To think nurseries seem depressing? Please help me narrow down

[pleaseguveadvicenotattack]

Posting for traffic and help regarding nurseries.

I’ve viewed 8 now and I don’t feel comfortable really leaving my child in any of them. They all seem a bit depressing! However, given I want my child to interact with other children I’ll overlook my concerns as this is my priority. I will also need it likely only 2-3 days a week.

This first nursery has a lot going for it. It has an "Outstanding" Ofsted rating and is owned by an ex-headteacher. It celebrates different cultural events, which is important to me, with events like Chinese New Year and Ramadan. They also have parent Saturdays and family days, which is a nice touch. I haven't seen this level of inclusivity at other nurseries and my child being mixed race in an overwhelming white area, these inclusions even if only on a small level, are somewhat important to me. They seem to offer a tailored childcare approach with twice-daily outdoor time and onsite cook and encourage light risk play which I think is important.

However, I do have a couple of concerns. Firstly, there's no dedicated sleep area, and I saw a child sleeping on their front. This worries me a bit, although the child did seem older (over 1 years old), unlike another nursery I viewed which had a supervised child at 8 months on their front which immediately put me off (I don’t know if I’m being silly!) Secondly, the nursery felt a bit cold and clinical.

The second nursery has a "Good" Ofsted rating. The children seemed happy and there was a generally good vibe. However, there was a smell at the entrance, mold in the baby room, a staff member I wasn't sure about (he appeared quite dopey and all of the staff seemed very young and inexperienced), and an overflowing skip outside. The Ofsted report also mentioned they need to improve consistency of support and encourage independence.

The third nursery has a bright and airy environment, focuses on learning, and has an onsite cook. It seems like there would be lots of interaction for older children and it did seem lively for older children. It had the most inviting and clean atmosphere and the staff seemed switched on and mature. However, there's a long waitlist which is also a good sign I guess - my child would be 1.5 years old before being able to go which is longer than I hoped, and the location is slightly more inconvenient. They haven’t had an Ofsted visit since 2019.

Which nursery would you choose and why?

Have you had any experiences with nurseries like these that you can share?

Any advice appreciated.

Children definitely need social interaction and will get lots from it, but they don't need the specific type of socialisation you get in a nursery environment (several other babies the same age and a handful of caregivers). It's fine of course, but it's not needed or necessary (or even the best kind of social interaction for children under at least three).

No-one should feel bad about making the best childcare choice available to them. Equally no-one should feel forced to send their child to nursery under the misguided belief that their child is missing out/will suffer from not spending 8-10 hours a day in a room with other babies. The socialisation they get at home/in a home environment is what they were designed to receive and what is best for them.

(Of course, nursery is preferable for those children whose home environment is problematic to the point of not offering appropriate socialisation or meeting other needs).

are they could be like me? Middle (one of them!) child in a large family, no nursery or childminder.

Yes. This. And there’s other form of social interaction eg playgroups, baby classes, parks, soft plays, trips to the supermarket! Not just sitting in a room with other babies for 10h a day.

The first one. A baby is at no risk sleeping on their stomach once they can roll. The risk of suffocation in small babies is because they can't reposition themselves. Once they can roll, they're fine to sleep how they are comfortable.

The mold could be dangerous though, I wouldn't send a child there.

For me I would go with nursery over childminder. I just don't feel comfortable with my child in someone else's home. Who visits during the day? How old are the older kids? Do they have kids of their own? I do feel uncomfortable that the children would nap in their 'bedrooms'.
It is clearly a very popular choice on here. But in my area they are practically non existent. It's lots of nurseries here. We opted for a private one though.
I would wait for no. 3. and be proactive about calling and checking if something comes up.

I much preferred nursery to the childminder option, but we were so lucky to have excellent nurseries local to us. They do so many things, they have a trips out multiple times a week, go outside everyday, and have so many resources to play with.

I think learning about different cultures is important. Lots of young children learn about Christmas and Easter, so why not other religious holidays, especially when their classmates follow different religions. Learning about them makes people more understanding.

Same with us. We started ours at 2yo and she has just grown in leaps since then. Speaking, socially, more independent play at home, even learning so much that I would never thought she could. They do so many fun activities, forest school weekly, I could never replicate all that at home. She often wants to stay longer when I pick up. We get daily feedback, teachers are so lovely. You just have to find the right one. If one has a waitlist I would go with that. I put my dc on the list when I was pregnant!

You're putting a baby into nursery to socialise them, @pleaseguveadvicenotattack?

I have always recognised that were very lucky with the nursery my daughter went to. It was a civil service nursery so lots of the parents were colleagues of my DH, giving it a sense of community. There was outdoor space, a cook so all the food was freshly prepared, and, most importantly, low staff turnover. There was the baby room, for six babies, a toddler room and three rooms for older children. Thry did lots of interesting things - Carol singing at the old people's home opposite, walking to the library. Not once did my daughter cry when we left her in the morning and, as she grew older, it was hard to persuade her to leave. Perhaps ironically, I had misgivings about childminders, single adults in their own space without the moderating effect of other adults.

I visited another nursery yesterday and I'm sad because it was actually quite decent. It was one of the cleaner ones I've been to and was part of a family center, so it was a bit more modern. However, the main drawback was that they can have up to 27 babies in the smallest room. Although the ratio is one staff member to 3 babies, this was still unsettling for me.

In the older kids' room (3-4 years), it felt more like Year One at school, and they can have up to 60+ children. On the day I visited, it looked like there might have been 30-40 children, and I think the staff ratio in this room was one to 8. Despite these concerns, I did like the place overall - it had flexible hours, is open until 6:30 PM, and is conveniently located, but these issues made me feel differently about it.

I've also found a school that accepts children from age 2. The school is 20 minutes away, and for 2-year-olds, they attend from 8:40 AM to 3:30 PM, with the option to pay extra for an additional hour or two. This could be another potential option, and then my child could continue at the same school once they reach the appropriate age. I could perhaps hire a nanny until age 2. This is also something I am considering.

He also discarded option 3 as my DH and I force past it day and were stuck in silly amounts of traffic. We could be looking at hour plus a day round trip it doesn't seem worth it

27 babies in a room is insane. I would never consider a babyroom with more than 9, maybe 12 at a push if it was very spacious.

If you can delay nursery til age 2, that would be better imo.

I wouldn’t consider the last one you saw at all. Not sure how it’s allowed to have so many kids in one place despite keeping to ratios.
all I can think of is if I put my kid there, they’d be bringing every bug possible from so many kids and would go to nursery 1 day, stay home sick the rest of the week every week 🤣

I once temped in a place that had 48 under 2s in one massive room - it was kind of zoned into 4 groups of 12 with low fences but it was still absolute madness, 48 kids and 16 adults, trying to feed and get them all napping in essentially one big open plan space.
I did two days and never went back.

that sounds horrendous - good for you not going back

If you don’t feel comfortable then maybe nursery just isn’t for you. Have you thought about a childminder?

also I worked in nurseries for years and most children over the age of one sleep on their tummies!! Once they can roll over it’s absolutely fine for them to do this and a lot of them do it naturally so I wouldn’t worry about that!

Look, you need to use some common sense with all of this.

If you need to use a nursery, then you need to have some hard criteria as to what is acceptable and not - with numbers, staff ratio, outside space, cook on site / cuisine, out of hours situation, nap areas, numbers napping vs non napping, where they nap if napping, free flow outside vs time allowed out…..to name a few….. there are more ….!!

To add, 27 babies in one room sounds horrendous on many levels…..please don’t go there

Tbh my main concern would be staff turnover and whether they are fully staffed or have to use temps. My daughter works in a nursery. For ages they struggled to attract and retain staff. It can be a problem in the industry. Stuff like celebrating cultures is imo trivial compared to the staffing. And check they do all the things they claim. The first nursery my daughter worked in claimed to take children out to the park but it never happened.

Cultural inclusion and events would definitely be a plus for me

It was a question, why?

Because it's reflective of the society we live in and I think that's important and should be celebrated

But you can teach about cultures and festivals at home? Why is nursery the only option to socialise and teach about cultures?! Eg at Easter you can buy sound books, even visit places of worship etc. it doesn’t have to be left to nursery.

Private nurseries are usually the pits of hell.

OP, I’m a little confused. Do you need a nursery so that you and DH can both work? Or is this
purely for socialisation? If the latter, just stop visiting nurseries now. There are so
many ways that you can socialise your baby with you at their side, and then when they get older
there are 2s groups, playgroups etc where you can leave them for a couple hours, then when they get to age 3 (assuming this is the same in England as Scotland) they can go to preschool.

If you don’t need the childcare then you don’t need a nursery at all, so if you don’t feel overjoyed by anywhere you’re looking at, just leave it.