How can I help my future bilingual three-year-old settle into nursery?

[Neclas]

Hi. I have a 3 year old who started nursery 2 weeks ago. its a Montessori nursery with total 20 kids at 3 or 4 age. First week I went outside for half an hour when he was playing with his teacher and he was ok with this. When I came back he usually wanted to stay more to play in the garden. On Day 6, teacher advised me to drop him at 9.30 and say a brief goodbye and then come back for collecting him at 12pm. I told him I will come back he said ok and waved his hand. After 45 min nursery staff called me and said it's better for me to come since he was very upset and they could not settle him. I could come back after 25 min. He was trying to solve a puzzle with his teacher but still crying. He was very stressed and thought I won't come back. He settled once he saw me at the door and smiled again. Anyway.. since then he doesn't want to go to the nursery and asks everyday whether we need to go to the nursery. I sit 90 mins on a chair in the nursery and he plays with a teacher and comes back to me each 5 mins for a hug. I don't work at the moment but we need him to learn speaking English. Also he is not very social with other kids. He plays always alone or just with the teacher there. I don't want to make him an unhappy child. The nursery pushes me to go outside and try a seperation again but I'm hesitant since he is continuously telling me to not leave him there alone again.. if you have any suggestions I would be very grateful to learn them. Thank you in advance.

I think it’s a but much to expect him to start nursery and learn a new language all at once.

I also think it’s unfair you expect the nursery to teach him a new language. The language he will likely be using mainly for the rest of his life if he lives here.

3 year olds don’t generally chat to other 3 year olds in nursery, nor do they play together as such. At that age, I would expect them to play in the same areas as other children but not play with them. What I will say though is that the longer you keep him away from nursery the harder it will be for him when he eventually starts in Reception. I have had many non English speaking children in our nursery and it’s amazing how quickly they learn the language just by being surrounded by English speakers.
You need to take him, hand him over and leave him for at least an hour to play. Yes he will get upset but he will soon learn from observing that he can play and that mummy will come back. I’ve seen children be absolutely sobbing at drop off but by the end of the week they’re so much more settled.

You need to tell him it's not a choice to attend nursery.
He goes to nursery to be taught English and he isn't left alone.
Teach him keywords now so he can understand the teachers and he can communicate basic needs.

The nursery I mentioned had no available space at that time.. also it is a private school nursery and almost all of the kids continue to P1. Although they normally have funded spaces for the nursery, staff told us it's a better idea to start there if DC can continue to P1 there which is almost impossible for us due to high cost of it.

Then forget that nursery and focus on settling your child into the one he attends.

The private school nursery may well have had staff who are both better paid and more experienced/trained. Or that particular assistant may have had experience with a hearing impaired child, hence the non-verbal expertise.

@Neclastheres a good book with puppets you can buy to act it out called Three Owl Babies. It’s to help with separation anxiety and the message the book teaches is “mummy always comes back”

Thank you for your reply. I hope the process will be similar to other non English speakers. Also it's good to remember that social skills of 3 year olds still do not include playing together rather than side by side. I just want him to settle there without being overly traumatised. I will try to leave him for very short times this week and observe whether he trusts me and feels better when I am back again. However I am also doubtful about the nursery type we chose for him. He likes playing with cars diggers etc but since this nursery is Montessori based, they mostly have puzzles on trays in the classroom. He can successfully complete these little games but always says that he doesn't like the toys there😒he tries to finish them asap and leave the tray back to its place. i love Montessori but maybe he doesn't. I hope this does not affect the settling process.

Honestly you need to show your child that mursery is now a part of his everyday life now. If you show doubts about choice of nursery and if you discuss attending with him he won't settle. He will prefer to stay at home speaking his own language being with you. He is 3 years old.

Outside of nursery, have you and he done many things together with English speakers eg toddler football or playgroups?

If he has been mostly with his parents and other speakers of his language, it’s such a huge change.

It was difficult. Especially when I only spoke 2 languages at the time. I understand one language but cannot really speak it and I’ve since learnt her third language much better. Her partner is also quad lingual - normal around here, so conversations can be amusing.
I would now class myself as almost quad lingual. I know the basics but at my age it is hard to swap around.

Yes, absolutely use Makaton. The nursery should be onto Makaton anyway. Have they suggested it?

Thank you. I asked them about a method we can use for communication. They provided me some images to show LO. Now they will try to show him these images at nursery to support their communication. However they don't have makaton signs etc on the walls etc.

They should, not just for your child, but for others who may have communication issues. You could ask for a referral to a Speech and Language therapist, preferably one with bilingual experience. They're very keen on Makaton and should liaise with the nursery to encourage them to use it.
Good luck!

I’m sorry to hear you’re both going through this, dd1 used to hate being left at school and would cry for half an hour after I left. Against my better instinct I left her, but I had miserable mornings wondering how she was.

in our case it turned out she was autistic (we didn’t know til she was a teenager) so was suffering from overwhelm and confusion, lots of other children, sensory overwhelm but our preschool found her a blanket and would let her calm down in a quiet spot wearing it, playing with her favourite toys.

i think it was bad advice to not teach your son English and I’d ask them for a list of commonly used terms eg ‘tidy up time’ ‘nap time’ ‘snacks’ ‘toilet’ and make sure that you use them at home. I don’t know how a Montessori works but at our preschool there'd be themed weeks - it might be colours, letters, animals, counting so you could ask what they’d be learning so you can teach them in advance to build up his understanding of what’s going on. Do they ever watch a TV programme? Can you watch it together as well? So I’d just try to make him more familiar with the key phrases that theyll be using.

Can you teach him about going away and coming back at home, like when you leave rooms or go out and leave him with DP if that happens, say things like I’ll be back in a minute I’m just popping to the toilet. Just reinforcing the idea that you come back. read some books about nursery, and also some books about going into environments where people speak another language if you can find some. Maybe act it out with some toys too? I would do a lot of conversation explaining he isn’t there alone, he’s with nursery staff who want to care for him, and make sure he’s ok. Tell him it’s ok to not love it there, but he’s safe and cared for and you’d never abandon him or leave him somewhere or with someone you didn’t think would look after him.
At most nurseries you just have to leave and the child just has to cry it out, which I wouldn’t like really. If yours are open to you being there like it sounds like, could you maybe tell him you are going outside for 5 minutes then come right back. Then try 10 minutes the next day. 15 minutes and so on.
tell him you’re going to leave for half an hour or pop to the shops then you’ll be back. And just increase the time. He learns you’re coming back every time and at home books and games and stories help him process it.

I would probably practice a little bit of English at home, or at least put some English tv on, and maybe give him something from home to take with him (or draw on his wrist or something) and tell him when he touches it you’ll be thinking of him, so the two worlds don’t feel as separate as they just feel right now

Thank you a lot for your suggestions. Actually we decided start from the beginning. I stay in the classroom with him around 1 hour and will try to go to the toilet to see his reaction. We will start from 1 minute and gradually make it longer each time. I have explained him that I will never leave him there etc however it seems like it will take time for him to trust. Currently he just sits at the closest desk to me in the classroom although his teacher also sits and plays with him. Since he checks me all the time, he does not focus on the activity and just tries to finish and go. At home he is not panicking when he doesn't see me. I will try drawing something on his wrist also. I hope he will be well soon..

We are trying to make him familiar with the most used words. He knows colours numbers food names etc but never tells them in the nursery.
He doesn't like crowded places with too many noises and faces around. He cannot stand noise of hand dryer or blender etc for example. Even he doesn't want to talk with someone who talks loud. A sensitive kid with very limited language makes everything harder. I am also trying to find a comforter toy but he doesn't care toys when he is upset.

Maybe the nursery is too busy, but at the moment you're teaching him that is a dangerous place by staying and supervising. It's scary for both of you, but he needs to know that you think it's safe by you leaving him. He will be picking up on your anxiety. I wouldn't worry too much about teaching him English. That advice will be mostly comiing from older or monolingual families. Most thinking is to do precisely what you do.

We're multilingual and go to what turns out to be the expat nursery, completely by chance. What works really well at ours is that all the rooms are 0-4. The different ages mean there's always someone at about DS's stage in each element. He's as mobile and fast as the big kids so plays with them, but speaks with the babies because he's bilingual so a bit behind.

Does he panic if he can’t see you at home, even if his dad or another familiar adult is there?

I would hold off sending him until he has learnt some basic English - your leaving him in a place where he can't communicate and others can't communicate with him. I'm really not surprised he's not settling. Nursery can be scary enough for some kids without additional communication barriers.

I would question hiw much is language and how much is standard separation anxiety. I lived in a 2 language country as a young child and there were kids with both languages at nursery. At that age kids can usually play together without sharing a language. He will pick it up fast if immersed in English too.

Mostly no. When he plays with daddy or grandpa, he doesn't care where I am for a long period. When we are outside if he cannot see me although I am close he panics then starts crying and running around.

Thank you it's a good question to think about. He mostly prefers adults to play with, which I believe can be quite normal at his age. However, he has also started to notice that the teachers do not always understand him because of the language barrier.
The nursery has also told me that they find it difficult to settle him when he is upset because they cannot fully understand what he is trying to communicate. I think he definitely has separation anxiety at the moment, but the bigger difficulty is that he has not yet been able to build a strong enough sense of safety and connection with the people around him. I have noticed that he tends to trust and bond more quickly with adults who naturally use expressive facial gestures and body language when communicating with him. A person like this would be a game changer I believe.

What language do you and your family speak? I live in a fairly diverse part of the country and my sons nursery had lots of bilingual staff on the rota.

Could you not find a setting where someone has experience of his language? The nursery my son attended had Arabic, Urdu and French speaking teachers.