As part of its Home Based Child Care Supply and Quality Project, the Office of Planning, Research, and Evaluation has published a literature review that summarizes features of childcare quality in home-based settings. The work finds wide variation in the definition of home-based childcare (HBCC), but some common features of quality, including those related to learning environments and the providers relationships with children and families. The review finds that HBCC providers often excel at certain quality features like mixed age and nontraditional hours care, but also that there is scant scholarship on family friend and neighbor (FFN) care, compared with licensed/registered/listed family childcare (FFC). The paper concludes with recommendations that future research focus on children, families, and providers from historically marginalized groups, on HBCC for older children or children with disabilities, and on drawing in multiple or mixed methods to best understand the breadth and long-term outcomes of HBCC experiences.
