Working Parents: Choose to Stay Home, If the Choice is Yours

The new book, The Irreducible Needs of Children: What Every Child Must Have to Grow, Learn, and Flourish, is in the market. The book challenges our essential ideas about daycare. The argument they present is compelling: When both parents work full-time (30 hours or more a week), their infants and toddlers are at risk. The solutions they discuss involve a total reassessment of the notion that both parents can work full-time and sustain a healthy environment for their children.

The basic question addressed is whether we are failing our children. Will future generations have the intelligence, emotional health, and moral compass to lead the world in the 21st century and beyond? This question will be answered by how we nurture our infants and children now.

In this book is define a set of seven irreducible needs of children as follows:

• The Need for Ongoing Nurturing Relationships
  Every baby needs a warm, intimate relationship with a primary caregiver, over years, not months or weeks. Both emotional and intellectual development depend on such relationships, not early cognitive training or educational games. If this relationship is absent, or interrupted, disorders of reasoning, motivation, and attachment are likely. Infants, toddlers, and preschoolers need these nurturing interactions most of their waking hours. The best setting for such interactions is at home with parents. If they are to be provided by daycare, daycare must change significantly.
• The Need for Physical Protection, Safety, and Regulation
  Both in the womb and in infancy, children need an environment that provides these assurances. This includes protection from physical and psychological harm, from chemical toxins, and from exposure to violence.
• The Need for Experiences Tailored to Individual Differences
  Every child has a unique biological make-up and temperament. If early experience is tailored to nurture this individual child’s nature, learning and behavioral problems can be prevented and the child can develop to his or her full potential.
• The Need for Developmentally Appropriate Experiences
  Children of different ages need care tailored to their stage of development. Unrealistic expectations, too much stimulation or too little can thwart or hinder a child’s development.
• The Need for Limit-Setting, Structure, and Expectations
  Children need structure and discipline. They need discipline that leads to internal limit setting, channeling of aggression, and an ability to solve problems peacefully. To reach this goal, they need adults who empathize as well as set limits. They need expectations rather than labels, and adults who believe in their potential but understand their weaknesses. They need incentive systems, not failure models.
• The Need for Stable, Supportive Communities and Cultural Continuity
  To feel whole and integrated, children need to grow up in a stable community. This means a continuity of values in family, peer groups, religion, and culture as well as exposure to diversity.
• The Need to Protect the Future
  Unless the previous six needs are met for our children, and society makes these needs the highest priority, we will be jeopardizing our children’s future.

The following are some tough questions the authors raise and give their answers to in The Irreducible Needs of Children:

• Relationships and Nurturing
  Are American parents spending enough time interacting with their children? How much time with their parents do babies, toddlers, and older children need?
• Safety and Security
  Does every child deserve to be a wanted child?
  How do we balance the needs of the unborn with the rights of an addicted mother?
  Are environmental toxins to blame for the increase in autism and learning disorders?
  In the case of child abuse or neglect, when should we fight to preserve the family?
• Daycare and School
  Is daycare a massive social experiment that damages children?
  Should human development and childbirth education be part of every school curriculum?
  Is home schooling the best for certain kids?
  Should we mainstream special needs children?
  What grading system should we use in our schools?
  What class size is a good class size? How many adults are needed per child at each age?
  How much time should a child spend doing homework in grade school, junior high, and high school?
• Adoption and Foster Care
  How long should a biological mother be allowed to change her mind after releasing a baby for adoption?
  Should foster parents lose stipends if they are willing to adopt?
• Custody
  In a divorce, will joint physical custody hurt a child?
  At what age can a child be separated from his or her primary caregivers overnight? For a weekend? For a week or two?
  What guidelines should judges use for custody disputes?
  Should mothers who give birth in prison keep their babies?
• Limits and Discipline
  How much TV is too much TV?
  Why is “tough love” a bad idea?
  Is spanking child abuse?