So I need some advice on dealing with our daughter’s daycare. My daughter is 2.5 and she’s kind of a high-energy kid. She’s very physical. On occasion she gets a bug up her ass and throws a fit. Our Daycare is starting to call us whenever stuff like this happens. I am getting kind of annoyed because I feel like she will learn that all you have to do to get out of school is pitch a fit, and they’ll call Daddy and he’ll come pick her up. I’m unemployed so I can right now, but what if I couldn’t? I’m not talking about every day though, I am talking about once a month or so. Personally I just think she’s a powerful, willful little kid. She wants things to go her way and will manipulate the situation to get it. Last time it was her screaming and crying all through naptime. I htink it’s because it was a gorgeous day out and they didn’t take her to the park. My daughter never naps, but she also doesn’t pitch a fit in the afternoon if she gets out to the park, and usually doesn’t pitch a fit if it’s too cold to go out. Today apparently she is anti-diaper and is taking her diaper off and has peed on herself. They spoke to my wife, but I sent the call to voice mail, because I do not want to support the habit of picking her up every time she throws a tantrum. I feel like this is what we pay the Daycare to do.
My aunt ran a Daycare all through my childhood, a rather large one with probably 75-100 kids separated into a few different age-range classes. I remember little kids doing this kind of stuff, but I didn’t really know what happened from the adult’s perspective so I am trying to call her and find out what is a reasonable expectation before I just consent to picking her up every time she gets pissy. Right now I am unemployed so I could pick her up, but what if I were not unemployed? What if I were at work today? Both my wife and I work on a contract basis and it’s not like we can just take off in the middle of a contract.
Basically, I am more worried about setting a precedent, and I want to deal rationally with the Daycare and respect limits, but for some reason it seems to me like pulling your diaper off and having an accident is well within the norm of behavior for a two-year old.
That is… odd. All of my 4 children were in a kind of day care at that age, all of them pulled stupid stunts too. I NEVER was called or asked to pick them up. It’s the daycare’s job to deal with that sort of thing.
They shouldn’t have to deal with the truly violent children, but normal rambunctious behaviors like you describe are part of their job. The most that ever happen was them pulling me aside to discuss the incident when I went to pick up the little monsters. They told me what the kid did and how they responded.
Looking for a new daycare would be very unfortunate because we have a very good relationship with the other parents and their kids. I’d hate to disrupt the sense of community my daughter is building there. I put the daycare on a time delay. I’ll call back at 4, I got their call at 3:24.
I spoke to my Dad and he said he never remembered getting a call, and I was a really wild child. Of course my daycare was run by my aunt when I was like 4 and 5 and the one before that was run by some family friends.
I think my daughter is feeling like she is too old for a diaper, but she’s really not. She’s been pulling these diaper hijinks at home too. She is mostly potty trained and uses the potty most of the time at home, but she still has accidents.
My wife’s co-workers are saying it’s a legal CYA thing because she’s running around naked.
That sounds a little odd to me as well. My oldest daughter wasn’t perfect when she was young and the worst I ever had to do was review two incident reports when I picked her up; one where she bite another kid, and another where she hit one. I also had to review some where other kids did the same thing to her. I can’t imagine what it would take to get her thrown out of day-care for the day. This was a fairly large professional day-care with trained staff. Either she is throwing fits way beyond the norm or, more likely, they are just lazy and don’t want to do their job. Little kids throw fits sometimes and you can’t always stop them right away.
Well I talked to the teacher and basically the answer is that they have legal issues with a child running around naked because they have cameras for the parents to watch.
I’d hate to have to find a new daycare it would be very disruptive for my daughter and devastating to be taken from her friends.
Also she is being disruptive at naptime which I think is not going to be an uncommon occurrence during the cold weather. She is not tired and wants to play, so she acts out. There really isn’t a place where they can take her to play as the daycare is small and basically in a two-bedroom apartment.
It doesn’t sound like your daughter was naked - just diaperless. And either way, I don’t see how that should be a problem. I’m not saying it’s not a liability for the daycare, but I would want far more detail on what “legal issues” there are.
I agree with the other posters, though - your daycare is being weird. The only time I ever got a call for my son’s misbehavior was when he found a small hole in the fence and escaped and decided to engage in a swordfight with a nearby tree. They wanted to talk the incident over with me and reassure me that they were correcting the problem (the hole), which I appreciated.
Out of curiosity, how many care providers are there?
Just a thought…if you’re not working, why isn’t your daughter home with you? I understand if you need to drop her off for a couple of hours while you hunt for a job, but the tot is only 2. She really doesn’t need to be there all day long.
And if she thinks she can be potty trained at 2 1/2, why not let her?
I wouldn’t have my (hypothetical) kid in daycare if I was unemployed. But if I pay someone for childcare, I’d expect them to deal with it. Put another diaper on the kid and punish her for removing it. Teach her that nap time is quiet time. They (and you) need to teach her that the world doesn’t revolve around her. Yes, she young. But I bet she understands “no”. And if she doesn’t, now is the time she learns.
Devastating? I don’t think I even had friends at two. Not the kind that being separated from would “devastate” me–wouldn’t she forget about them in a few days/weeks?
No, why would she forget about them? You think little kids don’t remember who their friends are? She talks about them all the time when she’s not in school. I don’t know why you would think that relationships are less important during one’s formative years than they are after them.
Well at fairly young ages, I know that kids aren’t really playing with each other, they’re just playing next to each other and there’s no real interaction. I guess that’s different at 2.5. But I definitely don’t think I had any friends when I was that age–but I wasn’t in daycare either. Also apparently I was only one of two kids at my first birthday party…when my parents had me not many of their friends had kids.
I think a really important relationship in your formative years is the one you have with your parents. Children that age might benefit from a few hours a week with other kids, but if possible I think its pretty well established that being at home where they can act out like that is a good thing.
I hope this is helpful and doesn’t sound critical. As the mom of a child with a Aspberger’s Syndrome, I have dealt with schools and daycares that felt my child was disruptive.
They deal with tons of kids every day and handle many small incidents all the time, without calling the parents. If they are calling you about her regularly, it is probably more than regular kid (mis)behavior. Yes, you are paying them, but the other kids’ parents are paying, too; and the teachers can’t create a “quality care experience” for all the kids if they have to keep stopping to deal with one child. It’s exhausting and unfair to the other children. Pulling off her diaper once a week? Fine. Pulling it off six times a day, every day? Exhausting (and gross).
I don’t have an answer for you; my kid has been in behavioral therapy since he was 5 (he’s in college now). You may have to explore other options for helping your child learn to behave appropriately in a group environment. It’s not the daycare’s problem, it’s yours, and if you want her to stay there, you need to work out a plan that is acceptable to all of you. Good luck, I have been there and I know how hard it is.
It sounds like a home daycare which means they don’t have the staff to really deal with this issue with your daughter. Is there any way you could only send her part time and keep her home with you a couple of days? That way she can still see her little friends and also spend time with a parent to work on the mentioned problems.
Since they have cameras for parents to watch (hence their apparent stressing over her diaper incident) why don’t you tune in and see how she’s really behaving? Maybe these incidents have been the last straw on a day where she was acting up a lot.
kittenblue That’s pretty much it. It’s not like this is happening all the time, it’s happened twice. I also think she was pretty bad once I got the final lowdown on everything. I had a talk with her a lot last night, several times, and again this morning I asked her if she was going to be a good girl, I asked her if she understood that what she did was bad, and she said yes. So we’ll see how much that actually sinks in. The advice to take her out of class more often might be good, I’ll consider it.
I really think the issue is that she is a rather energetic kid, moreso than most, and when she gets to run and play outside that energy has an outlet and she doesn’t act out. Now that it’s getting cold that isn’t an option. I really think that’s what it is. She doesn’t nap, so that makes it difficult.
They do have a good amount of staff, and it’s not actually a home daycare, in that it’s not in someone’s home. They have two people minimum for 12 kids and sometimes 4 or 5 people. The naptime regime seems a bit long to me, it’s from 12 - 3PM, so I can understand her freaking out as she just doesn’t nap, she just isn’t tired at that time. She sleeps like a log at night.
I also think she has entered some kind of emotional phase. Last night she freaked out about a raspberry that was moldy being taken from her when she had a basket full of raspberries. Like she was in tears over it. I talked to her about controlling her emotions, particularly in those words and she seemed to understand what I was saying as she reined in the tears and said, “Ok Daddy.”, sometimes I am surprised at what complex ideas she understands when simpler ones sometimes elude her.
I wouldn’t worry about her freaking out over the raspberry or other similar incidents. Lots of kids go through phases like that. Every time my son would make a developmental leap, he’d turn really irrational for a while. He’d get through it and all would be roses again, but sometimes it took a few weeks. He still does that sometimes (he’s only 3 1/2), but it’s not as frequent and those phases don’t tend to last as long as his communication improves. For all you know, it could be her asserting independence, getting frustrated because communicating clearly can be difficult, going through a clingy phase or just doing it for no reason at all.
As for the energy outlet - I can see that being a problem. Again, my son had the same problem. Do you know what they do before naptime? Is there a possibility that she’d get a chance to burn some energy then, then at least have the inclination to quiet time, if not at least an hour’s nap? It’s just not possible to force someone to sleep if they don’t want to, but perhaps they could give her something to play with quietly if she cooperates and lays down for a while.
I’m guessing that the nap is additionally frustrating because that might be the only time the caregivers get a moment’s downtime, but at the same time, that is what they’re getting paid for. I’d be surprised if they haven’t had similar issues with the other kids, too.
While I do agree with you that the daycare needs to ‘handle it’ when a child acts up, unless it becomes violent and/or very disruptive, I don’t agree with your decision to let your daughter decide not to take a nap. Young children need more sleep than perhaps you realize, and one of the consequences of them not getting enough sleep is to act up, sometimes exhibiting very bizarre and/or willful behavior. I also agree that if you’re home, she needs to be there with you much more than she needs to be socializing with other kids. Any more than 2 or 3 half-days a week is unnecessary if you’re not working.
Alice the Goon The only way my daughter is going to nap is with a sedative. She just simply does not nap, she is alert at that time of day and not tired at all. My wife similarly did not nap as a child and I wasn’t big on nap time myself. If a kid isn’t tired they aren’t tired. I feel like their scheduled naptime is too long and I don’t really understand why they have three hours of the day dedicated to naptime. A big part of the problem is the small space, which is a not uncommon condition in New York. Daycares here are often in residential apartments.
overlyverbose Yeah, I figure it’s a phase, I am just hoping that this weather change doesn’t become a strain on her relationship with the school. She is becoming much more intellectually capable, and she really seemed to understand what I meant by controlling her emotions. My wife and I got into this thing that we were training our daughter to be a Ninja, so I told her that a Ninja must be in control of her emotions and she responded to that, I was actually a little surprised. (By Ninja we mean it in the pop-culture Self-Mastery sense not the historical assassin sense) Hopefully things will work out. Naptime is starting now, and I actually have to work this afternoon, so hopefully I won’t be getting a call.