Really concerned about incident at nursery

[EvenLess]

Hello, I posted a thread a few weeks ago about DD (nearly 4) and her poor behaviour at nursery. I went in and met them, and we agreed some behaviour management strategies. Her behaviour at home is much better than it was a few months ago after a difficult start to the year for our family (bereavement, inquest into my DF's death, redundancy and more...). We've been working hard on emotional regulation.

DD was misbehaving and hitting/pushing other children - I am not excusing this, I continue to make clear our expectations of her behaviour and have spoken to her about this. However, the nursery decided to punish her by removing the Halloween dress my husband allowed her to wear to nursery that day... And she had no top underneath. I have heard 2 different stories about whether she was immediately dressed in her spare clothes or was going around topless. She did have her leggings on.

I'm really unhappy- I don't want her hitting others, but this seems humiliating and not a good message to her from a safeguarding perspective. I have told nursery I never want this to happen again, and have rung the HV for advice, who was also concerned. What would you do? I'm about to start a new job. Do I take her out of the nursery and keep her at home?

Does this sound like a setting capable of effective behaviour strategies to you?

Your responses on this thread are so far off, I truly hope you don't work with children or parents.

That is such a weird punishment. The only logical reason, as others have said is if there was an element of the costume or prop/accessory that the child was using to hurt other children, or the role play was causing them to behave inappropriatly. And you've said there was no fancy dress day, simply she wanted to wear a cat dress- so the punishment isn't her being excluded from participating in an event/theme day, it makes so sense Yes 3 olds would happily walk around naked-that doesn't mean it's okay to teach them that the removal of clothing should be used a punishment.

Hope that made you feel better.

Honestly shocked some posters are not appalled by this.

People seem to think nursery is the gold standard and they would never do wrong but having worked in childcare for years I'd never send my child to a nursery.

You said member of staff said topless but manager said changed immediately. They are covering it up. Happens all the time. You won't get the truth

When posters are deliberately obtuse in their responses, I think: do they seem to be enjoying attacking a woman ie the OP? do they seem like they have no knowledge of child safeguarding or child development?
Then I ignore them because they're not here to support parents - which is, after all, the purpose of MN. They're here for some other reason and no-one else needs to engage with that.

Hi @PurpleBugz , sorry to derail slightly but I’m really - and genuinely - interested to know why you’d never send your child to nursery as I’m currently weighing up our options. I agree this thread is concerning in itself of course though I hope rare!

This is very concerning to be reacting to a child with an unrelated and harsh punishment. I would be extremely concerned. Behaviour is a communication tool and if she does have sen then then accommodations and understanding of her needs are required.

@PurpleBugz do you feel the same
about preschools and childminders?

Was the manager there? The nursery I took my children too the manager was in the office rarely in with the children

Is there cctv

@PurpleBugz.. It's because people don't know.

Like old folks homes people thought they were amazing until something relatives started to question care, get cameras in.

I've said this many times. Any group of vulnerable people always need their loved ones to pop in occasionally and see them. It's the only way to 100 make sure all is just about ok. Of course you would never really know
I would only use nursery if it was a last resort.

do you feel the same about preschools and childminders? Or just nurseries? X

I worry about any non verbal people in any setting where they can't speak out.

Pre school isn't so bad as usually they are at least 3.

Child minders I would again pop in.
I've seen a few I would trust and many I wouldn't leave any dc with.
For instance I've seen some very proficient cm, wooing child face after dating, washing hands, sitting to do and craft. However speaking briskly, brusKly, chatting tk friends, not noticing a lot... Not being present with the child.

Not sure what nurseries you have worked in but in ours you do not punish children even if they are hitting,kicking or anything you explain to them it's not nice it upsets hurts others if there's anything they can do to make child feel better like say sorry give a hug etc. Taking the clothes off that they came in wearing is not acceptable an I would absolutely report this to ofsted.

What was she actually doing behaviour wise? You say she was wearing a cat dress. If she was going around e.g. scratching and hissing at other kids because she was being a cat, changing her out of the dress seems fair and reasonable consequence.

I don't think my concern would be that they changed her as a result of her behaviour, my concern would be that staff aren't able to give a consistent explanation as to why and what happened.

Apologies, wrong thread, I'll ask it to be deleted

No that's terrible! I'd be fuming! It's so random and seems to have come from a place of malice. As in, they were pissed off with her and did this.

I'd be moving her.

Picked up DD and at the door, one of the ladies who works in the room said I understand that you are sad about what happened yesterday. I explained that actually, I wasn't sad but I am angry that someone saw fit to remove my daughter's clothes as a punishment and that I am considering my options. Got a profuse apology and promises to stick to the agreed strategies, and that it won't happen again.

I was polite but have made it very clear that while I want to work with them productively, I am now very wary. I am going to look into other options available- have arranged to go and see two childminders next week. I think, whether I decide to keep my DD there or not, I will be reporting what has happened.

It seems she wasn't being a cat, but having trouble sharing- we are working on this at home, but there's only so much I can do when she's an only child and the only child on both sides of our family. She has all the playdates we can organise, and we encourage sharing and showing empathy for others. This being said, nursery is her main social outlet. And I am nervous about taking her away, as she seems happy there and talks about her friends.

To those who think I'm excusing her poor behaviour- I'm not. I know it's problematic behaviour. But I want to figure out why it's happening so I can help her to stop. To do that, I need them to report accurately to me what's going on during the day and not go off the rails with consequences that make no sense.

So I think I'm going to meet the childminders and be upfront about the situation- and ask them what strategies they have in place to deal with it differently. The other thing is, it's not every time she's there that she behaves like this. This makes me wonder what the trigger is for it.

That’s the thing @EvenLess thete is always a trigger. That’s not to excuse the behaviour, but there’s always a reason. Kids tend not to lash out for nothing.

And, most importantly you aren’t there. If you were, you’d probably be able to step in before any hitting happened. You’re doing what you can to work through this. Nursery also need to pull their finger out, monitor behaviour and step in before it turns violent. Not exact cruel punishments because they don’t like her (and believe me I’ve heard what preschool staff say about their “problem” children).

I have worked with children for over thirty years - from being a nanny, in a nursery, infant and junior schools and apart from one occasion when the shoes were removed from an older lad because he was kicking everyone around him, I have never witnessed taking clothes off a child as a consequence to actions!!!!
If your DD was whipping people with a tail on their costume then I could understand the nursery staff giving a warning that if DD continued to hurt children with her tail then she'd have to change into her spare clothes because hurting others isn't ok but it doesn't sound as if this was the case.
Moving her to a quiet area therefore removing her from whatever was triggering her would have been appropriate.
Who knows what the actual situation was as you're getting conflicting reports from the nursery but to be honest, that would worry me hugely anyway!

After your update OP I'd honestly just move her. The trust has gone now. You'll never get it back

OP I would email your concerns to the nursery in writing if you haven’t already. I’d ask them for a response in writing too. If they admit to what’s happened then that is going to be useful evidence to have if you want to move your daughter at short notice and cease paying fees to the nursery immediately. I think they’re very unlikely to ask you to pay fees up right through the contract notice period if you have proof in writing of how they treated your daughter, leading you to need to end the contract early.

if they aren’t prepared to admit in an email exactly what happened then what little trust I had left in them if I was you would be gone.

OP I’m sorry & it really does sound as though the trust has gone. I really think that a good nursery/ childminder would have strategies for managing difficult behaviour. For example my nephew has been pushing other children at his preschool & they have discovered that it tends to happen when other children come too close to him (he’s possibly ND). They give him space away from the other children rather than punishing him. I would hope we had moved on from the super nanny school of discipline but it seems not based on this thread.
Also don’t be made to feel that since your DD is an only that is the reason for her behaviour & something you should be rectifying. Plenty of children that have difficulty with interaction have siblings (inc my nephew) & there are plenty of only children who have no problems interacting in childcare settings.