I’ll start with a caveat: my child’s nursery workers are fantastic. They’re kind, loving, warm and (I believe) have genuine interest in my little boy.
Every single staff member knows his name and greets him personally as he arrives. I’ve even heard his key worker say, “I love you so much!” when she hugs him goodbye.
But nobody is perfect – myself very much included – and I do have a few niggles about his nursery workers, none of which I’m prepared to bring up with the management.
And it’s because the gripes I have aren’t about the standards of care, which are excellent, but... bad habits.
I’m talking about things like language. Perhaps I’m being pedantic, or it may be a side-effect of a career as a writer, but I place a lot of value in teaching my kids to speak properly.
I worry about England’s widening literacy gap – 5.1 million people in England don’t have the reading and writing skills expected of an 11-year-old – and find it achingly sad to hear reports that children find books “embarrassing” and are reading less than seven years ago.
And that means I can’t stand it when people, including nursery workers, model sentences such as, “I done it” (rather than “I did it”) to my son. He’s not yet three and is only just learning to speak properly, so it feels crucial to start him off on the right foot.
And it turns out I’m not alone. I spoke to some other parents with young kids in childcare – ranging from childminders to nannies and nursery. They all had their own gripes.
One mum told me she “can’t stand” the way her childminder used “baby words” while changing her two-year-old daughter’s nappies.
“I want my daughter to know the right words for her body,” she told me. “We’ve taught her the word “vagina” and encourage her to use it at home. But the childminder doesn’t call it that, and instead uses words like, “bits” or “privates” or even “noonie”. It really winds me up.”
Another mum said she felt that not reminding kids to say “please” or “thank you” encouraged bad manners – but said she felt “too embarrassed” to bring it up with her child’s nursery worker.
“They have lots of children to look after,” she told me, “and I understand they’re very busy. But it should be automatic to remind kids about manners. I don’t want to bring it up, because it feels like I’m just making a fuss or picking holes in what is otherwise excellent care.”
It can be awkward to bring up things you’re not happy with. According to Which? one way to do it is in writing – to make sure there’s a formal log of it. But you should always try to raise your grievance with a member of staff in person first.
[Read more: How To Raise Little Feminists]
Another ‘bad habit’ I have a big bone to pick with is gender stereotyping. I’ve written about how, in my opinion, Peppa Pig is a terrible, sexist role model – and I hear these kinds of lazy stereotypes reinforced all the time.
I’ll never forget the time I witnessed a former nursery worker handing out dolls to the little girls and trucks to the little boys, without giving them a choice. Or the caregiver who said, kindly but thoughtlessly, to my daughter: “Blue is for boys, pink is for girls.”
Of course, this happens everywhere – in shops, at family gatherings, on the street. It’s not specific to my child’s nursery, and I have enormous admiration and gratitude for the people who work there.
Looking after a gaggle of under-threes is no picnic, especially when they’re not your own. Plus, the pay isn’t great, it’s loud and hectic and full on – and they’re having to wipe bottoms and noses all day.
But my child spends three full days each week at nursery listening to adults he adores and naturally wants to mimic. And as a parent, I want to have confidence that he’s mimicking good habits, not bad ones.
Or am I just being pedantic?