Toy Rentals Also 'Walking Through' to Maintain Social Distancing

Seodaemun-gu Makes Every Effort to Minimize Childcare Gaps for Infants and Toddlers Due to Daycare Center Closures

The 'Seodaemun-gu Childcare Comprehensive Support Center,' a one-stop childcare support hub. Although temporarily closed due to COVID-19, it provides 'home content for stay-at-home childcare' and operates 'popup days for toy rentals.'

[Asia Economy Reporter Jongil Park] Seodaemun-gu (Mayor Moon Seok-jin) announced on the 14th that it is making every effort to minimize the care gap for families with infants and toddlers due to the prolonged closure of daycare centers caused by COVID-19.

First, during the closure period, guardians who find it difficult to provide home care due to both parents working can use the “emergency childcare” service, which operates meal service, snacks, and transportation as usual, from 7:30 a.m. to 7:30 p.m.

Among about 5,700 infants and toddlers in daycare centers within Seodaemun-gu, the number of children using emergency childcare has increased to about 2,300 (40.4%) this month, roughly double the 20.6% on the first day of closure, February 25.

The district conducted disinfection at 156 locations including daycare centers, the Childcare Support Center, and the Healthy Family Multicultural Family Support Center, and provided 16,500 children’s masks, 15,652 adult masks, and 1,554 hand sanitizers.

Each daycare center communicates with families by sending materials such as “Introducing Our Class Friends” and “Home Play” through infant communication apps and social network services (SNS).

In particular, although the Seodaemun-gu Childcare Support Center (31 Moraenae-ro 15-gil), a one-stop childcare support hub, is temporarily closed, it is receiving great responses by operating projects such as a toy rental pop-up day for “Homebound Childcare,” home content for “Homebound Childcare,” and the “Kids Clean Plus” project that dispatches cleaning professionals to emergency childcare daycare centers.

The “toy rental” is conducted in a walking-through manner to comply with social distancing. On weekdays from 12 p.m. to 6 p.m., six families per hour, totaling 30 families per day, visit after making reservations on the website in advance.

The “home content” will be provided free twice a week for one year on the center’s website using EBS and early childhood education specialist sites, offering various content in areas such as ▲Safety and Health (Infectious Disease Prevention Rules with Mom Katuri, Handwashing & Cough Etiquette with Pengsoo, etc.) ▲Play Methods (Parent-child interactive play activities, Let’s Play Art, etc.) ▲Parent Education (Understanding Children’s Minds, Growing Together with Children, etc.).

Additionally, the easy infant cooking activity content “Homebound! Cooking Cook!” will be produced by the Seodaemun-gu Childcare Support Center and provided once a week.

Seodaemun-gu ensures that infants and toddlers can use daycare centers more safely by having cleaning professionals disinfect and clean shared spaces within daycare centers through the “Kids Clean Plus” project.

As a direct solution to the childcare gap, the district operates the “Childcare Service,” where professionally trained babysitters visit homes to provide care.

In particular, the usage hours during the daycare closure period are not included in the annual government support limit of 720 hours.

Also, government support for service fees per hour has been expanded (up to an additional 40% support). Currently, 144 babysitters are active in Seodaemun-gu, and last month, 179 households used this service.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.