Nursery - full or part-time?

[meadow]

I just wanted your comments on whether you feel it's better to have your child in full or part-time nursery. I mean, does it make any real difference re. developmental skills if they are there for just 2 days or the full week.

I think it depends on what you do when your child is not at school. We used the time together to do lots of other things. Even a supermarket visit can be fun if you look at colours and shapes and talk about how much things cost and where they came from. You can go for walks, visit the library or the beach or the art gallery. You can cook at home or make craft type things and of course give your child one-to-one attention! If you want to do something more structured there are lots of early education activity books around now, too. HTH.

It does not make any real difference developmentally - as SueDonim says, everything you do together can be as exciting and enjoyable as time at a good nursery. Some children flourish on the time away from home, some find the bustle of nursery too distracting.
If your child is going to be new to daycare then maybe the best thing to do would be to start them on a couple of days/sessions a week and work up to five days/sessions in the last year/term before they go to big school.
I would also ask the nursery manager's advice. A good nursery manager should take into account what he/she already knows of your child's personality and not have an eye on the £££.
HTH

Thanks, feeling very reassured by your comments. I will go for a part-time place so she will have the best of both worlds!

meadow, you can always increase the hours as they approach school time anyway, my son increased his days slowly from 2 at age 1, and has been going for 5 since he was 3 - he absolutely loves it.

I would do the part time thing. This would be a fair thing for the child. Full time seems so long for children to be in a daycare away from parents. When i worked in daycares some kids would be there 9 - 11 hours a day. They would be totally exausted and missing mommy and daddy a lot. I feel thats way too much on them. Partime your child will enjoy it more and not get as bored. And at least the child will have a good amount of waking hours in the home.