Child Care Arrangements of Language-Minority Children: Care Provider’s Language Use

In the United States, child care arrangements serve increasingly linguistically diverse populations of children. However, little is known about patterns of childcare arrangements for language-minority children and the linguistic environment of child care arrangements. Using the Early Childhood Program Participation Survey of the 2001 National Household Education Surveys Program (ECPP-NHES, 2001), this report asks three research questions: (1) what are the patterns of child care arrangements for language-minority children?, (2) do child care arrangements differ by language use of the child?, and (3) what factors are associated with the child having a care provider who speaks a non-English language? The results show that after controlling for the characteristics of the child, children are less likely to be in nonparental care (i.e., center-based programs, and relative care or nonrelative care) when the child speaks a non-English language mostly. However, this association disappears when characteristics of parents and household are controlled. The results also suggest that language use of the child as well as parents are important factors associated with the care provider’s language use. These findings may suggest that an additional context, the linguistic environment of child care arrangements, contribute to a child’s non-English language use.