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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

To have a word with the nursery?

179 replies

lauraloveskitsch · 20/01/2012 01:30

DD1 is 3.6 and in nursery five afternoons a week. We got the newsletter yesterday and this term they're learning about animals. They will have a selection of animals coming in provided by parents which the children will learn about and be able to handle.

DH was up there earlier to find the children had already met a big chocolate labrador and tomorrow will meet a ferret.

AIBU to have a word with the nursery? There have been no consent forms given, the newsletter was handed out late and the only people who knew about this are the parents who are bringing animals and are friends outside the school with the teachers.

What if there was an incident? AIBU about this? FWIW I would sign the consent form but I wish I'd been informed and had a choice.

OP posts:

Sirzy · 21/01/2012 15:27

I am very happy for Ds (2) to be taken out with nursey without being asked before - they know his health problems mean he needs to be in the pram rather than walking and respect this, I find out when I have picked him up.

I know the older children have had animals in in the past and again that wouldn't concern me at all.

If you trust the nursery enough to send your child there why would it bother you?

tethersend · 21/01/2012 15:31

Because the nursery (nor other professional) is not in control of the animal, a parent is.

ChippingInLovesEasterEggs · 21/01/2012 15:36

Tethers - it's not just a case of saying some parents might mind, so permission should be obtained from all parents. End of. Some of us get fed up with the paperwork and nit picking by parents and would much rather the nursery/school spent the time and energy on things that benefit the children not Ofsted/stressy parents.

Why do you want to know when the nursery/school is taking your child out - what actual difference does it make?

Sirzy · 21/01/2012 15:39

And do you seriously think they let any old parent bring in any old animal without first making sure they are suitable?

So from that if a nursery worker brought her dog in for them to see that would be ok but another parent doing it would be wrong?

dreamingbohemian · 21/01/2012 15:46

I agree with Tethers actually.

We have exactly one nursery we can access at the moment. Luckily they are very good but my trust for them is not infinite. Does everyone really trust their nursery 100%? Really? I doubt it, frankly.

No I don't expect consent forms for everything, but it is nice to be kept in the loop about things.

I was badly bitten by a family dog (who of course was very friendly and had never bitten anyone before) when I was little. I fully intend not to make DS scared of dogs in any way but at the same time I don't want him to go through that either. So it would be nice to know if there will be dogs on a certain day so I could just give him an extra reminder in the morning to be gentle with the dog or whatever.

Bunnies and hamsters and turtles are totally different. Dog bites can inflict real harm.

I would not be outraged or sue or even have a word but internally I would be a bit .

tethersend · 21/01/2012 15:47

But I'm not saying this as a stressy parent. I'm saying it as a parent.

I want to know if my DD is being taken out. I am happy to give permission for all trips out at the beginning of term to save time, particularly if they happen frequently; but I am not happy to assume that my DD is staying on site all the time and then find out later she was taken out without my permission, and may have been injured. This does not mean that I think going out is a highly dangerous activity.

No Sirzy, I would only find it acceptable if the dog was brought in by a shelter/other dog professional and the dog was used to a class of small excitable children, for its sake as much as theirs.

The nursery staff are in no position to say whether a dog is suitable to be around (a lot of) children.

ChippingInLovesEasterEggs · 21/01/2012 16:31

Tethers - if your nursery go out and DD is injured - what difference would it make it you had given permission 3 weeks beforehand or not at all, she'd still be injured

Dreaming - the nursery would tell the children how to behave. Do you really think telling your nursery aged child to be gentle or whatever at 8 am will have any impact when he sees it hours later if he wouldn't be gentle anyway?

tethersend · 21/01/2012 16:40

It would make a difference, Chipping. In the first instance, I would have calculated the risk and taken it- I could only blame myself.

In the second, I have not been allowed to assess the risk and make a decision. It would be their fault.

That would make a difference.

peeriebear · 21/01/2012 16:48

I had no idea that DD1's school has "ferret Friday". One of the teachers keeps ferrets, and on Fridays one of them resides in the dining hall in a pet carry crate, and the children are allowed to hold and stroke it at break times. I think it's FAB. And I'm jealous.

GetDownNesbitt · 21/01/2012 16:54

I am thinking of suing nursery because the Giant Land Snails freak me out completely. Big slimy bastarding things.

The kids love them, though.

cory · 21/01/2012 16:59

"So it would be nice to know if there will be dogs on a certain day so I could just give him an extra reminder in the morning to be gentle with the dog or whatever."

So why do you think the nursery staff won't be capable of doing that? Do you think he will only listen to you? Or that he is more likely to remember something you told him in the morning than something his key worker says just before the dog is brought in?

yashie · 21/01/2012 17:01

So if you have any family friends/family members with pets do you not go and visit? There are no professionals there either. I think this is a very sad attitude to life, my daughter is still v young but this is the world she had to grow up in, where permission slips to stroke a puppy are thought nessacary. What if there was a dog in the park?

tethersend · 21/01/2012 17:07

"So if you have any family friends/family members with pets do you not go and visit? "

No, because that's me assessing the risk and taking/not taking it. I am likely to know the dog and know the owner. I know that they have a dog. Similarly, I would be really pissed off if I sent DD to her Grandad's and he had got a dog without telling me.

"What if there was a dog in the park?"

As I've said upthread, I teach DD not to approach and stroke a dog she doesn't know. This is also for the dog's benefit.

tethersend · 21/01/2012 17:09

Oh, and I think professionals are necessary specifically in a school context; a group of excited and loud young children may scare a dog, and I would want to know that the dog has a handler who is in control and that the dog is used to that type of situation.

laurenamium · 21/01/2012 17:13

I would be more bothered about the ferret than the dog...those things are savage! And don't get me started on hamsters!

I wouldn't be bothered about consent or be having a word but I probably would like to know that it's happening! More so I could use it as a bribe to get ready for nursery quicker

at squeakytoy

As a CM and as others have said, I'm sure they will have risk assessed and will have a general consent form

laurenamium · 21/01/2012 17:14

Also everything tethers has said is sensible and common sense!

babybythesea · 21/01/2012 17:25

Several things struck me reading this.

The first was that my dd is often taken out on 'mini-trips' - I never give consent and it's never occurred to me to mind. They don't have a decent outdoor space at my dd's nursery, so they walk them across a busy road to a field and woodland opposite. I think it's great - it was the one downside to them, that the kids didn't have a good place to play outside. She's been going there for 18 months and until I read a comment by tethers about whether you'd mind if your child was taken out of the nursery setting without consent, it had not occurred to me to even give it a passing thought. And now I have, and I still don't care. In fact, the first time I found out was her key worker mentioning in passing that she'd enjoyed the woods - no idea how many times before that she'd been out. But I love that she's outside and enjoys it, and I assume that they have thought it through.

I used to work at the other end of this - doing contact stuff with exotic animals (snakes, giant cockroaches etc) with visiting groups of kids. Nursery children almost never exhibited fear. In fact, children in general exhibited almost no fear until the age of about seven when suddenly there'd be a chorus if 'I don't like that' when we brought an animal out. If a child was genuinely scared then no-one made them touch. We used to say that if you didn't want to touch put your hands in your lap, but it was very very rare for nursery children not to get stuck in there. Allergies are different, but people who go on about their kids being scared are usually generating a self-fulfilling prophecy. No idea how the schools organised it though - mostly they came to us but sometimes we'd go to them. And what about the parents who worked on the staff and borrowed animals to take in? Wasn't done under our 'umbrella' but as a visiting parent, yet the animals are the same. Does that make a difference?

yashie · 21/01/2012 17:46

You would be pissed off if her Grandad got a dog and didn't tell you?!
So if he did tell you would you then stop taking her there and go alone for the next 6 months to get to know the dog before you let your child near it?

tethersend · 21/01/2012 17:50

No, yashie, you are misunderstanding me.

If I sent her to Grandad's thinking he had no dog, but in fact he had bought one and not told me, I would be pissed off.

If I knew about the dog beforehand, I could assess the risk and make a decision about whether to send her there or not. I would look at whether Grandad could manage the dog, whether it had been around children or not, had it ever bitten anyone, etc; normal, sensible factors anyone would look at, I would have thought?

mousyMouse · 21/01/2012 18:42

for the 'little' outings like trips to the park across the road or the supermarket to buy ingredients for baking, I signed a consent form when dc started at nursery/school. for bigger outings, requiring going on the bus for example, an additional consent form is needed.
if something out of the ordinary is planned (like a visit from pets) parents are informed in writing plus lots of notices hanging on the doors and staff telling us at pick up time so there is plenty of opportunity to discuss.

catgirl1976 · 21/01/2012 19:22

I am glad I am not bringing my children up in a world where I see terrible risks at every corner, where animals are something to be activley feared rather than just respected and where my prior consent is needed for them to do any activities or explore the world.

I must live in a diffferent world to some posters.

GirlWithPointyShoes · 21/01/2012 19:32

I completely agree with you catgirl. We all want to protect out children but all this risk assessment talk is odd IMO. Life will happen! Regardless of a consent form.

Kids are growing up so scared of the world these day that they are missing out all the great experiences we as kids had and all the lessons we had to learn on our own.

MildlyNarkyPuffin · 21/01/2012 19:36

I wouldn't leave my child in the care of someone if I didn't trust their judgement over things like this.

tethersend · 21/01/2012 19:42

Arf at the pity

Don't worry, DD is fine- consent forms haven't ruined her life. Yet.

catgirl1976 · 21/01/2012 19:59

Has anyone done a Risk Assesment on the consent forms? They could result in a nasty papercut :)

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