Handprint chickens

I love crafting, though as anyone who has had the pleasure of teaching me art (the only subject I was told by the teacher not to do at GCSE, though whether because I lacked the skill or she just didn't want me in her classroom for two years who knows) will tell you, I am better at the concept than the execution. Nevertheless what I lack in talent I make up for in enthusiasm. Hence having to share these handprint chicks. They are my daughter's hands, not mine, and come courtesy of her nursery rather than our efforts at home, though I fully intend to add them to my repertoire as number #102 of things to do with handprints when you are bored.

Incidentally, I blogged some time ago about making rainbow rice. It took ages, stank of vinegar, costs loads of money to buy the rice and the food colouring, went everywhere and I threw it out after a couple of months (though we did have some fun with it the few times we played with it). A friend of mine had a baby shortly after I had number two. We're spending a lot of time together. "I never understood," she said, "why you didn't just buy a big pack of cheap tricolour pasta and play with that instead."

She's a bloody genius. I will do that next.

Just say no (no)

There is a school of parenting thought where the parents don't use the word 'no' to their children. I found out about it when I overheard another parent at my daughter's nursery ask the staff whether they used the word. The staff were a little taken aback. I could see that they wanted to give the mother then answer she wanted, but that they were also thinking of the many many times a day they say it. "We only use it when it's necessary," one of them finally offered. 

In my experience, it's often necessary. When my daughter goes to touch an electricity socket for example, or tries to eat a crayon. When she attempts to empty the kitchen bin or thinks 5am is morning. 

I looked up the not saying no idea, or the 'No No' as I have started to think of it. Try to find an alternative to 'no', one book urged, suggesting that a toddler be distracted by a toy or an alternative activity instead. That way, it said, you can try to prevent your toddler entering the stage where they always say no. 

Now call me old fashioned but I want my toddler to both hear and use the word no. I do not want to give her extra time to be electrocuted while I think of something as exciting as a plug to play with. I do not have the wherewithal to simultaneously find something fun for her to do with one hand while preventing her from running across the road with the other. And when she is faced with situations where she is offered a choice, you know - sweets from a paedophile, drugs from a big kid at nursery, a drink with spirulina in it, I hope she also says no, as firmly and confidently as possible. 

Teach diversity? We live diversity

My daughter has started nursery and on the first settling in day where I had to leave her for a short while and entertain myself I went to the library round the corner from the building and looked up the Ofsted report. I’d read it before but wanted to reassure myself that we weren’t leaving her somewhere grossly inappropriate.

The report is ok. It’s not totally brilliant, but not awful either. It’s one of the tools we used to select a nursery, along with cost, convenience, safety and atmosphere. Above all, in fact, atmosphere. Would our daughter be happy and well cared for were the main questions we asked ourselves.

But there is one particular line in the Ofsted report that I find particularly irritating. It says “The promotion of inclusion and diversity is generally satisfactory; although not prominent in feature at the setting.”

This nursery is in Haringey, one of the most diverse areas in the entire country. Over 120 languages are spoken by its residents. And the nursery, while not representative of local families financially (due to the cost of childcare), is pretty representative ethnically. The children and the staff come from many cultures. There are several languages spoken, talks by parents on where they come from and displays about different countries. And while I can see that in less diverse areas specific promotion of diversity and inclusion might be needed, my daughter, and the kids at her nursery, live diversity every day. In the people who look after them, the kids they are looked after with, the streets they walk down, the shops they pass, the homes they come from. In fact if she was to be taught about the real world in which we live she’d need the specific promotion of the fact many places are homogenous and some people are bigots. Yet they call the promotion of diversity satisfactory. Well I think it’s outstanding.

(Not) remembering my first day at school

I've been reading lots of blogs and tweets and Facebook updates about people's children starting school and the pride and the worry and the changes to routine and it struck me, I don't remember my first day at school. 

I remember things that happened at nursery - song circles and the willow tree in the garden and my mum helping hide chocolate eggs for an Easter Egg Hunt and the accident that led to me being hospitalised for dehydration after refusing to drink with my battered mouth, and the nursery nurse I thought was a witch (because she had a wart on her face not because she was mean) and I remember a few details of my early school days such as where the classroom was and the blue maths workbook with an owl on the front and the teacher's name but as much as I try I just can't summon up the first day. 

Which means it must have either been a complete non event or so traumatic I have buried it. I suspect the former. Which should be somewhat comforting to parents of this month's newbies shouldn't it?