Anyone else's child started pre-school still in nappies? What does your pre-school do?

[Miaou]

Ds1 is 3 (just) and has just started nursery (by which I mean the 2.5 hour daily session provided as of right to all 3 and 4 year olds in Scotland, I know we all call it different things!). There are two members of staff there and it is obviously impossible for them to change him. Today was his second session and (as pre-arranged) I had a phonecall asking me to come and change him as he had pooed.

I am expecting a "chat" with the nursery teachers later this week as we work out what to do for the best. There are good facilities on the premises to change him (put in for a child with CP who is still at the school, but she has a keyworker dedicated to her to deal with that). This is the first time the nursery has taken 3 year olds and is not a problem that has arisen before (and as far as I can tell, he is the only one still in nappies!).

He has no SN so I have no way of getting "support" that way. I'm not envisaging him being ready to potty train before the October break at the earliest (he still shows no signs of being ready).

Anyone else in /has been in this position? What happens where you are?

MrsMuddle the DDA makes no distinction between a child who is incontinent due to a disability and a "late developer"

"Achieving continence is one of hundreds of developmental milestones usually reached within the context of learning in the home before the child transfers to learning in a nursery/school setting. In some cases this one developmental area has assumed significance beyond all others. Parents are sometimes made to feel guilty that this aspect of learning has not been achieved, whereas other delayed learning is not so stigmatising.

Definition of Disability in DDA

The DDA provides protection for anyone who has a physical, sensory or mental impairment that has an adverse effect on his/her ability to carry out normal day-to-day activities. The effect must be substantial and long-term.
It is clear therefore that anyone with a named condition that affects aspects of personal development must not be discriminated against.

However, it is also unacceptable to refuse admission to other children who are delayed in achieving continence. Delayed continence is not necessarily linked with learning difficulties.

However, children with global developmental delay which may not have been identified by the time they enter nursery or school are likely to be late coming out of nappies.

Education providers have an obligation to meet the needs of children with delayed personal development in the same way as they would meet the individual needs of children with delayed language, or any other kind of delayed development. Children should not be excluded from normal pre-school activities solely because of incontinence.

Any admission policy that sets a blanket standard of continence, or any other aspect of development, for all children is discriminatory and therefore unlawful under the Act. All such issues have to be dealt with on an individual basis, and settings/schools are expected to make reasonable adjustments to meet the needs of each child."

Thank you all, especially for the links to policies. I will ask them about changing him; I was told at the end of last year they needed two people to change him but haven't brought it up since. Tbh I don't have a major problem doing it, except that a)it will be very disruptive to ds (he was very upset to see me today and cried buckets because he had to leave early), and b) it will be potentially disruptive to ds2 who may well need to be woken from a nap in order to change ds1. However I am not intending to fall out with nursery over it! I can understand why they are not keen tbh.

Am back in on Wednesday and will see if I can have a word at the end of the session with them (we are doing alternate days atm whilst they settle in).

They should be in touch with the Pre-school Learning Alliance to get up-to-date sample policies which they can cut & paste to suit their setting.
2 qualified members of staff in charge of 24 children? Is that right?

Buckets, I've now got more info (and used my eyes ) - there are four members of staff plus a student

Am a bit non-plussed as to why they cannot change him though. I wonder if it is "don't want to" rather than "won't". I need to talk to them about contingency plans if he poos and they can't reach me.

Hi Miaou ,
I am in Scotland too ! My DD is (almost !) 100 % trained as regards to wees . Poos however - not at all - she is just not ready to do that and is very upset when it is mentioned.
DD who is 3 started on the 19th Aug at the preschool in Scotland 2.5 hours per day , same as your son.
DD has wet once by accident, which they changed and has poo`d twice ( major affairs ! sorry TMI )
They also changed her after the poo incidents. Latest was yesterday afternoon, apparently only 2 mins after I was out of the door !
I apologised and offered to come in any time she needs changed as I am lucky that I can be there in 2 mins , but they were appalled at that idea.
They said they have gloves etc and see that it is part of their job with a group of children so young !! They said it is unreasonable to expect a group of three year olds to go without incident !
They were in short absolutely lovely and told me to stop worrying " we would get her organised and confident together in time "

So sorry that they don`t seem to be considerate of you or your sons feelings.

I cant help but feel your preschools expectations of the children are a bit unreasonable

Mmm, thanks for that babbi. This is the first time they have taken 3 year olds; up until this August they only took 4 year olds and I know that they had only experienced incontinence with reference to SN (and the child with SN had her own helper to address that side of things). I think maybe you are right though and it's a little unreasonable. Apart from anything else I am a little worried about setting a precedent - ie, anyone else who comes a long with a non-potty trained child is told "well when this has happened before the mum was happy to come in and change them". Will think more.

A wee bump for this thread. I have emailed the Care Commission regarding this to see what they have to say (I'm not taking bets on how long it takes them to reply though ). Dh has said I really must clarify with them what they plan to do, that it's not fair to have me traipsing in to change him (and that I'm unreachable sometimes anyway if I'm out of signal area, which happens a lot round here). I'm just concerned about appearing confrontational

Interestingly when I went to pick him up yesterday a wee girl had just had an accident, so had been taken off to be cleaned up, and it certainly appeared to me that there was only one person with her (though maybe the other person went back a different way I suppose).

my friend did this, she sends her ds in pull ups and she doesn't ask them to change him and they don't offer.

she's been trying to train him since he was 2.5 and he's 3.5 now and still getting nowhere.

it seems to work fine for them, although she has asked them to start letting him go into the toilets with the other kids so he sees them all using the toilets and might get the hint as i told her this is what worked for dd in the end.

My daughter started pre-school last September in a class of children born between July and December 2004 - so between 3.2 and 2.6.

Although the school refused to take childen in nappies, a lot of the children were only semi-toiled trained. The school did put them on the loo at 10 am every day, and the TAs dealt with quite a few accidents.

This is the norm in France it would seem.

Ds1 started pre school in January wearing nappies and we were also told that they wouldn't change them as it needed 2 members of staff.Instead,if they need changing,they call you to come in and do it.He was there 6 months and luckily I was never called as he never had a pooey nappy.
He is now starting a new pre school next week and he's still in nappies,but they are happy to change him and according to them,they said the 2 person rule was absolute nonsense.
I guess it must vary quite a bit from each pre school.

What would they do if a toilet-trained child wet/pooed himself? Or if a child was sick down the front of their clothes?

Ok, back from pre-school and had a chat with the keyworker. Apparently not only is he the only one in nappies, all the Christmas intake are already potty trained, and all but one of next Easter's intake! I did try to point out that this may come up again in the future but I don't think she was convinced .

It appears the two-person rule is dictated by their union, and applies across the board (ie includes children with SN too). I asked what happens if a child has an accident, they said that the child has to wipe themselves clean. I don't think she is entirely happy with the "rule" anyway as it causes difficulties. I suggested that maybe someone from elsewhere could observe, eg secretary, classroom assistant from next door - however these people don't work FT so that may not be workable. I asked, what happens if a child vomits or has diarrhoea? Apparently they just "have to do it". At which my eyes lit up - well then, not so different with my ds, surely!

She is going to speak to the head to see what his take on it is, but tbh I think they are of the mind that they want to continue to call me if he poos, but will change him if they can't get hold of me (which is likely to happen fairly often simply because of the phone coverage here). Not an ideal solution but one I can live with.

She did suggest as one point that maybe they were unable to provide him with care because they didn't have the facilities. I pointed out that they have a legal duty to do so!

Overall it was a positive conversation and we parted on great terms, so I don't have any major worries at this point, though I am irked that I have to do this at all!

Hi everyone! I just joined mumsnet today! Today I have had a similar problem to Miaou. My son who is only just 3 started preschool today and we told the staff that he wasn't properly potty-trained and he had a pull-up on. There was a big fuss and we were sent to see the headmaster! We were informed that nappies were banned and that we had to send him in underpants from now on, also that they would clean up the occasional accident, but if there were too many then we had to stop taking him to the preschool. He's only there for 3 hours a day and we weren't even expecting the staff to change him.

I'm quite upset because my son likes the place and I would hate to take him out of the preschool.

I wonder if anyone could please tell me if the DDA act on incontinence which mrz kindly provided the link to would apply to our situation as I think it's a little unfair how we were treated today. Like we were lazy parents who couldn't be bothered. (We have been trying to potty-train him for the last six months)

Thank you very much in advance for any help!

Hi Natalie (Welcome to Mumsnet)!,

I think that you and DS were treated absolutely appallingly today . ( Please see further up the thread my experience - total contrast to yours !)

Their conduct is not acceptable and TBH I would question whether these people are in the right jobs if that is their attitude to young children. ( Is there somewhere else you could send him ? Where the carers do actually care about his welfare and can be sensitive to his needs ?)

They can`t stop him attending . They might ask you to come in and change him - as far as I know this is a greyish area - but they cannot exclude him.

"Nappies were banned" WTF ????

Which area do you live in ?

I honestly am stunned that childcare workers behave in this way .

Maybe my DDs keyworker is breaking all sorts of rules and regulations ?? Ha Ha dont think so.

PS Well done Miaou !!

(thank you babbi - still waiting to hear back from the head at the moment)

Natalie - welcome - sorry you are having this trouble

As babbi says - they can't refuse to take him, they have a legal duty to take him. The government says so! They have to provide appropriate care for your son.

If your ds is anything like mine, then his bowel and bladder motions are totally unpredictable. Therefore taking him to the toilet at regular intervals won't help - you could sit ds on the loo for ten minutes, he will do nothing, then stand up and wee on the floor. Putting him in pants will lead to numerous accidents which will stress and humiliate him and cause major disruption to the rest of the class.

I would also point out that studies have shown that the average age for boys to be potty trained is 37.5 months, so to not accept that some children will not be potty trained at three is unrealistic (here and here for studies).

IIWY I would write them a letter stating this (sorry, not very articulate today, am not well, but you get the gist!)

Hi! Thanks very much for the replies everyone. We spoke to a different staff member today and she was more sympathetic.

We're still not allowed to put a nappy on him but they said they'd help us to potty train him. It's quite a lot of pressure though worrying every day whether he's had an accident or not. I also think they could have handled the situation better than they did on Monday. That was very upsetting.

I'm glad I found this site, it helped a lot knowing that there were other people going through the same experience.

I've got lots of washing to do from now on it looks like

Thanks again for the help!

I had to send DD to school not toilet trained, to the extent that I removed her nappies the day she started school. This is also in France, so she wouldn't have been accepted if still in nappies. She had about 12 accidents in the first month, and the school never complained. I offered to take her out, and they said that this was normal and she would get there. Eventually she did. The difference here is that the school were accepting, supportive and helpful. (And I still panicked every lunch time to see if she'd changed her clothes or not!)
Subsequently we learned that she had SN, which is why it hadn't worked out as smoothly as expected, but that's another story!
Oh yeah, and she still poos in a nappy at 4, but just holds it in until she gets home!

DS2 started preschool at 3 yrs 2 months not potty trained - he wore pants but couldn't predict when he would wee or poo. We put him on the loo for a wee before taking him in and then I suspect the thought of being changed at nursery helped him keep it in for 2 hours, TBH. He had far more accidents at home than at nursery.

However, they were cool about it, had loads of spare clothes near the loos and simply asked if I was ok if they helped him going to the loo.

After the first term (sorry if that seems like a very long time!) he was properly toilet trained.

see, if ds would actually wee on the toilet it would help. I know he can go a long time without weeing. He has never yet weed on the toilet though!

Small breakthroughs though - last night he said "mummy, wee!" whilst in the bath, seconds before he actually did it - so hurrah, he knew he was going to wee! And this evening he told me he had just done a poo (normally he doesn't even know if he has done one).

If he's toilet trained within the term though I will be astounded!

Hello out there! I have a very similar problem. My little boy has been in a private day nursery for over a year now and in May this year he was diagnosed with a non-specific bowel disorder which has obviously delayed his training. He has now started in full time pre-school nursery (within the same organisation), he's three and a half. He is fully potty trained at home but has some sort of 'block' about asking to go to the toilet at nursery. Consequently they are having to change him three or four times a day. After one week of sending him in undies they are now refusing to take him unless he goes in nappies. We think that this is a tragic step backwards for him and I've trawled websites, the DDA etc for advice. What I can gather is that a disability is anything that affects the day to day life of a child, whether it's medical or not. The animosity is very evident now and life is becoming very uncomfortable. We have a very fraught meeting coming up on Tuesday organised because my opinion is that if he is forced to wear nappies, then any training we have done at home is pointless. Any suggestions?

The only time they might need 2 staff to change a nappy is if there is a known risk that a particular child might make a false allegation - not sure what they mean by this tbh.

They also can't ask the parent to come and change dirty nappies as it is a form of abuse to leave a child in a solied nappy whilst waiting for the parent to arrive.

If preschools say they don't have room for a changing area that is still no reason to refuse children in nappies. "If it is not possible to provide a purpose built changing area, then it is possible to purchase a changing mat, and change the child on the floor or on another suitable surface. A ?Do not enter? sign (visually illustrated) can be placed on the toilet door to ensure that privacy and dignity are maintained during the time taken to change the child."

Just putting another pint of view out here...

I'm treasurer of a pre-school, and we've just had to take on an extra member of staff because the proportionally large intake of non toilet-trained children has left the existing staff over-burdened.

I also think it is unfair on the staff to be expecected to change nappies in a pre-school environment - this was simply not part of the job a few years ago.

JMO.

i reckon they should just get on with it and do it if they take them. its not like moaning at a kid is gonna get them to toilet train any sooner is it??
ds1 was still in nappies when he started in nursery class of school. id say it was about a term before he was pretty much dry (and clean), partly due to them being matter of fact about it and not making a sodding fuss. ds2 had a long wetting phase in the same class. again dealt with without fuss.
ds3 has been delightedly received by the same class recently; he toilet trained himself before he was 2 [beam]. (hey i must have had some credit in my karma pot after all!)

miaou is your ds at a nursery attached to a school? I find this hard to believe!

my friend's ds was at pre-school (Scotland) from the age of three and did not come out of pull ups until he was 4+, the school did give my friend a hard time about it, but they changed him.

My ds (has undiagnosed sn) didn't get a one to one assistant until after xmas this year, so he was in pre-school nursery from Aug-Dec in pullups until August this term (he is now in pants, 4+), no one has ever suggested I went in to change him.

Next time your ds is in the bath catch the pee in the potty, that is how I got my ds started, he was refusing to pee for hours, I found if he was near water he couldn't hold on, he was having three ankle deep baths a day to get him peeing in a potty, standing up, it worked pretty quickly, within days he was peeing in the potty or loo nae bother.

Good luck with the training, I feel for you on the nursery thing, it is not a pleasant situation to be in!