happen soon. The regular legislative session is slated to end March 11.  With a long and slow economic recovery now likely, the question is: Will legislators make the connections between working, the need for affordable child care and a stronger economy?

For further reading:

• “Child Care Subsidy for Working Parents in Jeopardy,” The Children’s Alliance, 1/29/10.
• “Important Work Support in Jeopardy,” Washington State Budget and Policy Center.

We learned a lot about brain development in babies and toddlers during the last few years, but the sheer volume of research sometimes could be more confusing than helpful to parents and teachers. On Wednesday, the Talaris Institute will help everyone make better sense of these reports and headlines in a free webcast.

The Seattle-based institute’s Elizabeth Nelson will lead a discussion on what moms and dads should know about their child’s development from birth to age five, and then answer questions.

“Brain science has answered many questions about development in the first years of life, but it always raises others. New findings, as reported by the media, may be confusing, misleading or offer contradictory conclusions,” Talaris said in a notice about its inaugural webcast. “This webcast will present an overview of important findings in early development, and what they tell us about what children need from their parents and caregivers.”

I am more than familiar with the bewildering nature of this research. When I was a journalist covering the parenting beat, I spent a lot of time simply trying to figure out what parents needed to know in the mountain of research that piled up on my desk every week. Does television make kids violent? Are baby DVDs helpful or maybe a little less than useful?

While those two reports were important, I learned much of the data didn’t relate to the daily work of parenting. So, I am glad to see experts such as Talaris’s Nelson step forward to help us understand what matters. (Talaris’s parenting products group, Parenting Counts is hosting the webcast.)

You can check out the session on Wednesday, Nov. 18. All you have to do is go to http://www.parentingcounts.org/webcast by 11 a.m.

Parents have another headache this back-to-school season because the recession is cutting back after-school care, the Wall Street Journal reports today, and that trend is likely rippling through preschool, pre-kindergarten and child care.

The story paints a sad picture of working parents sending their kids to malls and libraries, leaving them home alone or sending them home with their second-grade sibling.

“As schools open their doors this month and next, closings and cutbacks at thousands of after-school programs nationwide have parents scrambling to make alternative arrangements. Some are forging new child-care alliances with neighbors, or turning their work or sleep schedules upside down to watch their children after school. A growing number will leave young schoolchildren home alone, or in the care of siblings.” – Parents Scramble as Ax Falls on After-School Programs, WSJ, 08/26/09.

The recession has clearly reshaped after-school care in my house. As a full-time stay-at-home dad and part-time journalist, I’m now in charge of after-school time. But, we know we are lucky and that many parents can’t rely on a spouse’s job to bridge this gap.

While the Afterschool Alliance doesn’t have hard data on the earliest years of school, you could expect similar cuts in the early learning community, the Washington, D.C.-based group’s vice president for policy and research, Jen Rinehart, told me this afternoon.

"A lot of the after-school providers we know are also providing care for younger kids during the day,” Rinehart said.

One parent quoted in the article said it all for many working and struggling parents.

"In this work environment, you can't really afford to go to your boss and say, 'I want my schedule changed,' " Mr. (Philippe) Zamor says.”You are grateful to have a job."

I am a big fan of the WSJ’s Sue Shellenbarger. She combines serious journalism chops, experience raising her own two children and three step-children and context derived from the fact her kids are now older to create some of the best family reporting out there.

Check out Shellenbarger’s latest story and join the interesting debate at The Juggle, one of the more useful online forums for parenting topics.

Working parents too often confront big information gaps when looking for child care and are forced to rely on friends, neighbors, word of mouth, turnover rates and tours to help make one of the more important choices for their child.

The good news is parents can get help this coming Wednesday by tuning in to a free webinar, “Will You Know High-Quality Child Care When You See It? How to Assess Child Care Settings.”  It is the latest development in efforts by policy groups, researchers and governments across the county to boost child care quality.

The idea is to get two experts, Niki Smidt and Mujaahida Latif , talking about how to find quality child care and then open it up for questions from moms and dads. It’s the brainchild of Child Care Aware Parent Network, a joint venture of the National Association of Child Care Resource and Referral Agencies and the Child Care Bureau, a division of the Department of Health and Human Services.

In Washington, families may soon have an easier time finding quality licensed child care.

State early learning organizations are in the early stages of creating a system that would rate licensed center-based and home-based child care businesses, so that families can get objective information about child care in their community – much like the ratings you can already find for restaurants and hotels.  The system would reward existing high quality licensed child care businesses as well as offer support and resources to all licensed child care professionals who commit to improving their learning environments and the care they provide.

Thrive by Five Washington has partnered with local early learning organizations and more than 60 providers are currently testing pieces of the system in Yakima and White Center. Thanks to funds approved during the 2009 legislative session, Thrive and the state’s Department of Early Learning will support testing of additional pieces of the system in Clark, Kitsap and Spokane counties.

While Thrive helps to develop this new rating system, check out the webinar on July 22 by registering here.

What: “Will You Know High-Quality Child Care When You See It? How to Assess Child Care Settings."

Where: Online.

When:  Working family-friendly time 8:30 p.m., 5:30 p.m. Pacific Standard Time.

The cost of child care continued to outstrip inflation last year, with care often costing more than food and rent, a new report found.
Last year, the annual cost of center-based infant care reached as high as $15,895, while quality care at an accredited center hit $16,835, according to “Parents and the High Price of Child Care: 2009 Update.”

“The bottom line is that you get what you pay for,” Linda Smith, executive director of the National Association of Child Care Resource & Referral Agencies, said in a statement. “And today’s economy only makes it that much harder for parents who are already struggling with the current cost of child care to afford the quality child care their children need and deserve.”

The cost of child care rivaled or topped other essentials. Parents, on average, spent more on child care fees than food in every region of the country, the report said. In fact, while the nation’s cost of living rose 3.8 percent last year, center care for a baby rose 4.8 percent and care for a four year old jumped 6.2 percent, the report said, relying on Bureau of Labor Statistics data.

New York topped the list of least affordable states for baby care, with Massachusetts the second most expensive, followed by Minnesota, Colorado, California, Hawaii, Oregon, Illinois, Wisconsin, and Indiana, according to the report. (Washington State ranked 13th.)

The report offered a few interesting recommendations beyond the demand for greater federal funding of child care grants, including a suggestion the early learning-friendly Obama administration could embrace.

“Requiring the Department of Health and Human Services in conjunction with the National Academy of Sciences to determine the cost of quality child care and report back to Congress.”

The report’s broader goal gets to the heart of the early learning issue: Are child care, preschool and pre-k parts of our commitment to public education or elements of a different and complimentary system?

The Virginia-based child care group suggests its position in another recommendation.

“Designing a system to help underwrite the cost of child care so that all families, not just wealthy families, can afford the cost of quality child care.”

Many moms and dads are anxious about the job market, but their work-family dance can become a lot more complicated if they take graveyard shifts. Plus, they and their kids may pay a price, the American Prospect reports this week.

Preschool children whose parents work nonstandard hours are less likely to be cared for in formal child-care settings that may provide important school-readiness experiences. One study finds that children under age 3 whose mothers have worked nonstandard hours perform significantly worse on cognitive tests. Problematic effects of parents' schedules are apparently not limited to young children; levels of depression reported by adolescents are higher when mothers work evenings (and also when fathers work irregular hours). – “Outside the 9-to-5: When most of us are at home, at night and on the weekend, millions of people - many of them women with children - are at work,” American Prospect, 6/9/09.

The story makes the point that fast-food workers, hospital staffers, police officers and others working outside the traditional grind don’t get the same work-family attention as the rest of us. That is a big deal in the global marketplace where businesses increasingly feel pressure to run 24-7.

What is the answer? We are sure to hear ideas from the Obama administration, which is trying to make work-life balance a major issue inside the beltway. The American Prospect article points out protections that off-shift workers enjoy in Europe, but it seems unlikely this country will adopt Norwegian, Dutch or German models. But, I can envision political support for expanding off-hours child care options.

It is hard enough finding quality child care from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Can you imagine locating good care for an 11 p.m.-to-7 a.m. shift?

In the Seattle area, "for all programs (both centers and family child care) 17 percent offer evening care; 8% offer overnight and 12% offer weekends," says Child Care Resources here in Seattle.

This information helped shape an intriguing four-part series, “When Opting Out Isn't an Option: It's time to shift the conversation about women and work,” which explores the real mommy challenge: The majority of women cannot choose to opt out or opt in, but have to work as they raise their kids.

Swine flu appears to have hit Washington state. What should child care teachers do? What should they tell parents and their kids? Birth to Thrive compiled a list of resources to make navigating this health scare a little easier.

Tips for Child Care Workers:

• Health Department Offers Guidelines for Child-Care, School Officials on Possibility of Swine Flu – Idaho Statesman, via National Association of Child Care Resource and Referral Agencies

Basic Information from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention:

• Preventing the Spread of Influenza (the Flu) in Child Care Settings
• Questions & Answers: Swine Influenza and You
• Swine Flu home page
• Interim Guidance for Swine influenza A (H1N1): Taking Care of a Sick Person in Your Home
  

Commentary and News:

• Swine Flu: Should Government Mandate Paid Sick Leave? The Juggle offers a thoughtful look at the delicate balance parents struggle to achieve between illness and their need to work:

This public-health imperative could hardly come at a more difficult time. Many jugglers face two hurdles to missing work: Time and money. On the time front, can you afford to stay home if you’re not sure you’re dealing with a real illness? Anyone not hard at work under the boss’s nose these days can feel more vulnerable to being laid off. – The Juggle, Wall Street Journal.

Plus: The latest from the Wall Street Journal. It offers a lot of statistics and updates.

• Parent’s Fears about Swine Flu – Lisa Belkin
  

There are health emergencies, and then there are reminders of the thin line that so regularly keeps us away from health emergencies. It’s an invisible barrier most of the time, but when it shows itself it can be terrifying.– New York Times, 4/27/09.

Washington state help:

• Swine Influenza: Public Health: Seattle & King County There are a lot of helpful items here, from tips for child care providers to a “Pandemic Flu Planning Guide.”
  
• Swine Flu Information: Washington State Department of Health.
  This guide is only an entry to the growing body of advice and news on the Internet, but it should get teachers and parents started.
        

Today marks the start of the Week of the Young Child, and people are already celebrating with organized and unplanned actions. Washington state lawmakers got a jump on the festivities late last week by voting to make early learning part of basic education.

Essentially, the week focuses on the needs of the nation’s young children and their parents, how we help them and how we fail, such as the fact that 24 percent of children under age six live in poverty, according to the event’s sponsor, the National Association for the Education of Young Children.

“We can invest now in our children and families and enjoy long-term savings, with a more vibrant nation of healthy, achieving children and more stable families. Or we can fail to make the investment and pay the price: increased delinquency, greater educational failures, lowered productivity, less economic competitiveness, and fewer adults prepared to be effective, loving parents to the next generation of children.” – NAEYC, Key Facts and Resources for the week.

Here at Thrive by Five, we are marking the week with five new segments in our Learning for Life series on KONG TV. (It runs locally on channels 6 and 16 between 7:30 a.m. and 8 a.m.You can also find links to all segments that have been broadcast on Thrive's Learning for Life page.

There is a lot of good stuff – clips on the importance of early literacy, child care help for struggling families and a look back at Seeds of Compassion. Wednesday’s segment explores the cutting edge work Thrive and others are doing in White Center and East Yakima.

Here is the lineup:

• Monday: Seeds of Compassion – One Year Later
• Tuesday: Reach Out and Read Washington State
• Wednesday: Thrive by Five Washington Demonstration Communities
• Thursday: The Early Childhood Education Assistance Program (ECEAP)
• Friday: Family, Friends and Neighbors Care (FFN)
  

Let us know what are you doing to mark this year’s Week of the Young Child!