To wonder if your 3/4 year old talks about nursery / school?

[mybluetractor]

DS is 3, nearly 4. He’s attended a nursery since he was 10 months and obviously then I mostly communicated with staff and via the app.

In the final year before school the app isn’t updated. I get a brief verbal handover which is absolutely fine but what is preying on my mind a little bit is how uncommunicative DS is about nursery. I know there have been incidents relating to name calling and I want to address this with the staff but I can’t do much as he simply won’t tell me. He bit another child last week and I told him firmly it was unacceptable and reinforced this message again today but in trying to understand what had happened it was just like talking to a drunk Glaswegian at the bus stop on a Friday night. Rambling and interjections of other observations (horse mummy … neigh) and changing the subject.

It is bothering me a little bit because he’s starting school next year and if he is struggling or if he has problems with any other children I won’t have a clue what’s going on! Is this normal? I know a lot of children do talk about nursery and their friends and DS doesn’t - I don’t even know who the other children are.

DD is 4.5 so about to go to school. I get a lot out of her but you have to take it with a pinch of salt. Walking home I might get a stream of consciousness like this:

‘Today I drew a rocket (definitely - I have the picture). Then Lucy was sick and her mummy came early (plausible). And her mummy took her home riding on a horse (unlikely, this is central London).

So I get a general sense of what’s happened, and if it’s a good or difficult day. But I don’t trust all the details!

It's really frustrating OP! My DS will just give monosyllabic replies like "good" when I ask how his day at nursery was. I've found that if I ask again later in the evening or at bedtime and ask very specific questions "did anything funny happen at nursery today? What did you have for lunch? Was it nice? Did anything upset you today?" Etc then he's much more forthcoming. I've made a big effort to get to know the other parents and kids in his class as he's been much more chatty about it all since he's realised I'm aware of who the different people are

It’s incredibly normal. My twins are 6 and about to go into yr 2. Whenever I’ve asked about school all I get is a ‘nothing / no one / can’t remember’ and that’s the case with the vast majority of the parents I know. They can normally describe anything particularly noteworthy, but otherwise it’s a black hole.

I wouldn’t worry about finding out about incidents though. As they get older they are usually very forthright in telling you about anyone who has wronged them (which sometimes you have to take with a pinch of salt …).

A good way of drawing information out of them is to tell them incorrect information about what you think happened at school, because love correcting people. Say ‘oh, so you had fish for lunch then’. They’ll say ‘no! We had chicken!’. Say ‘so you played with Peter with the magnets’ / ‘No, me and Maisie played ball!’. If you ask ‘what did you eat / who did you play with’, it’s not unusual to get a ‘nothing / no one’.

My 3.5 year old tells me a lot about nursery but generally the things he finds important enough to tell me about are not the things I’m keen to know! He can never narrate who he played with, what he ate or the activities he did but will tell me in intricate detail about an insect in the bug hotel, a thought he had about planes during quiet time, and a complicated query about where they would hide from dinosaurs at his nursery if they suddenly came back to life.

I have two chatterboxes and so I do get bits and bobs but it usually comes out a few days later. Agree with @OtterOnAPlane that the plausibility varies - DC2 has been on day trips to both the moon and Buckingham Palace with her nursery.

DC1 did have some friendship issues around the end of nursery/start of school - I knew it was real because she was talking about it at bedtime. If there's real problems beyond the usual squabbles you'll realise it even if he isn't vocalising it I think.

We got very little information volunteered from our DC about what they’d been doing at nursery, and most of what they did talk about was what they’d had for lunch.

Thanks! I’ve tried the specific questions thing - I think I saw it on the CBeebies website - and it still has got me nowhere.

I think it’s niggling at me because so many of my friends seem to be informed quite a lot by their children - as indicated above it might not be totally accurate or correct but it’s still a rough sense of people, events, and so on. DS tells me absolutely nothing, it really is like a complete blank. A few weeks ago a fire engine went into nursery and he LOVES fire engines but the only reason I know anything about it is because of the Facebook page!

@JaneGrint you see I don’t even get that. Typically if I ask a specific question ‘what did you have for lunch?’ he’ll say ‘yes’

My son often can't remember what he did when I pick him up, it's Only when I prompt him from what I've seen on the app that he remembers!

I think this is my worry as DS doesn’t, even when prompted.

My nearly 4yo is very descriptive but as pp said I have to ask specific questions. So for example I use clues from the app and ask before and after and location based questions, and closed questions (just one or two obviously, I don't interrogate her!)

What did you do in the garden?
What did you do after lunch?
Did anyone notice your new shoes?

That kind of thing. Sometimes I hit on a question that triggers a long monologue.

If I just ask vaguely "did you have a nice day" or "did you do anything fun today" I get zero detail!

Maybe worth a check in with nursery to see if they have any concerns about his communication if you're worried?

I generally get "don't know" to everything I ask, but sometimes get spontaneous commentary. And sometimes get a bit more luck with broader questions like "what was funny today?", "who was cheeky?" Etc. The majority of what I'm told I think is bollocks tbh 😆

Maybe worth a check in with nursery to see if they have any concerns about his communication if you're worried?

I generally get "don't know" to everything I ask, but sometimes get spontaneous commentary. And sometimes get a bit more luck with broader questions like "what was funny today?", "who was cheeky?" Etc. The majority of what I'm told I think is bollocks tbh 😆

DD just turned 4, she’s been in school nursery and starting reception in Sept.

She tells me bits and pieces but she’s unlikely to answer a direct question, it comes out in dribs and drabs at other times. She’ll also do a fair bit of role play where she’s the teacher and we’re the children and we get a bit of a sense through that.

We had an app, but it was not updated regularly at all and nothing personal to DD after the first week really. I was an Early Years teacher for many years until having DD, after which I had a career change. The sheer HOURS I spent on individual updates and observations for the child’s learning journey! I fully accept the curriculum has changed, and there is no longer any requirement to ‘evidence’ in this way - and I completely support that because it was never really for the benefit of the children. As a parent though I am a tiny bit disappointed!

Nursery have no concerns but I’m not sure that I do. The above is reinforcing that … I’m just literally getting nothing. Bollocks would be better

One thing to try is to deliberately get it wrong.

DS I heard you saw an ambulance at nursery today?

Then DS might correct you "no mummy it was a fire engine..." and that might trigger a discussion.

Might be worth a try!

Remember apps are a new idea and all we got in the past was ever so brief handovers we'll just goodbye really. One of mine was non verbal so got nothing from her!

DD just turned 4: all I get is "fine" or "I can't remember".

I find direct/specific questions to be the least helpful tbh. She's much more likely to respond if I kae a general observation and then let her speak, or if I state something incorrect as a pp suggested.

My 4 year old ds only ever talks about what he had for lunch and its always chicken and potatoes, every day its all he's says. End of term they went on a trip to the local farm and he still came home and said he had chicken and potatoes no mention of the farm!

I think each child is really different in this regard. DC1’s response was consistently “I don’t know” or “I don’t remember” anytime I asked about nursery or school (age 8 now). DC2 (age 4) tells me every little detail of his day.

I would say don’t stress about it and don’t make it into a big issue. I’ve stopped asking DC1 really, and have found that he now naturally tells me things out of nowhere when he is playing or when I cuddle him at bedtime. Just take the pressure off!

I think it bothers me in a wider sense as I do sometimes think there’s something a tiny bit - amiss? - with DS. It’s very hard to explain. He’s a ‘normal’ child, nursery have explicitly said that they don’t think he has any additional needs - and yet I do find communication with him very, very challenging and always have. I thought this would resolve itself when he started talking freely but it hasn’t.

He doesn’t communicate needs. He has, fairly recently, started to ask for water if he wants a drink but he never asks for food - occasionally something specific like an ice cream but then he doesn’t seem to ‘really’ want it, will lick it a few times then it just melts. I never get asked for a snack or dinner or breakfast.

He doesn’t tell me when he needs the toilet: again very recently he’s started to say when he needs a poo but not wee, so we’re still having a fair few accidents (which is becoming a little bit embarrassing.)

And I get nothing re nursery, at all, not even the sort of monologues or bizarre rambles. I always thought parenting would get easier and I imagined the sort of discussions we’d have. I’ve been proved wrong!

Like I say, if you ask a question you get nothing but equally if you ask nothing you get nothing 🤷‍♀️😂

Mine are teens /young adults now. It's totally normal.
I actually found out more information from earwigging on my twins conversations (still do now sometimes). The eldest I never knew much.
Some things we did was apart from ask 'have you had a good day?' When collected ask nothing. Then at tea time we'd do one good thing that happened today that would sometimes get some information.
Also when you find out what topics they're doing you can get some books out of the library on the matter, watch a program, visit somewhere overtime you get information about what they've done.

Ah OP he is still very young and if nursery isn’t concerned about him, I would try not to worry too much. I can understand it is hard.

Maybe switch from a questioning line to a chat about your day. Someone else said 'say something wrong' so they can correct. In case he's feeling like the questions are too much of an interrogation and can switch to telling rather than answering.