Set up your daycare forms with a clear, repeatable routine

Before printing, note the details that shape which fields and pages are useful in your program:

• Children’s age range, including whether you care for infants, toddlers, preschoolers, or school-age children.
• Your operating hours and whether care is full-day, part-time, after-school, or scheduled another way.
• Your capacity and how enrollment works, such as ongoing, seasonal, or session-based care.
• Whether you work alone or have additional caregivers who complete, check, or store records.

Use these answers to decide who will fill out each form, when it will be completed, and where it belongs.

Check current requirements with your state licensing agency and applicable local authorities before adapting a template. Keep required information, tailor the remaining fields to your care arrangement, and remove questions that serve neither your operations nor a requirement.

• Use child-specific instructions only where they help caregivers provide the agreed care or complete a required record.
• Make fields and prompts understandable to every caregiver who will use them; separate enrollment details from daily notes.
• Keep health fields for organizing reported information and observations. They do not diagnose, prescribe, or provide treatment.

Do not collect extra details simply because a blank is available. Keep the information that supports your program or a verified requirement.

The toolkit’s six files work together from intake through everyday recordkeeping. Their titles and order are:

1. 01

   Attendance and health-tracking forms

   Use for dated attendance and factual daily care or wellness observations that are relevant to the child and day.

2. 02

   Incident documentation templates

   Keep event details, observations, response, family communication, and follow-up together in a separate incident record.

3. 03

   Enrollment and child-profile forms

   Gather enrollment details and family-shared child information in one place; use your center’s required forms and process for official records.

4. 04

   Parent communication templates

   Turn specific daily observations into concise, child-specific family updates and repeatable weekly summaries.

5. 05

   Quick-start guide

   Follow a practical sequence for using the attendance, care, incident, communication, and storage routines together.

6. 06

   Daily Attendance & Incident Record Forms

   Use the combined hand-completable pages for a daily attendance log and separate incident-record fields.

Choose a paper, digital, or hybrid filing method that fits your center’s established process. Keep enrollment and child-profile information, daily records, incident notes, and family messages easy to distinguish and retrieve.

Use the same sequence each day so another authorized caregiver can understand what was recorded and what needs follow-up:

• Keep one dated record for each child and operating day. Record actual arrival and departure dates and times when they happen.
• Write factual daily-care details that apply, such as meals, fluids, rest, toileting, or a wellness observation. Describe what you observed; do not guess.
• Keep a separate incident note. Record observed facts, the response, family communication, and follow-up as distinct details.
• Before sharing a family update, check the child, date, details, and recipient. Use only the communication channel your center has approved.
• Review and store records using your center’s established process. Mark a detail “Unknown” or “Not applicable” when that is accurate instead of guessing or leaving an ambiguous blank.

Follow your center’s practices for limiting access, correcting records, and deciding how long to retain them.

For more detail, read the attendance and incident guide or the parent-update guide.