How to choose a pre-school for your child

As a parent it can be confusing when you start to think about what to do with your child to prepare them for school.  The provision can be divided up into the following categories:

• day-nurseries, nannies and childminders, who look after children of all ages before they start school.  These are child-care facilities allowing parents to get back to work or to have their child looked after among other children.  Day nurseries and child-minders usually offer extended hours to fit around your working day.  Day nurseries are usually divided into different rooms for different age-groups, and the pre-school room will often cover much the same ground as a pre-school or nursery class.  Child minders will usually have far fewer children, and will happily take your child for you to playgroup, pre-school or nursery class.
• playgroups and preschools.  These are provisions with fairly short sessions, for children from the age of around 2 and a half.  They may be with or without parents present.
• nursery classes, often attached to schools.  These usually take children for the last year before they start school.
• The other option is, of course, no provision at all.  Compulsory education in this country starts at age 5, not at age 3, so there is no need at all to send your child somewhere if you are happy with them at home.  It's just a case of weighing up what is offered at these facilities and whether you think there is any benefit to them.

This and all other pictures are from the Facebook page of our pre-school 

This article is concerned with what is on offer at a playgroup or pre-school or a nursery class, though often nursery classes are attached to schools, so they are selected more based on what the school as a whole offers, rather than just the nursery class.

Playgroups and pre-schools often offer shorter sessions.  They are about easing your child from the home to a more sociable setting where they learn that other people than the parent can give instructions, about working and playing with other children, and experiencing a wide range of toys.  There is usually some routine, but plenty of unstructured play, outdoor activity, arts and crafts etc.

Nursery classes are usually more structured, with more routine and with the intention of offering a secure grounding in key skills before they start school.

All the options mentioned above will be following an early years curriculum stipulated by the government (or Scottish Parliament) which intends to lay the foundations on which future learning will build.  You might wish your child to stay with one provision all the way through, or you might move from a play-group to a nursery class.  In some areas, your options may be limited, either because of rural geography, or because in some towns and cities demand for places is very high.  It's worth making contact several months before you want your child to begin, so that you can have a look around and fill in the relevant paperwork.

Charges for different provisions will vary.  Three and four year olds throughout the UK are entitled to some free early-years education, though the amounts in the different countries varies.  If you use less than your entitlement, then you'll be getting it for free, but if you use more, then you'll need to know what charges are.  You will often also be charged for snack (or asked to contribute some fruit each week), and expected to pitch in at fundraising events to help raise cash for equipment.

Questions to ask

• is it clean?
• when you visit, are the staff welcoming and friendly?  If you have your child with you, do they engage with them straight away or spend all the time talking to you?
• does it have a good reputation?  Check out the inspection reports on-line, and ask other people (particularly at the school gate) what provision they used and whether they would recommend it
• do they have an open-door policy?  I don't mean that they leave the front door open all the time and any weirdo can walk in, I mean that any parent can pop in for a visit at any time.  If they don't - what are they hiding?
• following from that - what is the security like?
• Do they have clear guidelines on timings, sick-child policy etc.
• Ask about what they do to develop pre-reading skills
• What provision have they made for left handed children?
• How do they deal with Special Needs?
• What does a normal day/session look like?  How much routine is there?
• How much of what they do is focused on reading and writing skills and how much on play?
• what kind of snacks do they serve?
• what do they do if a child is having a tantrum?  What is their behaviour policy?
• how much time do they spend outdoors?
• what are the toys like?  are they easily accessible, kept clean, varied and age appropriate?
• what provision is there if your child still naps regularly?  What about if your child is not yet toilet trained?
• How many staff are there?  What is the ratio of children to staff?
• What qualifications do the staff have?
• What is staff turnover like?  Do the staff seem happy to be working there?

Once you've asked all those questions you'll have a good idea of the quality of the provision you are looking at, and more importantly, whether it's a good fit for you and your child.

I'm pretty lucky.  I live in a small village.  Our nearest pre-school is about 2 miles away and came recommended to me by several parents at the toddler group in the village hall.  I decided that as an active and busy stay-at-home mum I offer plenty of opportunities to the children already, so there was no hurry to get them into the education system, but that the chance to develop more social skills with other children and adults, and to ease into the routine of a school day would be valuable in the year before school.  I first went to an open day at the pre-school myself, and liked it and the staff.  A few months later I went to another open day with C.  Then a couple of weeks later  (in June) he went for a taster morning (with me staying as well).  By the time August came along he couldn't wait to get started and has gone from strength to strength there.  He's a smart cookie, and his reading and writing are coming along brilliantly at home - I don't think this has been developed much at pre-school, but that's fine with me because that's not what I wanted to get out of pre-school.  I wanted him to learn to play and share with other children, to get into a routine, and to learn to respond to and interact with other adults, and he's doing those things brilliantly.  C (age 4) has been attending three mornings a week since August, and after Christmas is increasing to five mornings a week.  After the Summer he starts school.  Bug (age 2 1/2) has been attending one morning a fortnight in an unofficial capacity when I'm on the parent duty rota.  She's got to know all the routines and is keen to get started.  After Easter, when she's gone past three and her free provision kicks in, she's going to start three mornings a week as well.

Christmas shopping with small children in tow - how do we do it?

It strikes me that there's a problem with Christmas shopping.  Just at the age where Christmas is supposed to be at its most magical, the parent is faced with the problem of invisibly shopping for Christmas presents.  I mean, shopping with a baby in tow is no problem.  They are blissfully unaware of what you are putting into the trolley or basket, can be easily distracted, and are often unaware of postman or delivery man delivering your internet buys as well.  Once the children are approaching adolescence, they are more likely to want you to deliver them at one end of town with their friends on a Saturday afternoon, leaving you free to get on with your own shopping until they are ready to be collected.  The in-between ages are hard!  I hesitate to say it, but especially so for a stay-at-home mum.  You can't dart in to the shops in your lunch break, or stop at the shops on the way home.  Whenever you are shopping, you have at least one small child in or around the trolley or your hands, and they are ultra-aware of delivery men with parcels arriving at the door.

Here are some of my strategies:

• yes, I do on-line shopping, and I try to make sure they are busy when I spot the postie with a parcel.  I have a horrible accumulation of Amazon boxes in my wardrobe.
• I've started to do my supermarket shopping on my way home from Scout meetings late in the evening.  That way I can drop a few stocking-fillers in the trolley without them being spotted.
• Today, I went to a shop with the youngest while the older was at pre-school.  She was so focused on her own Christmas shopping (she chose what she was getting for big brother and daddy) that she didn't see the things that I picked up!
• I only have a few more things to get.  I don't really know when or how they are going to be bought.  It might be a case of leaving the children in the car for a few minutes while I dart in to a retail park store, with a fictitious shopping item to get, which is in fact the desired present.  I might ask Hubby to pick something up over the weekend while we are away.  Little things like the wrapping paper that Santa uses (which needs to be different from the wrapping paper that we use!)

Habit forming - feeding the fish

I posted last week about how I'm trying to improve my life by making good habits.  But actions require consistent practice to become a habit and you can't change everything at once.  So I'm introducing one new habit at a time, trying to focus on it consistently for five weeks, hoping that by the end of that time it will be a firmly fixed habit improving my life.

Last week I decided that I was going to drink more water.  I was going to make myself drink a glass of water every hour and a half, which would add up to about ten glasses of water.  I've not done badly.  I usually take my 10pm glass of water with me to bed, and drink it at some point during the night or when I wake in the morning.  The 7am glass is replaced by a cup of tea (not ideal I know).  The rest of the drinks throughout the day I'm pretty good at remembering.  Effects so far haven't been that beneficial.  I've been going to the loo all day long, and my spots seem to all have come out to play.  I'm hoping that's just my body getting used to the increased hydration and decrease in caffeine, but I'll have to wait and see if there's any adjustment over the coming weeks.  I wasn't so good today or yesterday.  When Hubby's home the kettle is on more often, and there isn't as much routine, so I find it very easy to forget I'm due another drink.  I'll keep working on it.

This week the habit I want to introduce is for the children, but it's up to me to be on top of it and keep reminding them until it's a habit.  We have a small tank of fish.  Currently there are only three fish in there, so it's my intention to restock up to about seven in the next week.  It's Bug's job to feed the fish in the morning, and C's job to feed them in the evening.  To help them remember, they are supposed to do it just before brushing their teeth, then they are also in the correct place to wash their hands too.  We were quite good at this routine item for a while, but it slipped after a long summer holiday, and now we more often forget to remind them and do it ourselves, meaning that the habit has slipped from the children.  It's my intention to refocus on this task, and make it a habitual part of their routine again.

How to be Free: SELF-IMPORTANT PURITANS MUST DIE

I’m writing a series of blog posts exploring the books “How to be Free” and “The Idle Parent” written by Tom Hodgkinson.  I enjoyed a lot of the ideas expressed in these books, and think that exploring them further will help me to explore the principles behind my own way of living and parenting.

Chapter 24 – Self-Important Puritans Must Die – WE ARE NOTHING

Tom tells us that Puritanism, where pre-destination is doctrine, and where you believe in the notion that wealth and success are signs of God’s approval – then you become insufferable.  Much better to live for the moment.  Subscibe instead to the teachings of Jean-Paul Sartre – if all is meaningless and nothing, then why not enjoy it? Puritanism was born of resentment, of other people having more than you, more fun than you.  It’s all about jealousy. 

Today it’s not Puritanism, instead it’s consumerism and the “job” culture.  If you have a big car, wear the right trainers, have the better job or more money then you are somebody.

Let’s not follow the rules of anybody though.  Nobody is telling u

s to burn our phones – just to follow our own lead.  We don’t actually matter, so eat, drink and be merry.

How does this match up to the ink-spots-and-grass-stains life?

Here’s another chapter which  I’m not really in tune with.  I don’t buy that “we are nothing”.  Certainly, we are not as important as we sometimes think we are – I sit through some mind-numbing meetings listening to people discussing things as though they think that they are actually making a difference, which they are not. 

I do think though that the hedonistic “eat, drink and be merry” suggestion takes things a little far.  Sure, we aren’t in this for our ticket to heaven, but surely we can try to leave the world a little better than we found it for future generations, or for the neighbours that live around us?  It isn’t self-important to try to be a good person, or to do things for others, it’s just neighbourly.  Also, I don’t subscribe to any chapter which begins “….. must die”, it’s a little far-fetched!

Quick and easy makes - advent calendar

I like to make advent about more than just chocolate (not that there's anything wrong with chocolate!).  While we aren't church-goers, advent is still a time of preparation.  With young children, twenty-four days seems like an awfully long time.  Doing something small and special every day to gradually prepare for the big event, while also counting down the days is a way to ease them through the process, get them in the frame of mind for the type of Christmas that you want, and help out with the essential preparations.

Make a list of twenty-four different activities.  Take your time over this, because you want to make things achievable.  Use your diary - on days when there are already Christmas events happening, make that your activity for the day (Pre-school Christmas party, Scout District Carol Service, theatre trip etc.).  On days when you're going to be very busy, keep your activity short and easy, and leave more involved activities for the weekend.  Check out the local papers to find out when carol concerts or Santa visits are planned in your area.  Think about when you need to get tasks done (I make Christmas cake, Christmas pudding and Christmas cards at the beginning of the month, as they either need to be posted or need time to mature!).  Put each activity on the appropriate day in December.

Now think about how you are going to display your activities.  In the past I've had folded cards stuck to the fridge or hanging from a tree branch, with the number on the outside and the activity on the inside.  I've also made advent calendars out of 24 match boxes made into a little chest of drawers so there's space for a sweet too (I'm still working my way through all the matches!).  This year I decided to make a fabric Christmas tree shaped advent calendar.  I used spare fabric leftover from when I made my table runners and napkins about three years ago.

1. Cut out the tree shape and hem.
2. Cut out strips of fabric to make the drawers and stitch a hem for the top and sides.  Stitch the bottom of each strip to the tree, then fold upwards to create the pockets.  Stitch up the sides to make the pocket sides.
3. Use fabric paint to write on the numbers.  Again I had some left over from making my table runner and napkins.
4. Use PVA glue to stick on the pot for the tree and a star for the top, and trails of sequins and sparkles to jolly the tree up.
5. Pop your activity for the day, along with a treat of your choice (mini-Christmas decoration for a mini-tree / chocolate?).

Resolutions already?

When you're never quite satisfied with yourself and you're always looking for ways to become a better person, then you'll always be coming up with strategies and tricks to transform yourself into the person you'd rather be.  I have a new strategy!

So... it takes 30 days to make a habit (apparently).  I have made a list of things which I would like to make into habits to make me and my family life a bit better.  Obviously I can't change everything at once - that would be doomed from the start.  So... I'll introduce one habit every week and really focus on it.  I'll continue to focus on it for five weeks (that should push the 30 days), but after one week I'll add a second habit to focus on.  Then after the second week I'll add another habit.  This way I'll have focus on five areas at any one time, and by the time I add the fifth, the first one should be pretty much routine!

I'll share on here how I'm doing.

The first habit I want to focus on is drinking more water.  According to the NHS Choices website, I should be drinking 1.6 litres of water every day.  I currently drink much less, and much of my liquid intake is caffeine related!  

So to make it a habit, I'll make myself drink a glass of water every hour and a half to two hours. 

Other habits I'll be introducing are:
for the children - making feeding the fish more of a routine, daily table time (we used to have a good routine for this, but it's slipped), 10 mins housework daily;
for me - swish and swipe in the bathroom (flylady!), write blog daily, up at 6.30 and 20 mins on exercise  bike, clear desk and e-mails daily, 50 sit-ups daily, get the laundry on after dinner, hang before bed, and put away in the morning.

Pre-school crafts - letter familiarisation with paint!

Bug is two and a half.  She has a comprehensive vocabulary, and good understanding when she can be bothered to listen.  She is showing signs that she is keen to start reading and writing like her four year old brother.

To help her out I've started doing letter familiarisation games and activities.  I'm trying to do this either when C is at pre-school, so that we can be uninterrupted by bickering, or to choose activities that I know they can both work on together.

I spotted this one on "No Time For Flashcards" and thought I'd give it a try.

We have a vast array of cookie cutters, including alphabet ones (thanks big Sis), so decided to make use of them for some letter printing.  I chose the letters in Bug's name, as well as M for Mummy, D for Daddy and C for her big brother.

I then just showed Bug how to dip the cutters into the paints and print with them.  We used A3 paper, and we also used red, green and yellow paints, so that we could talk about the colours too.

As we printed I asked her which letter she was using, which letter she was going to use next and so on.  I also showed her which letter I was going to use.  We also printed her name.  We kept the letter naming very low key - it wasn't like a test or anything.  Just part of the conversation.  She didn't always get it right, but she did a lot of the time.

After she was fed up with printing, I just left her drawing at the table.  Just in the last week her drawing has stopped looking like scribbles, and have turned into actual pictures.  Check out this gorgeous person with shoes on.: 

Pre-school craft - beautiful pressed flower window decorations.

If, like me, you have interior doors with glass panels, and also small children, then you'll know that they get a lot of finger-prints all over them.  One way to make sure that you don't notice the finger-prints is to decorate the panels - because you're so busy looking at the decoration!  Plus it just looks gorgeous.  You can use these to decorate any window really.

Contact Paper Window Decorations

I've made these before using squares of coloured tissue paper as the decorative item, and they look very effective - almost a stained glass effect.  I've also had the idea of using those metallic table decoration confetti type shapes - which you can get in star shapes, amongst others.  On this occasion we used pressed flowers, which looks lovely.

What you need:  Contact paper (sticky backed plastic) - you can buy this from any stationers, most Post Offices and larger supermarkets; pressed flowers;

1. Cut out a square or rectangle of contact paper that's smaller than your window.  Peel off the backing and lay it sticky-side up in front of your youngster.
2. Give them a variety of leaves and pressed flowers (or other decorative items) and get them to choose a few to use.  Don't let them use too many, because if they cover up all the contact paper then it won't have any stickiness left to stick to the window.
3. Encourage them to arrange them on the contact paper.  They need to be very gentle with the pressed flowers, and they won't be able to pull them off and rearrange them without damage.
4. Stick them to your window and admire.  The pressed flowers look particularly lovely with some sunshine coming through, but also with a light behind them too or against a white background (our wall paper is a light faun colour).

Pre-school crafts - Castle pencil pots - tutorial

We decided to make some pencil pots for the children's desks.

Step 1 - With your children, raid your recycle box to find likely materials.  We used cereal box card, yoghurt pots, a tin can and the bottom of a small food package box.

Step 2 - Cut out the base from cereal box card and then arrange your pots to your satisfaction.  We went with four pots each.  Tape them securely both to one another and to the base.

Step 3 - Cut or tear small squares of kitchen roll tissue paper.  Use a mixture of 50:50 PVA glue and water and stick these all over the structure, taking care to overlap them and not to leave any gaps.  Don't forget the inside of the pots.  Small children may well lose interest during this process, so leave them to do it themselves as much as possible, and step in to finish off when they lose interest.

Step 4 - Leave it to dry.  This takes at least 24 hours.

Step 5 - Paint it in your choice of colour, you might want a blue moat, or green grass ramparts.  It's up to you.  C chose dark grey, as it's night time, and Bug chose red with a moat around.  When the paint has dried you can add embelishments with more paint or marker pen.  C has yellow windows for the candle light shining out, while Bug has black windows and some stonework.  You can also add flags and banners if you wish.

Progress on the model railway - the fence

So for those of you interested in models and model railways etc. I have posted on progress on the model here and here.

I finally finished the fence which has been causing me a problem for some time now.

I spent an hour several weeks ago:

• carefully chopping the heads off matches, 
• cutting the matches in half
• painting the matches with brown watercolour paint

Now it was time to work out how to make the fence wire.  First I glued the fence posts on to the scenery.  This was quite successful.  Then I tried to glue the wire (plastic thread for bead work) on to the posts.  This wasn't successful.  In order to hold it in place to allow it to dry I pegged the wire in place on each post.  The washing pegs were too heavy, so pulled many of the fence posts over.  In addition, when I pulled off the pegs it turned out that the wire was more stuck to the pegs than it was to the fence posts, so the whole thing fell to bits.

This time I've done it mostly the other way around.  I pulled the wires tight between some books, and carefully placed glue covered fence posts into place.  When this was dry this was the main portion of fence done.  Now I had a problem though, this fence section was too short for the area it needed to surround, but now there wasn't enough wire at the end for me to hold in place taut.  I stuck the fence on to the scenery, then I stuck further fence posts in place at both ends.  I haven't actually finished the fence in the strictest sense, because I'm still carefully gluing the wires on to these extra posts, wrapping around both sides of fence posts (instead of neatly on the inside) but just trying to get the wires fixed to the posts.

I've now ordered some sheep for C.  Up until now we haven't been able to order any sheep because without a fence in place they'd be wandering all over the train track, but now that the fence is there, we feel confident to put some sheep on the scenery.  Another picture with sheep in situ to follow in a couple of weeks.  I've also made a pretty good start on the Village School from Metcalfe Models.