Hi all,
Just after some advice or thoughts on moving my daughter to a new nursery.
She is 15 months old and started nursery at the end of July 2019. I thought the nursery was lovely at first, very small and intimate. There were a few concerns I had from the beginning, but I put that down to me being overly sensitive. The babies (in my eyes) weren’t being watched enough when I took her to the settling in sessions. Ill try to keep this as brief as possible as it’s a long one.
In the garden they have a wooded platform which is reaches by two steps where they can paint. I witnessed a baby (who could walk) standing at the top and doing a roly poly off the top step and hitting her head on the bottom step. No members of staff were anywhere near her but noticed when she fell and picked her up.
My daughter had a hard time settling in. On the first full day she did, the called me to pick her up early as she was unsettled. They also called her father as I missed their initial call. He asked if she had taken any milk from the bottle (she’s breastfed and refuses bottles), he was told no, when he asked if they had tried the other bottles I had been taking in to see if it made a difference, he was told that that had tried but on that particular day I didn’t send any additional bottles so this was a lie.
They kept calling me to leave work early to collect her as she was unsettled, even saying one time that they would like me to collect her early as they had a full house that day and she is disturbing the other children. This has really messed my hours up at work.
They then asked me to change my working hours at very short notice as they thought that doing half days would be better for her. I was unable to do it the first week they asked and said that it would have to start the week after as I wouldn’t have chance to work my contracted hours that week. They refused to take her for the full day that week even thought they knew I had no alternate childcare and wouldn’t be able to go to work. I did this for a month then reverted back to full days.
The other week when I arrived to pick her up, she was sat behind a bookcase with a little boy. As soon as the nursery worker saw me she dashed over to them and appeared to take something, my daughter had started crying so the nursery worker picked her up and said that she dashed over as the little boy was trying to give her a hug and my daughter didn’t like it so started crying. I didn’t think anything of this at the time until I got home and saw she had biro on her head so I am wondering if the boy had a pen he was outing in her face and the worker got it from him before I saw.
2 weeks ago I picked her up, and I had a phone call from the nursery after I left saying that they meant to get me to sign an accident form but forgot and would have me sign it next time I took her in. She said on the phone that my daughter was walking and lost her balance and her cheek hit the floor, so if she has a small bruise in that area this was the reason. When the bruise came up, it was a very deep dark like about 2 inches long and a centimetre wide so it was obvious to me that she had hit herself quite badly on the edge of something, When I took her to nursery the following time, they got the form for me to sign, I made a point of reading it and it said the same as she had said on the phone. I questioned it and told them that the bruise was a line like she had hit it on the edge of something, the worker pointed to one of the ramps they have there and said that she might have hit it on that. I asked then if she was telling me she hit it on the edge of the ramp and she said that she might have.
Last week when I picked her up on Wednesday (she goes Tuesday and Wednesday) and got her home to change her nappy she had a very dark (almost black) mark on her privates but very near to the crease in her leg. I know this happened there as it wasn’t there on the Tuesday or the Wednesday morning. At first I thought it was pen, so I tried wiping it off before realised it was a bruise. It was very small but concentrated. About the size of a tic tac. I put it down to maybe she hit herself with a toy when she was being changed but as it was very prominent even a week later, I became more and more concerned. I questioned it when I took her back this week, the room manager didn’t seem bothered, just said she would keep an eye on it (no need it’s a bruise) and that she might have hit herself on something as she is more mobile now. I don’t think she could have hit herself that hard in that area to cause that with a padded nappy on.
One last big thing, last week I dropped her off a bit later than usual, they serve breakfast until 9am. I took her there at 8:45 thinking nothing of it and that she would have breakfast. When I got home and read her report for that day it stated she had breakfast at home.
There have been many other little incidents too. They have lost a piece of her clothing which meant a lot to me, it disappeared into thin air. They would ask me for more nappies and then send them back in her back when I took them in. I don’t think they’re putting cream on her when they change her nappy as she always seems a bit red after nursery. They have sent other babies clothes home with me on many occasions. They post a monthly blog with photos, on month she wasn’t in any of the photos.
Can I get some advice on what you would do? Sorry it is so long but thanks for reading.