day care

[dey kair]

noun

1. supervised daytime care for preschool children, the elderly, or those with chronic disabilities, usually provided at a center outside the home.

   Finding quality day care that we can afford has been challenging.

adjective

1. of, relating to, or providing day care.

   daycare center;

   day-care program.

Word History and Origins

Origin of day care¹

First recorded in 1895–1900 for noun, and 1940–45 for adjective

Example Sentences

He got his 17-month-old son ready for day care, put him in the car and drove to a school in Chicago’s Roscoe Village neighborhood.

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She’s got plenty of ideas about how to spend the tax revenue, from free day care to more public housing.

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Many sent a video from that morning of immigration agents running into a day care facility in Chicago’s Roscoe Village neighborhood to pull out a teacher.

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Public child care services survived the city’s fiscal crisis of 1975, largely due to the activism of working-class communities who fought against day care closures.

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A day care centre for children, a gym, a tax advisor – and a mini experimental steel plant.

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Related Words

• child care www.thesaurus.com
• daycare 
• nursery 
• nursery school 
• preschool