Parents of young babies talking all through the singing bit.

[toddlergroupsing]

I go to a baby and toddler group. Like the name suggests it has babies and toddlers there. I can't decide who is being unreasonable?

Parents of toddlers sit on the floor at the end for ten minutes and a woman runs the singing and rhymes.

The parents of babies are in the circle but talk loudly through every song. I think it's bloody rude and distracting and not great role modelling for the toddlers.

I also think why don't they join in, so what if their baby is only a few weeks old. They'll still benefit from it.

On the other hand many are first time mums and just want to chat about feeding and nappies and lack of sleep and they want to make friends.

Aibu to think parents should join in the singing for the ten minutes at the end of a group or at least sit there quietly? Or have I forgotten what it's like to have a little baby?

I used to take my toddler to a toddler specific group. About 12 in the class all sitting on the floor. There were a few times where the mum-chat between certain individuals would be so loud the poor woman who ran the group had no control and lost the "flow" so to say as she couldn't concentrate and the toddlers couldn't either.

I don't go to the groups to chat, I go because it makes my toddler happy so found this incredibly rude. Also as a paying customer I found the disruption annoying too.

Baby groups are a bit different as I'd say they are more for the mums benefit tbh.

They're being rude.

YANBU this is one of the reasons why I stopped going to Rhyme Time at the library. They're usually the cliquey ones as well.

That’s so rude. All the parents sang when we used to go to baby and toddler groups. The ones who didn’t want to sing just sat there quietly

It's rude. The leader, or yourself, should speak up

Yeah stuff like this happens constantly. It drives me mad and is one of the reasons I don't do many baby/toddler groups.

Parents chatting all the way through, and parents not intervening when their kids are wild. I find it so stressful.

Yes, that's really rude. If the toddlers are all running around playing then obviously it's fine for the parents of tiny babies to be chatting - I'm guessing you really bloody need a chat if you've been at home with a brand new baby all week - but for the ten minutes of singing, they really should shut up out of politeness. It does set a bad example for the toddlers and it must also be irritating for the person leading the singing and the parents who are joining in with their kids.

I realise that tiny babies aren't actually getting anything from a ten-minute sing, but the parents of the babies could always leave when the toddlers' singing bit starts and go and get a coffee or something if they want to carry on chatting.

Yes it’s rude, they can talk before or after the session! It would really annoy me too

I've experienced this a couple of times at different classes/groups. It's really rude and I totally understand if they want to chat but then go for a coffee afterwards or something. I would have a quiet word with who runs the group or send them an email saying it's quite disruptive and makes the group unenjoyable for others. They should be able to address it.

Urgh. We used to get this at a lovely group I went to when DS was tiny.

They used to chat all through the singing and then get up and leave half way through the last song so they didn't have to help with tidying up.

Those kind of people are annoying. But they won't change. Focus your attention on ignoring them and making friends with the other mums with similar values to you.

I've been going for years and I've seen it happen before. Eventually the talking parents' babies grow up and they have to sit and join in with their toddlers. So the problem solves itself eventually but in the meantime the talking drives me mad.

I would rather sit on a cactus than go to groups like this hahahahaha
Anyone like to join me on the cactus?

I'm starting to feel that way. I've outgrown them a bit.

The woman singing needs to tell everyone to be quiet, is she not doing that?

The next time you go, you should go and speak to this woman, and tell her how rude and annoying the chatting mums are when the singing is taking place. Hopefully then she will ask them to be quiet.

I used to go to a group where the volunteer leading the singing was an ex teacher. She was so brilliant!
She would get the mums that chatted to pick the next song. Then, if that didn't work she would go and sit next to them and sing really loudly

literally don’t know why new mums feel pressured to attend these baby groups so early. Your baby is a potato. Arrange meet ups on peanut or your Facebook mum groups in nice cafes with squishy sofas. Watch lots of box sets. Go and do all the things you used to do like galleries or museums or nice walks with a pint at the end.

I know newborns benefit hugely from us singing and sensory experiences, but you can achieve that at home without sitting in a cold church hall drinking Nescafé original. They only start to become ‘nice’ once you can prop them up and they can play with the toys a bit more.

i think I’d find it mildly rude if it were an organised class with activities, and if the person leading the singing was running the whole session as a succession of different activities, but I couldn’t get excited about it if it’s a more casual village hall type affair for babies and toddlers with unstructured play and just ten minutes of singing at the end.

used to run a baby and toddler group when DS was little, was usually the one to break into ‘Wind the bobbin up’, and recognised different people engaged with different aspects, depending on the age and inclination of their child. Yes, some people never helped put stuff away, but again, it didn’t preoccupy me.

Yanbu. That's rude.
I miss a good round of 'wind the bobbin' up.

Omg I'm a nanny and I found this with a dance class we went to! It was horrible. It was in a church hall so very echo-y. Parents spoke so much that I couldn't hear the teacher giving instructions. I felt for her, she was quite young so I expect to intimidated to ask the parents to shush.

As someone who leads baby, toddler and pre-school singing classes, I have absolutely no worries about telling these parents to arrange to meet for a coffee after the class if they want to talk.

We clean up the toys BEFORE singing, which means everyone has to join in. Of course there are some people who conveniently need the loo or to change nappies at this time; I figure out early on who these people are, and I approach them 5 minutes before tidy-up time and let them know that they have time to go to the loo 🤣

I don't agree, and what makes you think new mums are being pressured to go to groups? I started taking my newborn to groups and classes very early and really enjoyed them. It was a great sensory experience for my baby and brilliant for my mental health to get out of the house and go somewhere/do something. I also had mum friends I met up with and used peanut, but I enjoyed the classes too. Yes the babies start to get more out of it as they get older, but that doesn't mean it can't be enjoyable as a newborn.

It is rude but I’m not sure why the typical superior posts about baby groups are being made.

It’s literally just a nice thing to do with your baby, they get some lights and bubbles and props, you get the day broken up and a bit of adult company. I honestly don’t understand why so many posters on here have to be so rude about them.

Very rude.

its very rude. I used to run baby and adult dance/movement classes for toddlers from 18 months to 2 and a half years. We would do both action rhymes and travelling movement such as walking, running, jumping, balancing and so on and using props and basic percussion instruments. The children learnt best when their parent/ guardian interacted with and actively participated with them- things like joining in with the action and counting songs and rhymes, holding their child’s hand whilst they tried to balance or jump etc. it was very much a Dance With Me type class, and was advertised as such. There would always be a few parents who would dump their kids in the middle of the room and clear off to sit at the other end and chat, they would then complain that their child wasn’t engaged in the class, because their bewildered toddlers would just keep wandering back to their parent because most of the class. One of them also used to bring her older and bigger preschooler who would also join in (but she only ever paid for her younger child to participate) and this older girl would spend the whole session snatching props off the smaller children and bossing the little ones around. I would redirect her back to her mum but every time she would reappear again moments later and carry on.
In the end I closed the class and stopped teaching that age group- we had a rapid fall in numbers as we got more sitting down gassing type parents and the active participants started to get put off by what was essentially a bunch of chatting laughing spectators at the end of the room. This was despite every week me asking that all parents join in with their child, they would for the first 5/10 mins then just clear off and sit down leaving their kids to follow along on their own (most of the time the children didn’t- we had a separate dance class for older more independent pre schoolers anyway for that). Eventually it was just me, the sitting down group of parents and a bunch of confused toddlers who weren’t ready for the next level class without their parent being there and I got well and truly fed up.
I never understood why anyone would sign up to a class for tiny children that stated quite clearly that some kind of parental interaction was required in order for the child to get the most from the session if all they want to do is sit around and chat.

Also- our class had free play at the end of each session for 15-30 mins- we would get toys out and the children could then play and the parents chat- so it’s not as though they didn’t get the opportunity anyway (!)