Childminders at soft play

[Hollygolightly89]

I visited a soft play with my 3 year old yesterday morning. There was a group of childminders about 3 or 4 of them and they each had a couple of children. They mostly sat in the baby part of the soft play chatting in a group with their backs turned to the children the whole time and also constantly on their phones, even when the children were eating they were on their phones. Most of the children they had went off into the soft play alone and most of them looked under 2. I was quite shocked by this because if I was paying for a childminder I wouldn’t expect them to be on their phones and my child let loose in the soft play. At various points the children were crying for various reasons and they acted like it was a massive chore to go and get them. I aslo heard them speaking negatively about the children like “oh guess who’s crying again”.

Yes I’ve seen this a lot at toddler groups and soft plays. It’s one of the reasons we went with nursery for our two DCs rather than a childminder, even though nursery is more expensive. Whenever I’ve gone into the nursery kids are happy, being played with by multiple staff, lovely activities, songs, stories and great food cooked on site. Whenever I’ve seen childminders they’ve been talking to themselves and ignoring their kids, kids running unnoticed or unhappy and being ignored. I’m sure there are some great childminders I just haven’t seen any myself.

The problem is this is obviously pretty common as so many people have seen something similar. There is such massive variation across child minders it totally put me off that as an option. I used my nursery for 5-6 years across that time and there was of course variation- largely down to how effective the manager was but there was visibility so when the manager was struggling, it was noticed.

They are only professionals because they are not the child's parent and they are being paid. That's as professional as child minders get. All the ones I knew when my children were small were thick and doing it because they had small children and needed to be paid for doing something. Nursery workers are the girls who failed their GCSEs but are just about capable of looking after a baby, children minders are mainly appalling. One day people will wake up and realise what they are doing with their precious child

Look, I’ve had 3 children of my own. They do need a level of supervision. These were children from around 8 months to 4 years. The little ones, you have to keep an eye on incase they get tramped on or get into something they shouldn’t, the older ones are usually having a barney over sharing or trying to lamp each other.

The do need to be looked after. Dumping them on one side of the hall and then sitting on the other side, chatting away and paying no attention to them doesn’t cut it.

I am far from a perfect parent. The days I couldn’t be arsed to supervise to make sure they didn’t eat glitter, launch themselves off a slide or whack another child over the head with a toy, I didn’t take them.

But when I was running the groups, I saw a hell of a lot of CMs who regularly couldn’t be arsed to supervise or interact, or comfort when there was an accident or upset. There was no teaching how to share, how to behave when eating (not to run around the room with food). Not great when you are being paid to care for children.

The exact reason why I didn’t use a childminder. During maternity leave I spent some time at our local playgroups to get a feel of the childminders and I wouldn’t have let a dog with them. Whenever I have been at group events where nursery groups have turned up the level of care and security around them is so different.

i remember at those play group events, if anyone ever saw a toddler with so much snot hanging from their nose it had clearly been there for ages, you would automatically send them to the group of childminders chatting away for a tissue.

@Hollygolightly89 I remember one of the boys in the group was always crying. At the soft play, library, park. It made me really sad. One day I was in Tesco and I saw this child with his mum and he wasn’t crying. I almost couldn’t place him because he was so different. I had one of those snap decision moments - do I say anything? I decided not to. Because the mum didn’t know me. And all I would be doing by saying something is giving her another problem. Another job. Giving her the dilemma and putting it on her mind. So I didn’t say anything. After all, the child is fed. Is warm. Is taken out. ‘Just’ ignored

The same with Nannie’s. I’ve always wfh or been a sahm for the last decade and always had a nanny throughout. I couldn’t believe the stuff they did when I was around and always think of those kids under sole care of a nanny.

I disagree with nursery workers failing their GCSEs. A few yes I agree with and to be honest you can mostly tell which girls these are. My old nursery had a few arrive but left after a few months. Others you can really tell they just love children, a few at my current nursery are studying a degree in children’s education to eventually come out of nursery’s and go into teaching or something else.

I’m not saying nurseries are better but atleast in a nursery phones wouldn’t be allowed around the children. So yes I’m sure some nursery workers likely do ignore the children and have a gossip and a chat but there’s more security in a nursery, the rooms are smaller and they can physically see the children at all times and they have a manager to answer too etc

What a judgemental, twatty take.

For reference, I am not a childminder, a nanny nor do I work in a nursery.

What a small minded point of view you have.

Honestly I’ve seen so many things like this that is absolutely never use a childminder.

We constantly had this at my local softplay. But the worst was at playgroups. Too busy planning nights out together or on their phones to actually know what the children were up to. I’ve seen children under their care hitting and lkicking eachother without intervention, saw a boy fall and bang his head pretty badly and the childminder had no idea what happened or how this boy had hurt himself.

I stopped going to one group because the childminders were solid h a PITA. This group took place in 2 rooms and you couldn’t see one room from the other If that makes sense. One day it was me as a sole adult with my dd and almost all of the versions childminders children while the childminders sat on the sofas in the other room. I had their children asking me where their parents were, saying they’d done a poo and fighting. I had to go get the childminders several times but still not one of them though to come and stay and keep an eye on the children, just stayed on the sofas chatting away. I stopped going as I thought I’m not the one being paid to watch these kids.

So no I’d absolutely not trust them. Sorry to any decent childminders reading this.

I was a nursery assessor for years.

YANBU but there are good and bad childminders, just like there are good and bad nurseries. And good and bad schools!

This is awful 😭 those poor babies.

Ex childminder here. I could have written the OP myself. Sadly it's common to see this happening. It gives the good childminders a very bad reputation.

I don't think I ever sat down when I would take the minded children to a softplay centre as I was constantly checking they were safe or playing with them. I would often end up with other childminders children joining us as we engaged with our children.

There are good childminders out there but often they have a long waiting list. If you see these same childminders sat chatting and ignoring the children in their care I would report them to Ofsted. They are neglecting the children in their care at best, at worse it's an accident or safeguarding issue waiting to happen.

I'm always at toddler groups and soft play and I honestly think this is the norm, there's a group of childminders I see regularly, they don't interact with the kids and sit eating and chatting with each other instead.
Don't even get me started on the amount on the school run picking up their kids with their childminded littles on tow - there is one who parks for a space at 2:30 with car time those kids are in her car for 2 hours a day. Wouldn't be what I would pay for.

Yeah but there not being paid!

You must live in a really shitty area.

Lots of childminders near me have lovely lifestyles and do it in spite of the awful pay, not because they are too thick to so anything else.

This is why i only entrusted DC when they were verbal and able to communicate what happens, almost 3 yrs old

Also the inevitable consequence of people being told on here to set up as a childminder as it’s a job they can fit around school hours / look after their own children at the same time.

I was at soft play one day and a little girl was over wanting to play with my baby which is fine but it soon turned into basically minding her as she was asking for help on the slide etc. I said to the girl “where is your grown up?” And she pointed to her nanny who was slumped in a chair with a coffee scrolling her phone, enjoying her down time while I minded her charge!She waved over at me when she noticed the girl pointing at her and went back to her phone. The bloody cheek! (Obviously I sent the girl back to her nanny I’m not minding other people’s kids!)

Many many years ago I used to see the same group of childminders doing exactly as you described OP everywhere I saw them (small town, limited options!). Put me right off that form of childcare!!

Many m

If that’s your take on the entirety of the nursery profession then I’m afraid I don’t believe you.