Age Definitions
Understanding your child’s age and how that connects with opportunities is an important part of choosing care and education programs.
Infants
Community Care Licensing division (CCLD), the CA state entity that oversees all licensed care in CA, defines infants as a child that is 0-24 months old. While some schools or family care homes may have policies that differ, most centers that serve infants can begin caring for children at 6-weeks old.
Toddlers
CCLD does not define the toddler age, rather they say any child over 24-months old is a “preschool child”. This age definition does not necessarily mean that all preschool programs would be eligible to serve 2-year-old children. Additionally, private preschools may divide classrooms further (i.e. 18 months, etc.). It is important to understand what other age groups your child will be interacting with.
Preschool
CCLD defines any child over 24 months to kindergarten entry as “preschool children.” This means there are different licensing standards, including child to adult ratios, teacher qualifications and more, for this age group. Different programs, such as the CA State Preschool Program, may have different age definitions to determine qualification for programs.
TK Age
A child who turns 4 years old by September 1st is age eligible to attend TK in California.
School Age
Children are not required to attend school in CA until 6 years of age. For kindergarten, they must have their 5th birthday on or before September 1st of the school year of which they are enrolling, and for 1st grade, they must have their 6th birthday on or before September 1st.