Please compare my nursery with yours

[FeelingDeviant]

Regretfully, I only looked at two nurseries before signing up DD to one of them. She's now been there for two months (almost 14 months old) and although is very happy there, I'm having niggles and just wanted opinions as to whether I'm being precious which everyone overcomes or are these genuine concerns.

Firstly, during her two week settling in period, her keyworker went on holiday for half the time.
They weren't keen on DD using a doidy cup and I had to really stick to my guns on this one.
They give semi-skimmed milk to the children. Brought this up with the baby room manager and now DD gets full fat (or so they tell me).
All children drink water with their breakfast and only at my insistence did DD get milk.
When DD first started, I was always had informal chats with staff as to how DD slept, ate, etc. now nothing unless I ask.
Recently, there seems to be more and more agency staff used in the baby room which I think makes the babies feel more unsettled (though my DD doesn't seem to be perturbed by this). It creates a really odd atmosphere because the permanent staff don't seem to talk to the agency staff, who in turn seem clueless (ie when a baby cries, they don't rush over to distract, see what's going on, etc. they just carry on sitting there talking amongst themselves).
They don't have a separate sleeping room. This is perhaps my biggest niggle and although I was fully aware of this before DD started, I didn't realise how much it would impact on DD who is a very light sleeper. She has gone from napping for 2 hours after lunch(which she still does at home on weekends) to sleeping for only 45 minutes, leading to rattiness when I pick her up at 3.30.

I've been comparing with parents in RL and they've all said how nursery has been great for their child, how they sleep better, eat better, etc. With DD, though she's always eaten well (and nursery encourage her BLW), her sleep has got worse. I'm feeling really guilty that I've not sent DD to the best possible nursery.

I'm going to visit all nurseries in the area but in the meantime, wanted to get opinions on whether I'm being anal or are all nurseries like this?

I agree with your DH - ask them about her day every evening. You can't be the only parent who wants this information, and it concentrate their minds on whether they should be providing it as a matter of course. It's not an unreasonable request on your part.

Ds' nursery is 1 in a million but it is from 18 months + great staff, good food, sleeping room, trips out of the nursery at least once a week sometimes more, they potty train all the children very well by the time they move into the next nursery room I haven't got 1 complaint about them at all.

I've been lucky with our nursery in that I've always found the staff approachable and the quality of car high so I've never felt guilty about leaving my boys at nursery. To be honest, I'd rather leave them at nursery than with their Grandma as at least I know that nursery will respect my routine.
Our nursery don't have a seperate sleeping room and neither of my boys sleep as well at nursery as at home but they drink milk for quite some time, at least until they're 2. We take in an A5 notebook and the nursery staff write down what they've done, how they've behaved, what nappies they've changed and when and what they've drunk and eaten.
Our nursery have a few key staff in each room but rotate the extra staff arounf the rooms which is good because the kids know the staff when they move rooms and provides the stability of a key worker whilst stopping them becoming overreliant on one person.
I think there will always be little things that niggle you about nursery but you have to decide whether they're big enough to make you concerned or just a result of the fact that someone else is looking after your child. Have you thought of looking round a few other nurseries as a comparison?

Hello - Sorry I dont know where you live but I work as a nursery nurse in a family learning centre in Glasgow.

I worked in the baby room for over a year and I am now working in the toddler room so I can compare the 2 areas.

In the baby room children do not move up to the toddlers until they are walking however most move up around 18months old.

Baby Room - Does not have a seperate sleeping area- parents have a choice whether their baby goes to sleep in a cot, bouncy chair or on a mat on the floor.
You said your child is a light sleeper and we have had a few babies who had disturbed sleep. Our routine is generally at 10am nappy change then an activity with all the babies then sleep time. This is done so even if there are some babies awake at this time the room is quiet and relaxing. This relaxing time happens again after lunch for the afternoon nap time.
For a child roughly 14 months in the nursery I work in their morning nap would have stopped around 1 year old. However for their afternoon sleep they would sleep for up to one hour.
This routine works well in my nursery and the babies get into a calm routine. However a child over the age of 1 would not be forced to stay awake if they fell asleep in the morning.
-Regarding the milk situation there are babies over 1 who still get milk during the day in beakers which is the request of the parents.

At around 18months a child moves to the toddler room. The morning nap is stopped and one nap occurs around 1:15pm after lunch. Children who are under 2 sleep for 40-45minutes depending on when they fall asleep of course.
Children over the age of 2 sleep for 30minutes and are gradually weaned off a nap time during nursery.
The toddlers sleep at one end of the toddler room which is sectioned off with units and a saftey gate (which blankets are put over to make it dark) The main lights are turned off and one light is left on (there is also a window with natural light)They sleep on a mat with a sheet over it and blankets. They do not sleep with cushions as this can damage their young necks. During sleep time the children who are too old for a nap have a quiet time/activity such as a puppet show or a story so the younger toddlers can get to sleep.
The reason my nursery does this is to keep to a strict routine which cares for each child.

• However the routine may sound like children who are only 18months are not getting much sleep but this is so not to disrupt the routine of the parents etc.

I hope you have had some luck with the nursery.

Ok

Bad form re key worker on holiday. Has never happened at dcs' nursery when settling in - big fuss and protocols on this. If it has happened at moving between rooms I guess they would have delayed the move. My nursery don't employ agency staff, although after 18m of stability there have been a rush of new staff in the last 4 months which imo is common as the younger ones often start college/uni courses about then but the core staff have stayed the same.

Non spill cups are used in the baby room, but once about 15m they move to normal cups. My nursery are quite hot on using spoons & forks from an early age too - ofsted target I believe?

The under 2.5s have the option of sleeping in cots in the main room or in the sleeping room - whichever is the parents' preference. Once in the rising 3s room they have sleep mats. DD always sleeps more at home than when in nursery but not to the detriment of her mood. DS took a few months to get used to sleeping well at nursery and he was grotty in the evenings as he was tired.

Written form every day ticking which meals they've had, nappy changes & sleep times,plus what dc has been up to. Only in the oldest room is a daily board about what they have been doing.

And yes to full-fat milk, it's in loads of official healthy guidelines for the under 5s which is how I know to give it to them.

Dcs are in the best nursery locally imo but we only ever looked at this one to know it was exactly right. I would have kept looking to find the best too.

tbh i havenever held much store by that milk thing

nowadays babies only have cows milk over 1 so diet should compensate for any lack of fats

the sleep thing has been my big bug bear wit all child care experiences but i now think 'chill' it s a pain to have over tired child but not a huge issue

Water offered at breakfast is ok - breakfast is a meal and milk being offered with it usually fills a 14 month old up rather than the food if you see what I mean - water is fine if they are getting a pint of milk a day otherwise.

Insisting on a doidy cup - whoever invented the doidy cup must have been drunk - have you tried using one - whatevers in it goes everywhere as its at a funny angle and putting it down is a feat in itself.

Don't worry your little one will learn to use a cup in their own time - mine were still on bottles - everything is rushed these days.

The sleep situation - I don't know how that works in nurseries - do they have them all in one room to go to sleep at a certain time? It sounds like it.

I was a little worried by the lack of a sleep room at DS's nursery (he's 2). But to be honest, there is no chance he would sleep even if there was. He gets home and he's so so tired bless him - we have the most horrendous tantrums after he's had a full day. But he will not stop and rest if there's something going on and I don't think there's anything we or they can do about it.

Well my son is 8mo so his needs will be a little bit different to a 14mo.

• Milk. I agree with the rest of the other posters, they certainly should NOT be giving babies semi/skimmed milk!

• My son drinks water from a doidy cup which I provided to nursery and they are happy to do so. You are paying for them to provide a service, I don't think that asking them to use a doidy cup with your dd is unreasonable!

• my nursery has a policy of only using agency staff in extreme circumstances - generally they cover sickness and absence by using other staff within the nursery or using staff from other nurseries with the group.

• DS has been at nursery for 2 weeks now and there are 3 regular members of staff who involve themselves in his care and understand him and his needs very well. I get a daily diary detailing his food and water intake, sleeps, nappies and a brief description of his activities. I always have an informal chat with the staff as well. There is space in the diary for me to write feedback as well and pass messages on.

HTH

One of the things that 'sold' the nursery i've just started using for my (6 month) dd was when i asked if it would be ok for me to ring and check how she was doing a couple of times during her first day. they said i could ring as many times as i wanted however long she'd been there because their job was as much making us the parents feel secure about leaving our babies with them as it was looking after the babies themselves. That reassured me massively.

For what it's worth I think I would probably leave your 14 month old there because she's happy (as long as you feel she's safe there) but look elsewhere if anything else happened (just read your hand print thread - oh my god!!!)
But I would definitely look around for baby no.2. I felt so awful leaving my dd at nursery for the first time (even though I am totally in favour of them) that if I hadn't felt completely supported by the staff and felt that they would make absolutely sure she was ok I couldn't have done it.

And i wouldn't worry what they might think of you - if you want to know what your child's been up to all day (why wouldn't you?!) ask away. They should be interested enough in the babies to want to give you that info.

Well here's my comparisons

Firstly, during her two week settling in period, her keyworker went on holiday for half the time.
This didn't happen to us but then there were only 2 staff member for the tots room (1-2 yr olds) and DS got to know them both relaly well

They weren't keen on DD using a doidy cup and I had to really stick to my guns on this one.
Never been an issue for me, not that we use a doidy cup but DS needed a bottle for far longer than 'normal' and they were happy to give him one.

They give semi-skimmed milk to the children. Brought this up with the baby room manager and now DD gets full fat (or so they tell me).
Not good - all kids under 2 shoudl have fullfat milk, I'm mega careful about diet as DS has food allergies so I need to trust that the nursery is giving him the right stuff - they are great about it!

All children drink water with their breakfast and only at my insistence did DD get milk.
Actually I think they all get juice or water with toast/cereal fro breakfast. I don't see this as an issue aged 1+ because most kids will be having a drink of milk at home first thing in the morning.

When DD first started, I was always had informal chats with staff as to how DD slept, ate, etc. now nothing unless I ask.
Don't you have a diary/logbook? You do have to be senstive for example if the staff are very busy its not easy to find time to chat, but as long as things are quiet DS workers always have time for a quick chat. They have logbooks (sleeping times, what ate, etc) up to the age of 3 then in preschool they have diaries which are brill, they take digital photo's of them doing activites and stick them in so you can actually SEE what they are doing as well as getting a description, You cna also write in comments like "DS slept badly last night and may be tired." They also have record sheets with photo's of activities and a description of which types of learning it is and what the next step will be.
Every 2 weeks they have a parent/worker workshop on a different day (rotating to give all parents a cance to go) you go along and have up to 20 minutes chat with your key worker.
The two managers are usually available for chats as well and they know all the kids and help out in the rooms.

Recently, there seems to be more and more agency staff used in the baby room which I think makes the babies feel more unsettled
I wouldn't like to see alot of agency staff, the majority of the staff at DS nursery have been there since he started 2 years ago, alot are well over the average agency age of 18-21 which I like as older staff come across as more mature and are often better trained. The staff do rotate (ie there will be 2 key workers but then additional staff covering hols etc) but then there's only approx 15 of them so the kids soon get to know all the faces.

when a baby cries, they don't rush over to distract, see what's going on, etc. they just carry on sitting there talking amongst themselves.
this would really bother me

They don't have a separate sleeping room. This is perhaps my biggest niggle and although I was fully aware of this before DD started, I didn't realise how much it would impact on DD who is a very light sleeper. She has gone from napping for 2 hours after lunch(which she still does at home on weekends) to sleeping for only 45 minutes, leading to rattiness when I pick her up at 3.30.
Now I was very fussy about DS sleeping when he was under 2, in the end when he started nursery I accepted the fact that they didn't have a seperate room, but actually it works great. On the ground floor are all the kids aged 0-3, after lunch (11.30-11.45) all the rooms have quiet time/naptime. The blinds are drawn, the kids each have a sleeping mat and blanket and everything is quiet. Changeover for mornign and afternoong sessions is at 12 - 12.30 but they make sure its all handled quietly and over with by 12.45. Even in the 2-3 yr old room any kid who doesn't nap is taken to the far end of the room and they watch a quiet DVD or listen to a story.
DS has always been a very difficult sleeper but he consistantly slept for up to 2 hrs every lunchtime until he was 2/12 then he slept for 1hr at nursery.

(can you tell i love DS nursery?)