Minimum Standards for Tribal Child Care: A Health and Safety Guide
Table of Contents (This document is also available in PDF and Word format.)
Section II:
Building and Premises
Nurturing and Enriching Environment
PrincipleA nurturing and enriching child care environment stimulates learning across all domains of a child’s development: social, emotional, cognitive, and physical.
Why This Is Important
- The quality of a child’s surroundings can have a significant effect on his or her happiness and emotional well-being.
- Children who are encouraged to respect the feelings and rights of others engage in positive relationships that build social competence.
- Healthy child development and brain growth requires human contact as well as interesting and stimulating surroundings.
Standards
- A written plan for daily activities should be in place. The daily plan should include the goals for children’s development and learning and the activities through which they will achieve these goals.
- Daily routines should be established to allow children to develop expectations and feel secure at the child care setting.
- Caregivers should model respect for the feelings and rights of others, and provide an environment that respects gender, culture, ethnicity, family composition, and the special emotional, cognitive, and developmental needs of the individual child.
- The child care setting should include toys, activities, and materials that are safe and appropriate for the various developmental stages of the children in care.
- All equipment in the setting should be designed to support the abilities and developmental levels of the children served, with adaptations made as necessary to support children with disabilities.
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