To think that nursery are clueless or just don't give a shit

[chewybiscuit]

Its a long one sorry... but I would value any opinions on this to make sure I'm not kneejerking.

DS is 3.4 and started a new nursery in January (yay for 30hrs free childcare). Prior to that he was at another nursery for 2 mornings a week (7hrs total) for about the last 14 months.

Whilst we had absolutely no qualms about the old nursery who were great, we moved as they could not offer more than 12 hours a week for the first term, there were transport costs that would scale to 5 days a week (unable to drive due to medical condition). The new nursery is attached to the primary school that DS will attend and is within walking distance.

New nursery did a home visit and DS went to a few introductory sessions and all seemed fine. DS started off 2.5 days a week and began working up to doing the full 30.

About a month ago DS started a biting phase; his dad, other children at soft play and nursery. This was rather strange as he had a biting stage around 18 months that has long since ceased. Nursery weren't too concerned and said it was a developmental stage, we kept him away from soft play and any bites or attempts with us were met with being removed from the situation, sat down and told matter of factly that it was wrong, that we do not bite and that it hurts. All the standard recommended approach really.

Nursery seemed not at all phased and said it was a developmental stage. As the biting continued we also enquired if the nursery thought this was due to the large increase in hours DS was going to nursery (4 days at this point). By mutual agreement we reduced this to 3 days on the quieter days. We went for nearly 2 weeks without a biting incident at home and thinking the 3 days a week is a better approach.

DS just had a meltdown in nursery over apparently nothing and started banging his head against the wall, have only ever seen this once before at home recently during a tantrum.

After this having a chat with the nursery teacher she drops the bombshell that he never talks in nursery and always wants to be on his own at story time and lashes out at other kids when they try to get near him and generally doesn't interact, yet she stated this is the complete opposite of what she observed on the home visit. She suggested she had only seen this in autistic children and suggested we may want to get him checked.

On going to collect him we were informed that he had bitten a child again, so not great as we thought he was passed that again.

Now this is where I'm losing the confidence in the nursery, if this is a regular occurance, why the hell would you not say anything for 2.5 months? Other than the recent biting incidents they have not said word one about the lashing out/not talking

This is a nursery where they post pictures on a website periodically along with descriptions of what activities the children have been doing, but no actual regular conversation between parents and staff with oh x did y today that we got with the previous nursery..

I should add that this is the complete polar opposite of DS at home, he loves playing , reading etc and more recently is yak yak yak about everything he sees and is doing.

I would think that if he did have some kind of learning/developmental issues that it would be a uniform behaviour at home and nursery. I have a friend in EYFS who is less than impressed with what I am telling them about the nursery but I don't want to let that cloud my objectivity.

Appointment made to see a GP re: autism but I can't help thinking the nursery CBA and it would be better to go elsewhere even if that meant some more logistical options/costs and less time in nursery

Some nurseries are not great, especially in the current climate (eg 30 hours) with rising costs and lower income.

I wouldn't put DS in a commercial nursery now. He goes to a charity preschool instead as I know they are at least doing their best. I pulled him out of a private nursery who were not good, mostly their communication was appalling, they completed an assessment that was nothing like him at all and they misled me about funding.

Its almost irrelevant what the nursery have done though, if you now dont trust them then you dont trust them. I found once trust was lost it couldn't be got back and dont regret my decision. YEs I would expect them to mention major things like him not settling, not talking to other kids and lashing out. The suggestion that you should investigate getting him assessed for ASD is weird as Im pretty sure if there are concerns it is the nursery that should be starting a process of getting him assessed. So yes, to me, sounds like they are not doing a great job and your son is suffering. Personally I'd move him.

Thanks lostherenow. Now that you mention it his old nursery was a charity one with smaller ratios than his current one. His current one has the 1:13 maximum ratio with plans to expand.

I heard a program on the radio recently about the current state of nursery funding and relating it to his current nursery it sounds like they are very much on a numbers and margins game. For example they are quite pushy about ramping up to using the full 30 hours citing that we will lose it if we don't use it. I spoke to the HMRC line for childcare recently and they said they have no issues with the full 30 hours not being used but that the local authority may have a different policy.

I havn't had time to follow up with the LA to see if this is the case but did smell a rat with the nursery i.e they suggested if we wanted to do 3 days we would need to use the 15 hours FEL and then pay for the rest privately.

They also say he is fine 121 and my friend in EYFS suggested that their approach should be shadowing/121 temporarily to manage the biting until it abates.

I'm expecting the GP visit will be brief and uneventful, I will take it from there. I'm keen on him staying there so he will go into primary school with kids he knows but not at the expense of him being miserable for all that time. The OFSTED is good but I guess thats a point in time picture of the place and it was prior to 30hrs free and the ration increases being introduced.

A school based preschool is a totally different beast from a private nursery (commercial or charity run). They tend to run a lot more like school - minimal handover unless there's an incident, a higher ratio of children to staff (although I'd expect that in the pre-school room of a private nursery). Whilst all childcare providers follow the EYFS curriculum a pre-school at a school is very geared towards actual school. Also they are less flexible about hours usually as they work around the school day format.

They should still have a SENCO (may be the school SENCO) and should get the SENCO to observe and start assessment processes if necessary.

Request a meeting with the SENCO, his room leader/key worker/nursery manager and talk through everyone's concerns

2.5 months is a respectable amount of time for the nursery to spot irregularities in your sons behaviour.

They have got a responsibility to raise these concerns with you.

I would not be so quick to dismiss their concerns.

Quitesolikely, I am far from dismissing it, hence arranging a GP visit. The nursery only volunteered the information after being questioned if this happened before.

Furthermore they've been rather dismissive around the biting and ignored emails/closed conversations down. If they have concerns I'm quite happy to engage them and work on them, which is not what I've been able to get from them.

As I say DS is completely different outside of nursery which is leading me to believe its situational to the nursery rather than it being developmental/medical.