I-T CHILD: Building Babies Brains with the Power of Healthy Relationships  

Frequently Asked Questions by Home-Based Care Providers

What is this research study?

 We are looking at how family day care providers, with help from early childhood consultants, can support the social, emotional, and holistic development of very young children through their daily interactions. 

Why participate?

By working one-on-one with a consultant, they can help you strengthen your caregiving practices by

  • Sharing information and strategies on how to boost the healthy social and emotional development of infants and toddlers in your program;

  • Answering your questions about challenges with caregiving;

  • Offering support tailored to your individual needs as a family day care provider;

By the end of consultation, you can gain new strategies and skills to support the children in your care.


How does this research project work?

Family day care providers are assigned a consultant who will visit frequently to provide one on one support over 3-4 months. The consultant meetings might be weekly meetings that are virtual or in-person, depending on current COVID regulations and your comfort level.

 

You will be assigned to one of 3 groups (lottery):

  • Group 1 will work with a consultant in the winter (~January) 2022

  • Group 2 will work with a consultant in the spring (~April) 2022

  • Group 3 will work with a consultant in the summer (~June) 2022)

Providers fill out surveys online or over the phone with support. These surveys go to the data collection team at Yale University, who is evaluating the effectiveness of consultation. Providers receive gift cards for responding to surveys at each wave of data collections (winter, spring and summer).

Observers from Yale will also visit each program three times (winter, spring and summer) to conducts an observation to examine how the services are working to strengthen your caregiving skills.  

 

Who is involved? 

  • Licensed NYC-based family day care providers serving infants and toddlers. Participation is limited, so if you are interested please sign up soon. Participation is voluntary and you may decline participation at any point in time.

  • Yale University- Yale is collecting the data from this study and helping to coordinate all of the partners.

  • Consultants- Consultants are the specially trained people who will work one-on-one with providers to provide weekly meetings (consultation). You can talk to your consultant about your work as a child care provider. They can help you think about ways to support the children in your care and introduce you to new strategies. They can also help you recognize the amazing things that you are doing every day to support your “kids”, because we know that you care for them like your own family! Consultants may be employed from:

  • Adelphi University

  • Docs for Tots 

  • Committee for Hispanic Children & Families (CHCF)

 

Where will this study take place?

Consultants will work directly with providers, either virtually or in-person. All data collection will also happen in your program. Yale will send you links to online surveys or communicate with you via phone or text message, whichever works best for you!

 

When will this study happen? 

All providers who choose to participate will be enrolled in the study by December 2021. Each provider will be assigned to group 1, 2 or 3. Survey data will be collected from all providers, in all groups, in the winter, spring and summer 2022.

Do you have more questions?

Please email the project staff at: itchild@yale.edu