Childcare professionals: Nursery or childminder?

[BabybabybabyOooh]

Apologies for the shameless use of AIBU for traffic.

I’d love to get the opinions of anyone with inside knowledge of the childcare profession on going with a nursery vs. childminder.

What is best, specifically for a 1 year old?

(This is partly prompted by reading on here that nobody in childcare would ever send their child to nursery. Is this true?)

Many thanks for any advice! 🙏

I've worked in nurseries, been a childminder and now manage a nursery. 25 years plus in total:

look at both. There are some amazing and terrible options in both fields! Your gut will tell you very quickly. I'll say I have children In my baby room
now who's mum I looked after as a baby so there are definitely people in it for the right reasons who genuinely love their charges!

ask questions about how the carers discipline and teach right from wrong. I hâte the use of time out and thinking chairs but they still exist 😭. Ask about staff turnover and how many people are first aid certified. Id want to know how many staff were qualified and not: id also want to have somewhere that supervised sleep. A homely caring environment where your baby will be picked up and cuddled when they need it, lots of outdoor opportunities and learning through play rather than a load of rubbish work sheets for the bigger ones. If it's a nursery, id want to check the baby room staff were the same so that positive attachment could be forged.

trust your instinct and look at everywhere you can even if you do t think you'll like it. You never know!

Totally agree you have to visit and decide for yourself.

There are some CMs who are just doing it because it’s convenient around looking after their own kids and they are not providing enriching, nurturing environments. There are others who are absolutely amazing and provide the sort of loving preschool environment that an involved auntie/uncle or grandparent might.

There are some nurseries with a high level of staff turnover, usually young girls out of school who aren’t all that interested in childcare but couldn’t think what else to do. There are others with staff that have been in place for years and years who truly have a vocation for early years care and education.

Ask for personal recommendations local to you, don’t be afraid to ask loads of questions when visiting settings and as PP said, trust your instincts - they’re really valuable.

In general small children are best suited to a small and homely environment with one caregiver (as close as you can get to the experience of them being at home with their main caregiver). There is lots of research on this that you could probably find with a Google. Older children (3+) will likely see some benefits to a nursery environment.

But obviously for any child a fantastic nursery is better than a bad childminder so it depends what is available in your area.

I work in childcare (nanny) and I have worked in nurseries and I am one of the ones who would never send my child to a nursery. The reason being that it is far, far harder to determine a good from a bad nursery than it is a good/bad childminder. There are too many people, room changes and staff changes to be able to get a feeling for anyone specific or to predict who will be with your child on any specific day. With a childminder (as with a nanny) there is absolute accountability with one person, safeguarding is much easier.

Depends on your child and the options local to you. I personally preferred a good nursery over a childminder as there are often more activities/enrichments and more children which helps socialise, as well as several staff which allows your child to gravitate to their favourite! Plus removes risk of childminder calling in sick.

Some very helpful perspectives, thank you everyone! I agree that a more domestic setting seems better for younger years. It also seems like childminders could be more variable? But I agree that the high churn of staff at nurseries is their real Achilles heel!

A good childminder who works alongside another one. I’ve worked in nurseries and wouldn’t use them until 2+ ish.

A good friend of mine was a childminder for over 30 years.
Half of her customers were teachers, so that speaks volumes I guess.
I used a wonderful childminder until my child started school nursery at age 3.5.
Large nurseries just didn’t appeal as babies & toddlers need lots of attention, not loads of activities.

It depends what works for you as well. I don't have the kind of job that I could have just taken holidays whenever a cm did - especially if the cm was more likely to take holiday in school holidays. Also nursery gave them 3 meals a day, the childminders round here cost the same per day but only give them dinner.

If she offered term time only contracts that was likely to be a factor in her client base being lots of teachers!

I'm not a professional, but my mother was (and worked in both settings).

There are good and bad in both, it's a very individual thing. I'd say a good childminder slightly trumps a good nursery. But in my own area, nursery was a better option.

Keep an open mind, visit as many as you can and go with your gut.

If you're on maternity leave now, I would observe the childminders you see out and about at playgroups, rhyme time etc.

There are some great ones but having seen many at work, I wasn't impressed with many of them. There are a lot who do it to be at home with their own children rather than because they particularly love looking after other people's.

I also found that most wouldn't deal with preparing food for my child who has allergies - fair enough in one sense but I really didn't want to be faffed with packed lunch every day. I also didn't want to take my holidays in school holidays and that is when most childminders want time off.

Having looked at a few places, we went with a small nursery - numbers wise not dissimilar from a large childminder+ assistant setting. The staff had all been there for 7+ years, most had their own children, it was a really homely environment, but had the pros of nursery as well in terms of year round operation

I'm a primary school teacher and DD will start nursery in a few months. She'll be 11 months old by then (to allow me to do the settling in...we're abroad and it takes weeks).
I've chosen a nursery because there will be other kids her age there and the hours are secure. They won't close just because one of the carers might be sick or on holiday or whatever.
I've picked a really small nursery, though. (Did the same with DS when he was little.) They only have two groups and only have 14 kids aged 6 months to 3 years. School here starts at age 6 so she'll transfer somewhere else when she's a little older. It's also only 5 minutes from our house.

I chose a nursery after observing multiple childminders and nannies in the park meeting up with their own friends or being on their phones and basically ignoring their charges.
One nanny used to bring her charge to a baby music class and sit in the circle doing the actions and singing along while the child wandered off around the room emptying people's changing bags. I never once saw her interact with the child or try to encourage her to join in. Made me really sad.
I went back to work 3 days a week when mine were small and used nursery for 2 days and grandparents for the other day. I appreciate these aren't options open to everyone.

Thank you everyone, some very helpful views. I’m leaning towards a childminder until my baby is older, but am slightly haunted by accounts of childminders ignoring the kids!

I always felt happier with my children in nursery. I know there’s brilliant and rubbish in both category. Personally I liked the school kind of setting, I didn’t like the idea of putting my child in someone else’s home. I like more staff to hold others to standards and to account. I also wanted them to socialise in larger groups.

To be fair, there are awful nursery staff too (I have personally come across them) but they aren't so visible.

There are excellent childminders out there.

Well if only you'd had the chance to covertly observe the nursery for such long periods of time as well.

I've worked in one. Chatting about boyfriends and nights out, moaning about management and parents, regularly out of ratio, accidents because everyone thinks someone else did xyz....

No not all of course, but then neither is your bit of research in to what childminders and nannies are like. We're all different.

That is very simple thinking. We looked at a variety of solutions when I wanted to return to work.

The childminders we spoke to in our area all had their morning and afternoon very much determined by the older children's school run. They wanted fixed nap times, were all about mixing children but I was cautious about the idea of toys for 4-8 year olds and a baby mixed together. It felt a lot more that the babies had to go with the flow instead of focusing on the younger ones. But that obviously is if you have CM who have school age children.

One was also very open that if her children were off sick, she wouldn't take any of the mindees - difficult thing if you have no emergency support. Others only wanted term time contracts.

The nurseries - again, it depended on a lot of factors. Outdoor space, feeding attitude, holiday outside school holiday, no issues with staff on holiday/off sick.

Visit/speak to lots of options and choose the one which works for you and baby.

We did childminder for a year and have added on a day of nursery now that dd is 2 and have been pleasantly surprised by how much she seems to enjoy both. I had people telling me it would be cruel and damaging to put my child in childcare but all I’ve seen is a child who has grown in confidence and come on in leaps and bounds in terms of communication.

I was an Early Years teacher for 16 years, working in schools but I also did some moderation in nurseries as well as visiting for transition meetings. I moved to supply teaching whilst caring for a sick relative and did some supply in private nurseries during that time too.

I chose a childminder for DD and was definitely happy with that choice. I wouldn’t say I’d never have used a nursery, I’m sure there are some amazing ones out there but I never came across one that I’d have been fully happy to send my DD to. I never had a second’s doubt or any concerns about our childminder - it did take meeting with quite a few to find the right one, and initially she couldn’t quite offer the hours we needed as she was very in demand. I was very fortunate to be able to be flexible, shift my work hours around and wait for her to be able to offer more - I know not everyone has that luxury.

That said, I’ve heard some horror stories from friends who used other local childminders and I came across quite a few that left a lot to be desired at playgroups etc. It’s definitely important to meet with a few and to be quite thorough in your research/ questions - personal recommendations are always helpful too if there’s any local parents groups either in person or on Facebook etc where you can ask.

I never worried about socialisation either - I think it actually helped DD’s development more that she was mixing with some older children too, I certainly saw a huge leap forward in her imaginative play, and she was taken out and about to different groups and activities. I don’t think nursery would have been the right step for her at 1, but when the time came for her to move on (to a school nursery) at 3 she was absolutely ready and there were no wobbles or tears.