Nursery want to have a talk … worried

[Yubslp]

Toddler (2.5) has started hitting and kicking at nursery. There’s no pattern to it apparently. They’re in 3.5 days a week and very very rarely behave like this at home. Apparently it’s happening a few times a day. It stopped for a while and now started up again. Nursery have asked me to go in for a chat. I am worried. Do they think we are causing this?!

Hopefully they’ll support you to present a united front in whatever approach you decide together to use to tackle this. If it’s a good nursery, the meeting will be about support.

Not to worry you but they might be concerned that it’s not improving and be worried about his suitability to continue on at the nursery if he’s presenting a safeguarding risk to other children and injuring them by hitting and kicking. It might be a meeting to discuss a plan before thinking of more drastic measures like expelling him

There could be many reasons a for a chat. Most likely are:

• To get you on board with how to teach him it's not OK, to maybe help him have better boundaries at home (does he listen to you? Does he ever kick or scream at you? What happens if he does?). What is prompting these incidents? Can you recreate them at home eg. Is it having to do something he doesn't want to do (but at home you just let him not do it)? Does he understand no means no? Is it sharing toys? Does he play much with other children when you're around? How does he behave? Is he seeing anything at home? Violence in the house? (even video games or films). Does he have older siblings? How do they treat him?

• They may be concerned that your DS may be neuro divergent and they need your permission to ask someone to come and observe him to give them strategies and begin a process of diagnosis. If he needs, for example, a 1:1 helper to stop him hurting other children then they need to be able to get funding for him to have someone to be with him constantly.

No they won't think you are causing it (unless there is something going on in your life?) but either they want to go through it with you and come up with solutions or... maybe they wonder if he has additional needs. I imagine it as happened quite a number of times and it is possible that other parents have complained. Don't worry.

This is very common. Often comes from children who are getting frustrated by communication problems between themselves and their nursery classmates as obviously they are all learning.

My DC's nursery would agree a plan with the parents of basically hyper monitoring the child that was lashing out to be able to intervene when situations were escalating. I doubt they think you are causing the problem. They might ask you to reinforce messages at home about what to do if your DC gets cross or worried through play or using consistent language.

If he’s not hitting and kicking at home then it’s more likely that they are causing this (not staff personally but the nursery setting in general, being around the other kids)

it’s also extremely common behaviour for a 2 year old and not at all indicative of their behaviour later on so try not to stress about it. He won’t be the only one. My DSD was an absolute terror at nursery, bit, kicked, punched, scratched, spat, ran away daily. She’s now a teen and is wonderful and gentle.

What?? It isn't out the realm of normality for a child that age to hit. My son has hit at nursery recently. I would hope he wouldn't be expelled

Can he communicate or does he have a speech delay? That frustration or overstimulation can cause them to lash out.

He's 2 and a half. His social skills probably just need a bit of improvement. They could be questioning a mild issue there also, which would be a good thing to catch and address early. They won't be looking to blame you, more to get to the bottom of it for your sons sake and to keep other kids safe too. It'll be fine and if they do question if anythings going on at home, it will be most likely to try and understand what's happening. Just talk to them and ye can try figure it out together

I'm sure they don't think you're causing this behaviour - it's very normal toddler behaviour which the nursery are used to dealing with. They probably want to talk to you about putting a plan in place to tackle the behaviour and make sure that you're all on the same page and being consistent. Please don't worry, it's a good thing that there is open communication between parents and nursery.

I didn’t say it was out of the ordinary but my DD went through a biting and hitting phase at 1 and nursery told me that was one option if it didn’t improve so just sharing my experience.

Think that is extreme of that nursery to have said that. My child is hitting out at times at the moment but nothing has been said like that. Could solve it with cooperation between parents and nursery.

@Lmnop22 Just seen your child was one. That is ridiculous of that nursery to mention expulsion.