Daycare Teacher Job Description: Template, Duties, Requirements & Pay (2026)

A daycare teacher runs a classroom of infants, toddlers or preschoolers in a child care center: planning the day, keeping children safe and fed, supporting their development and keeping parents informed. Below is a copy-ready daycare teacher job description template, a short preschool teacher assistant version, the federal background check rules that decide how fast a new hire can start, and what federal pay data says about the two occupations this title straddles.

What a daycare teacher does

In a center, a daycare teacher is responsible for one room and one age group. The day is greeting children and parents at drop-off, running a planned schedule of play, circle time, meals, naps and outdoor time, changing diapers or helping with toileting, keeping daily records of meals, naps and incidents, and telling parents at pickup how the day went. O*NET's task lists for this work include maintaining a safe play environment, supporting children's emotional and social development, sanitizing toys and equipment, and identifying signs of emotional or developmental problems and bringing them to parents' attention.

The title sits across two federal occupations, and which one describes your role changes the posting. O*NET lists "daycare teacher" as a reported title for childcare workers (SOC 39-9011), whose typical entry-level education is a high school diploma and whose median pay was $16.82 an hour in 2025. The neighboring occupation, preschool teachers (SOC 25-2011), lists an associate's degree as typical entry-level education, and the BLS says 65% of preschool teachers work in child daycare services. Inside that industry in May 2025, the BLS counted 347,720 preschool teachers at a $36,850 median and 269,970 childcare workers at a $34,170 median.

In practice, the job your state licensing rules call a lead or head teacher is usually closer to the preschool teacher profile, and an assistant or aide role is closer to the childcare worker profile. Decide which one you are hiring before you write a line, because the requirements, the pay and the candidates are different.

Daycare teacher job description template

This template is written for a lead classroom teacher in a licensed center. Replace the bracketed fields with your state's actual requirements and your room's details, and cut what does not apply.

Requirements: what to keep, what to soften, and what to drop

Child care postings mix three kinds of requirement: what your license requires, what makes someone good at the job, and what was copied from somewhere else. Only the first kind should be a hard requirement.

Requirement	What to know
Education and training hours	Keep exactly what your state requires for the role, and name the state rule. Adding a degree your license does not require shrinks the pool in an occupation where the BLS lists a high school diploma as typical entry-level education. Head Start is the exception: center-based Head Start preschool teachers must have at least an associate's or bachelor's degree in child development or early childhood education, or equivalent coursework (45 CFR 1302.91).
CDA credential	Make it preferred, and offer to pay for it. The BLS describes the Child Development Associate credential as requiring coursework, field experience and observation, renewed every 3 years. "We pay for your CDA" is a recruiting line that costs less than a vacancy.
Background check	Keep it, and say it includes fingerprints. It is required for licensed and subsidy-eligible providers, and candidates who know it is coming are less likely to drop out mid-process.
Age-group experience	Soften it. Someone who has cared for toddlers can learn an infant room; state the room and let them decide. Required "2 years in a licensed center" removes career changers and parents returning to work.
Health and immunization records	Keep them if your state requires them. The BLS notes that state licensing commonly requires a complete record of immunizations and a minimum training requirement alongside the background check.
Résumé upload	Remove it. Name, phone, the room they want and whether they already meet your state's lead teacher qualifications are enough to call them.

Background checks: the federal rule that sets your start date

Under the Child Care and Development Block Grant regulations, states must require background checks for staff of licensed, regulated or registered child care providers and of providers eligible for child care subsidies. Under 45 CFR 98.43 the check has five parts: an FBI fingerprint check, a search of the National Sex Offender Registry, and searches of the state criminal registry, state sex offender registry and state child abuse and neglect registry in the state where the person lives and each state they lived in during the previous five years.

Two details belong in your hiring plan and your posting. The state must return results as quickly as possible but within 45 days of the request. And a prospective staff member may begin work once they have a qualifying result from either the FBI fingerprint check or the fingerprint-based state criminal check in their state of residence — but until every component is complete, they must be supervised at all times by someone with a qualifying check from the past five years. Existing staff must be rechecked at least once every five years. Your state's licensing agency runs the process, so link to its instructions in your offer letter. Our background checks guide covers the general mechanics.

How to customize it for your setting

Infant room

Say the ratio and the group size, and say how safe sleep and feeding are handled. Experienced infant teachers choose centers on whether the ratio is honored on a bad day, so if you staff above the minimum, say it.

Preschool and pre-K room

Name the curriculum and whether you have state pre-K funding, because it usually brings its own teacher qualification rules. Candidates with an associate degree look for this, and it is where the pay difference between the two federal occupations shows up.

Head Start and Early Head Start

State the qualification rule plainly and the path to meet it. Federal rules require Head Start preschool assistant teachers to have at least a CDA or equivalent state certificate, or to be enrolled in a degree program or in a CDA program to be completed within two years of hire (45 CFR 1302.91).

Faith-based and employer-sponsored centers

Religious, grantmaking and civic organizations employ 13% of preschool teachers, according to the BLS. If your center is part of a congregation, hospital or employer, say what that means for schedule, holidays and benefits. The employer's benefits package is often better than an independent center's and is worth putting in the first lines.

Preschool teacher assistant job description

The assistant teacher works in the same room under the lead teacher's direction, and in most states the qualifications are lighter, which makes it the role you can fill fastest and grow into a lead teacher. The BLS counts teacher assistants (SOC 25-9045) separately: in child daycare services in May 2025 there were 140,750 of them at a $34,920 median annual wage. The BLS notes that teacher assistants in childcare centers "work with a lead teacher to provide individualized attention that young children need." If you are hiring for a school classroom rather than a center, use our teacher aide job description instead; the federal paraprofessional rules there are different.

If you are hiring rather than describing the job, our child care staffing shortage guide covers why centers are short and what works, and our childcare interview questions cover the next step after the application. The broader recruiting side is on our frontline recruiting page.

Writing the ad version

The templates above are for your ATS and careers page. The ad on Facebook or Instagram has to answer four questions in the first two lines: what room, what hours, what pay, and whether they qualify. For example: "Toddler Teacher — $17–$19/hr. Mon–Fri, 7:30–4, no weekends. Free child care for your kids. No CDA? We pay for it. Apply in 60 seconds."

The strongest benefit in child care recruiting is often discounted or free care for staff's own children; if you offer it, it belongs in the first line, not the last. Keep the form to name, phone, room preference and the qualification question. Our candidate conversion rate guide covers why each extra field costs applicants, and our help wanted ad examples library has worked examples.

Preparing interviews for these roles? Our childcare interview questions are written for center directors and cover lead and assistant teachers.

Pay, employment, education, openings, largest employers and licensing statements: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics Occupational Outlook Handbook, Childcare Workers (last modified September 14, 2026), Preschool Teachers and Teacher Assistants (last modified August 27, 2026). Industry-level employment and wages in child daycare services (NAICS 6244) for SOC 39-9011, 25-2011 and 25-9045: BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025, via the BLS public data API. Tasks and reported job titles: O*NET OnLine 39-9011.00, 25-2011.00 and 25-9042.00. Background checks: 45 CFR 98.43; Head Start qualifications: 45 CFR 1302.91, both on eCFR. All read at source on September 28, 2026. General information, not legal advice; state licensing rules vary. Cost per applicant: Boostpoint 2026 Social Job Advertising Benchmark, report-wide median (the benchmark does not segment child care roles), advertising costs only. Cost per applicant is not cost per hire. Updated September 2026.