Family Child Care in Columbia, MD, 6 Weeks to 5 Years

Why a home

Why Parents Choose a Family Child Care in Columbia, MD

Parents in Columbia choose a family child care home when they want their child known by one adult instead of passed between rooms. The group is small, the space is a house, and the person who greets your child in the morning is the same person who tells you how the day went.

That matters most in the first year out of the house. A child settling into care is learning a room, a routine and a person all at once, and a home takes two of those variables off the table.

A child who starts here as a baby does not meet a new teacher every September. They stay until they leave for kindergarten.

The setting

A Home Setting, Not a Center

Morning Dew Family Childcare runs in a home, not in a commercial childcare center. In practice that means a small group, one consistent provider, and a day that looks more like family life than like a school timetable.

Maryland treats family child care homes as their own category, with their own registration, training and inspection requirements, separate from the rules that apply to child care centers. Morning Dew holds Maryland family child care registration #260200.

The group

Mixed-Age Learning, From 6 Weeks to 5 Years

Children from 6 weeks to 5 years learn together in one mixed-age group instead of in separate age classrooms.

Infant care starts at 6 weeks. A baby joins the same home, with the same provider, and stays through the preschool years, so there is no move to a different program at two.

Younger children pick up language, routines and self-help skills by watching older ones do them first. Older children practice explaining, waiting and leading, which is how a four-year-old consolidates what they already know. Siblings stay in the same group instead of being split across two rooms and two schedules.

A child who joins as an infant keeps the same provider through to kindergarten. That is up to five years with one adult who knows how they settle, what they eat and how they handle a hard morning.

1. 6 weeksCan start here
2. Age 1Same provider
3. Age 2Same provider
4. Age 3Same provider
5. Age 4 to 5Same provider
6. KindergartenLeaves ready

Verify it

Maryland Family Child Care Registration #260200

The provider

More Than 20 Years With Children, 3 Years in Columbia

The program

School Readiness Through Play

School readiness at Morning Dew happens through play, not through worksheets.

Children explore colors, textures and creative movement using open-ended materials, the kind that can be a tower one morning and a road the next. Open-ended activities are the ones with no single correct outcome, and that is what makes a three-year-old keep going after the first attempt falls over.

By the time a child leaves for kindergarten they have practiced what kindergarten actually asks for: sitting with a group, following a two-step instruction, managing a coat and a lunch box, asking an adult for help, and finishing something they started.

The program supports children academically, emotionally and spiritually, in a family setting.

Where we are

Serving Columbia and Howard County

Morning Dew Family Childcare is based in Columbia, Maryland, and serves families across Columbia and the surrounding Howard County area. The home is eco-conscious, kept clean and safe for children to play and learn in.

Most families pick a family child care home within a short drive of home or work, since the trip happens twice a day, five days a week. If you are in Columbia or nearby in Howard County, we are worth a visit.