to think that day care centres or 'nurseries' should be banned?

[Goodomen]

Having spent some time working (doing supply) in several different nurseries I have been appalled by the treatment of the babies and and young children.

The babies spend most of the day crying, desperately wanting to be held or have some kind of one to one attention.

They are all forced to 'nap' at the same time whether they are tired or not.

They are put in highchairs and fed one by one with the poor children at the end of the row crying until it is their turn to be fed.

The worst part is when the parent arrives to collect their child and asks how they have been they are told 'He/She has been fine, had a lovely time' even if the child has been crying all day!

Why oh why would anyone out there child in such a place?
If you have to work get a childminder!

you never really know what goes on in a nursery do you...even "good" ones...a good ofsted report sometimes isn't worth the paper it's written on....plus it's not just a question of good or bad....it's more is "institutionlized" care good for under 3's...imo, no it isn't.

at least with a c/m it's a homely enviroment with the care being given by the same person everyday....of course a bad c/m is probably worse than a bad nursery.....why i'm glad i didn't have to use any form of childcare.

thekilling

The same could be said of any childcare including childminders. In fact as a childminder is usually on her own a child is much more vunerable.

Indeed, the same could be said of a child at home with their parent. You never really know what is going on.

what georgimama said. I have never actually used a nursery (apart from sending dcs to playschool), but I always felt dcs were safer with the childminders than with me

I'm not sure that I've ever been more pissed off, disgusted, upset and angry with a thread than I am with this one

What does the OP suggest we do with our children when we go to work to keep a roof over their heads?

Would the OP prefer that I give up my job, be unable to pay my mortgage and outgoings and have to live off the state in a B&B with my DS?

FFS grow up and remove the rose coloured glasses.

With DS in nursery - which I chose VERY carefully and he absolutely ADORES going to btw - I can work and pay for our lifestyle. DS gets good food, treats, toys, books and quality time.

I'm not surprised that the OP can't get a teaching job - she has the empathy and compassion of a piece of granite

Waspie, the OP is only the beginning of the bile on this thread.

"Would the OP prefer that I give up my job, be unable to pay my mortgage and outgoings and have to live off the state in a B&B with my DS?"

I don't think she would, but there are posters on this thread who actually do think that would be better, because then you and your children would be "togevva" (adopt Timothy Spall's accent in that insurance advert from the mid 1980s) all the time. You'd be on tranquilisers, but at least they'd be with mummy all the time, eh?

OK, I have worked in a nursery. Here we go.

• Ideally one or two people on the staff should have a related degree, or be working towards one. Others should have attended a good FE college and have relevant qualifications. Some of them should be doing additional courses out of genuine interest, eg sign language, baby yoga, that type of thing. If they're not training, they either don't like their job, or they think they know everything.

• Staff turnover should be low and generally related to people moving out of the area and/or having their own children, rather than job hopping. It's a good sign if staff come back to the nursery to work after maternity leave bringing their own children with them IMO. It's not good if there are too many agency staff. It is another good sign if trainees from the local adult education college do course placements there. The older the average age of the staff, the better, generally speaking.

• Children should be fairly free to move around the nursery between rooms if they feel like visiting somewhere else or visiting one of the other carers they have taken a liking to - obviously not in a chaotic way, but for social purposes. Eg DS2 used to like going into the nursery office and putting his teddy onto the scanner to make electronic pictures, and generally chat to the office staff.

• Mealtimes should look sociable and jolly and there should be more fruit and veg than cake and biscuits during the course of the day. Children should be able to ask for snacks between meals like drinks of water, bits of banana or breadsticks if they want them. If they sleep through a meal, someone should keep some food for them to have later.

• Dettox dettox dettox! There can be skimping on cleaning of changing mats and potties sometimes, which leads to diarrhoea outbreaks. It's best if children are provided with their own potties, blankets and so on.

• Plenty of outdoor play and little trips to the postbox or to feed the ducks, that kind of thing.

• Children should feel happy about asking for a cuddle.

• There should be fun events like dressing up days and charity fundraising days that the children and staff clearly look forward to.

that's of course true georgimama....if you're the type of parent who shouts at your children all day while you're sitting around smoking and watching jeremy kyle...the children are better off at nursery.

Bad things I have seen:

• Dirty changing mats not dettoxed properly between children.

• Nursery manager that never picked a single child up or gave them a kiss and cuddle, but made them do pages of sums instead.

• Nursery owner's teenage son being left in charge of playtime outside.

• Parents leaving child in nursery even though he was mental with grief and obviously wasn't ready to be left - he cried all day (and we told the parents).

boffinmum that is truely shocking...

Thank God!

Something constructive!

Thanks BoffinMum

Oh Georgimama I haven't even calmed down enough to process the repugnant attitudes shown by some on this thread

I did always make a fuss when I saw bad practice. It made me no friends with the management though.

Nursery manager was Montessori trained and so up herself and unaffactionate. I always had kids on both hips and kissed their little podgy cheeks on demand. Now there are so few jobs where you can get paid to be surrounded by lovely kids giving you cuddles. Why would people not respond to that????

BoffinMum

i was the same like you.

But i think those who didnt work like this maybe were over-tired, stressed, fed up of the bad management and feeling too restricted by paperwork and rules.

Tbh when i left nursery and went into nannying i felt that i was giving much more to the babies i looked after and this was because of the ratio but also because of the freedom to plan my day, to follow the baby's pace and to use my initiative.

georgimama - Interesting that you think looking after ones own child would lead to one being on tranqulisers. Makes me wonder why people have children if this is what they feel about looking after them.

Thanks boffinmum! I'm pleased to say that my nursery meets almost all your suggestions - apart from the 'freedom to roam' one - why do you think this is important? My DS doesn't nap anymore so he's allowed into another class while his classmates are napping, but the children don't have the freedom to just roam wherever they like, and I think that's a good thing. So I'm interested to know what's behind your thinking.

BTW DS is at a fab Montessori nursery. Being Monty doesn't mean 'up oneself and unaffectionate' . My DSs teachers have always been wonderful, kind, warm, cuddly women. That comes down to personality, not training.

londonone - actually in the 50s when most women were forced to be SAHMs (employers would sack you when you got married) there was a VERY high rate of tranquiliser use.

Your opinion on parenting issues is less valid than 99.9% of other posters because you aren't a parent. When you eventually have children, you'll realise that. My sister's a nanny and confessed when she had her own daughter that she used to have all sorts of views and opinions that she now realises were just ill-informed.

edam - I presume you don't have any opinions on education then, not being a teacher, or any opinions on the NHS, not being a health professional or any opinions on anything that you do not have first hand experience of?

I don't mean freedom to roam in the sense that the kids are anarchically going where they like all the time, but more that if an individual child wants to go to see a member of staff they like in another room, they should be able to ask permission and then go across to pay a little visit at some point in the day. I think that promotes continuity, if they can for example leave the pre-school room for a little while to visit the toddler room to say hello, that kind of thing. I also think it shows a nursery sees the kids as individuals and respects the quality of the relationships they have built with other members of staff. Am I making any sense?

Good god..hasn't this thread been done a million times before? I presume it's already kicked off, big style.

I am very pro Monetssori/Steiner/Froebel by the way, so that wasn't any kind of dig at Montessori training. She was just cold.

Do try to concentrate, londonpaper. As it happens I have professional and personal experience of the NHS. Most people have experience of being patients or their families being patients and most people have been to school. Many parents have children in schools.

The point about motherhood and fatherhood in particular is that you can't possibly understand it fully until you have your own child.

If you really don't get that, then you are very hard of thinking indeed.

edam - And I have been in a family, I have parents, I have siblings, cousins, aunts and uncles all of whom makes parenting decisions. So I am as entitled to an opinion on parenting as you are to one on education given that you have been to school.

And edam if you want to start throwing personal insults don't omplain if they come back to haunt you.

Hey, I have stayed in lots of hotels and I wouldn't presume to be able to run one. I also eat out a lot but I wouldn't have a clue about how to run a restaurant properly.