To think nursery owner is a dinosaur.

[funder]

Please help me make sense of this situation.

My son started a new small nursery/ large childminding setting at the beginning of January. The facility is in the owners home, but there are two key workers and about 10 children so bigger than his previous childminder setting.

He attends 15h over 2 days. He is a confident, social and happy 3 1/2 year old who communicates very well (he started talking in sentences at 20m old). The first couple of days he loved the setting and was desperate to attend.

On the third day I picked him up and he was inconsolable, the nursery owner mentioned that he wouldn't eat his dinner and was crying for his mummy (something he didn't tend to ever do and he loves his food so it was very unusual) whilst he was crying one of the other children told him to stop crying and that his 'mummy isn't coming back'. While telling me this the owner was kind of laughing and brushing it off saying that even the children were 'fed up' with his behaviour

Anyway, over that weekend my son told me that the owner had shouted at him because he was impatiently asking for a tissue while all the children were eating. This is what set him off crying, asking for his mummy and not eating. He was clearly very frightened of the owner and did not want to attend. I text the owner and voiced my concerns about shouting at my son and politely asking that she does not unless he is doing something dangerous. I requested that she sit down with him and speak about what happened and apologise for raising her voice (something we do at home when voices are raised). This worked and he was once again happy to attend.

Anyway, this weekend my son mentioned that the nursery owner grabbed his arm and hurt him when he tried to leave the table after he finished eating.

AIBU to think this woman is a dinosaur and I really should talk to her about how she handles my child. I don't want to make a big deal of the arm grabbing after the shouting incident but I don't think I'm wrong to think this isn't how children should be treated?

UABU - this is normal, let the woman do her job. You are being too precious.
UANBU - this isn't normal and not how a nursery setting. It's reasonable to raise concerns with the owner.

Thanks for making it this far. My head is picked and I don't know if my feelings are disproportionate to the situation. I am apprehensive to move him to another setting as he seems settled now.

I would definitely move him.
You know his levels of articulacy/reliability and given that the nursery owner corroborates his story it's cut-and-dry that this setting is not going to suit him. It sounds horrible. My LO is almost 3 and recently told me that when a little boy at her nursery was crying for his mum she and the other children cuddled him and told him she would come back. That is the setting you want.

I work full time so pulling him out without having childcare covered isn't feasible.

Well it is feasible if the alternative is him being hurt by the people are supposed to care for him.

I took my 3 year old out of a school nursery where staff were yelling at the children and unnecessarily manhandling them. My child didn't tell me as he was largely non verbal, but witnesses told me and I then saw the cctv.

You're doing the right thing.

I think you are under reacting. I'd move him as quick as I could.

[quote funder]@Nanny0gg he's not there until the end of the week. I will send an email today logging my concerns with regards to the arm grabbing. I'm not going to be guns blazing and throwing accusations around but I need her to know that it's not acceptable to me unless he or another child is in a dangerous situation.

I work full time so pulling him out without having childcare covered isn't feasible. I don't think he is in harms way but I do not want the placement to continue so will move him ASAP.
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Do you have any AL you could take?

It doesn’t really matter what actually happened. You don’t like the nursery, or the owner so you won’t ever be happy with your son being there.

When she was nearly 3, my daughter told everyone a member of staff at her nursery broke her leg. They didn’t. At a similar age she told everyone I kicked her off a chair. I didn’t. These were her interpretations of things that happened. “They grabbed me and it hurt” could be anything from the entirely normal quickly taking of a child’s arm as they go to move off, to grasping them and squeezing hard enough to bruise it. But no matter what, if you are suspicious then move him. Not because “instinct” or “gut feeling” means anything at all, but because you will always think the worst because of your interpretation of what happened.

Take him out immediately. She sounds awful.

@Nanny0gg I'm self employed and don't tend to take any leave unless it's been meticulously planned for months. After taking the half term off I'm very much catching my own tail for a while.

As I said, I do not believe he is in harms way so taking drastic measures isn't on the table. But I do expect better from his childcare and I'm glad the overwhelming response is that I'm not being unreasonable.

So sorry to read this, OP, what a worry for you. Both of those incidents would be red flags for me and as pps have said, you will now be worrying about what else might happen whilst he is in her care. I would chat to the owner but also put out feelers to find somewhere else for him to go. Someone recently took a reference from me on our childminder so worth doing that for a new place too.

Good luck.

While telling me this the owner was kind of laughing and brushing it off saying that even the children were 'fed up' with his behaviour

I was once on pick up but had to speak with the room senior about something and her key worker came over, handing my daughter to the senior saying “can you take her, she is doing my nut in today” Having spent the two previous days with my whiny, annoying 18 month old, I knew exactly how she felt. This member of staff was my daughter’s (and my) firm favourite, she absolutely loved my daughter and the setting had the highest ratings from the care commission. Sometimes whiny kids can get on the nerves of staff too. They aren’t automatrons, immune from whiny kids. How they deal with those situations is important but it’s unreasonable to expect staff to always be entirely 100% happy with your child.

Yeah, I wouldn't call her a dinosaur - but I wouldn't leave my child in her care either. It's not appropriate for her to treat your son like that, and while I'm not in favour of being too soft with kids, if he's scared and upset around her, then it's the wrong placement for him. There's no need for him to have to put up with that.

I would move him, but I would also look into options to spread his hours over more days in his new setting. It is always going to be harder to settle a child into two long days than three or four shorter ones.

@BoredZelda

While telling me this the owner was kind of laughing and brushing it off saying that even the children were 'fed up' with his behaviour

I was once on pick up but had to speak with the room senior about something and her key worker came over, handing my daughter to the senior saying “can you take her, she is doing my nut in today” Having spent the two previous days with my whiny, annoying 18 month old, I knew exactly how she felt. This member of staff was my daughter’s (and my) firm favourite, she absolutely loved my daughter and the setting had the highest ratings from the care commission. Sometimes whiny kids can get on the nerves of staff too. They aren’t automatrons, immune from whiny kids. How they deal with those situations is important but it’s unreasonable to expect staff to always be entirely 100% happy with your child.

Shouldn't be speaking about kids in your care like that though. Or certainly not around the children or parents. That would totally piss me off and I'd explain that wasn't acceptable.

[quote funder]@Nanny0gg I'm self employed and don't tend to take any leave unless it's been meticulously planned for months. After taking the half term off I'm very much catching my own tail for a while.

As I said, I do not believe he is in harms way so taking drastic measures isn't on the table. But I do expect better from his childcare and I'm glad the overwhelming response is that I'm not being unreasonable. [/quote]
How can you believe he's not in harms way when he's being humiliated and physically hurt?

[quote funder]@Nanny0gg he's not there until the end of the week. I will send an email today logging my concerns with regards to the arm grabbing. I'm not going to be guns blazing and throwing accusations around but I need her to know that it's not acceptable to me unless he or another child is in a dangerous situation.

I work full time so pulling him out without having childcare covered isn't feasible. I don't think he is in harms way but I do not want the placement to continue so will move him ASAP.
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I'm not sure I would flag the issue then leave him there until you find somewhere else. Give notice, then tell her why on the last day

My child would not be going back there.

Hes trying to tell you things, to protect him. i think you should be listening to him and pulling him out and reporting to Ofsted.

It doesnt sound great, sure it may actually just be a little of nothing BUT it may be something and Ofsted will at least have it on file.

If you complain, don't say the dinosaur thing. That's more related to someone who gets confused with technology, not someone who is mistreating the children in their care.

Take him out. If he's not happy there and doesn't feel safe, it's only going to cause him harm in the long run.

@sofakingcool why wouldn't you flag it as an issue? Do you think this would cause problems?

He is - at the moment - happy to attend the setting so I'm not going to cut him off without giving him a chance to say goodbye to his friends there and move him without preparing him emotionally first. I think this would be more problematic for him than sending him to the placement for a few days.

Did you have issues with his previous childminder? Why did you change settings?

OK it's not unusual for children to have to confirm to a nursery's pattern because they have to ensure they are meeting minimum ratios of staff to children, so they wouldn't want your DS wandering off to another room if other children are still eating for eg.

My DS (around age 3) broke into tears one day I was at nursery because one of the workers raised her voice / spoke sharply to him - but he was not doing as he had been asked and was actually on the verge of climbing onto something he shouldn't have been. I had no problem with the worker 'shouting at him' because I witnessed what happened and could see the intervention was in his best interests, but it may not have been so clear cut if I had relied on DS explanation.

I did however have to have words with nursery about them asking DS to wait for a few minutes before taking him to the loo when he had just potty trained. He couldn't wait and inevitably soiled himself. I told them this was unacceptable and he either had to be allowed to go to the toilet himself or they had to take him pretty much straight away.

Personally I would try and get more of a sense of what's going on and speak to the manager directly to understand what the issues may be and then make a decision whether this setting is a good fit for your DS

Your son needs to be removed from them immediately then find somewhere new.

@funder

Dinosaur in regards to the way she provides childcare. I feel like her 'methods' are outdated and we have moved on from shouting and intimidation as a means of discipline. Not in regards to her age, she is maybe 5 years older than I am.

I didn't know if I was expecting too much from his childcare provider but it seems like this just isn't the done thing.

Some very good points made here. It's true out styles just don't match and I don't trust her so that enough is reason to move. I'll find somewhere else this week for him.

And for those asking - I didn't probe about the arm grabbing as I didn't want him to realise it was a concern for me so he wouldn't be inclined to embellish. I just asked why she grabbed him as he already said it hurt. I do trust the things he tells me.

Did you check his arm for bruising ?

@brainhurts we both loved his pervious childminder but on one of the days that he attended there was only babies in the setting with him so he was missing the interaction with children his own age. After lockdowns etc I thought it best he gets more social time with peers in a bigger setting before he starts school.

She was an older lady who was stern but fair and very warm towards him. She would use a 'thinking step' if discipline was needed as apposed to the 'naughty corner' at the new place. Small differences but I guess they make a difference.

@glitterelf I didn't check for bruising. He told me this at the weekend after having the half term week off so he didn't tell me immediately. I didn't probe for details from him about it as I didn't want him to get concerned or feel like he needs to embellish the event.

Tbh he is covered in bruises anyway so even if his arm was bruised I would not be attributing it to the 'incedent' as it just wouldn't be reliable.