Your job really matters. The work you do in a nursery is extremely important because better care means better development for children, especially for babies and toddlers.
The quality of the care that they receive matters more to children than anything else about nursery, even more than the age they are when they begin or the number of hours a week they spend there.
And although 'high-quality care' is made up of lots of different elements, the most important - the one that underpins all the rest - is you, the care provider, and the relationship between you and the child. So never doubt that you matter to each and every one of the children you care for.
Nursery can be difficult, both for children and grown-ups. Children in a nursery cannot have an adult each; they have to share adult attention and talk, laps and arms with each other.
As one experienced nursery nurse put it, 'A baby has to go from being "me" to always being "we", and that's really hard.'
The fewer children you have to care for (see box on ratios and group size below), and the more consistently you can care for the same children each day and all day, the better their experience of nursery will be. And the better it is for the children, the easier caring for them will be for you too.
Looking after babies and very small children is always a hard job - not just physically but also emotionally - and working with children who are unhappy at nursery, or who are sad or angry a lot of the time, can be really upsetting.
KEY-WORKING
Babies and toddlers need to be able to take it for granted that they will be with the same familiar people, day after day. The way most nurseries and centres arrange this is by what is usually called 'key-working'.
From the moment a child starts at nursery, he should be the special charge of one particular adult most of the time. This is his key person (a role that is now statutory - see Practice Guidance for the Early Years Foundation Stage, page 15).
We all have key people in our lives, people we need and on whom we rely. In the same way, being a child's key person means having a special relationship with him or her.
The role of a key person
As a child's key person you will be primarily responsible for actually looking after him; greeting him, playing with him, feeding and changing him, comforting him when he is hurt or sad, angry or tired.
He'll quickly learn to look for you when he arrives at nursery and when he needs special attention during the day. Other people will take the close relationship between you for granted (even if it may hurt their feelings that he wants you and not them) and come looking for you if he is upset or unwell.
While the relationship with the child is at the heart of what it means to be a key person, the role also means being the link between the nursery and the child's parents or carers, and perhaps being responsible for the paperwork for that child and family.
The child's parents will rely on you to take good care of him, and while they will be grateful when everything goes well, they may sometimes blame you when things go wrong.
The emotional demands
Having a key person is good for children, but being one is not always so easy. The very personal relationship that develops between a key worker and 'her' children - and does so much to help a nursery meet children's needs - makes heavy emotional demands on adults.
You may encounter older nursery nurses who used to share the care of all children in a room among all the adults, and would still prefer to work that way. They used to take it in turns to do unpopular jobs like nappy changing for the whole group, rather than each doing everything that was needed for a few children.
Sometimes the most junior caregiver in a room changed twice as many nappies as anyone else and seldom got to read a story. But if one adult has to change ten toddlers' nappies twice in a morning, those children can't all be special to her and may pass across the changing table like tins of beans across the supermarket checkout.
That creates a vicious circle: the more the children are treated like objects on a production line, the less satisfying caring for them will be, and the more probable it is that changing nappies will seem like a tedious and messy chore rather than an intimate personal service and an opportunity for songs and jokes.
Attachment and child protection
As a key person you will do everything that needs doing, all the time, for a very few children, including being their teacher, cheerleader and fan club. This way of working helps 'your' children become attached to you and so encourages you to get attached to each of them.
The days when young nursery nurses were told not to 'get involved' and to 'ignore the attention-seekers' so as not to spoil them are thankfully over. However, while close relationships between adults and children are encouraged, nurseries tend to be more conscious of child protection issues than ever before and this can sometimes seem contradictory.
It is vital that nursery practitioners are vigilant about protecting children from abusive physical contact - any that is careless and uncaring or aimed at the gratification of adults rather than the well-being of children - but sometimes child protection is misunderstood, and a culture develops in some nurseries that implies that all physical contact is to be avoided.
To deprive children of hugging, holding, cuddling or lap time is as abusive as inappropriate physical contact. So, if you feel this is the case in your nursery, do talk to your manager and colleagues about it and read the nursery or local authority child protection policy so that you can all be clear about what it actually says.
You might also consider asking if a specialist child protection trainer could be invited to the nursery to give some advice about physical contact.
A developing relationship
Children need you to care about them personally as well as caring for them professionally. Attachment is two-way. A child cannot become closely and securely attached to you if you hold back from her and avoid getting emotionally involved.
If you are to be a child's key person, your relationship should start to develop from the initial 'settling sessions', when the child is first brought by a parent to visit the nursery. It can be quite daunting for a parent and child to come into a nursery with lots of unfamiliar faces. A key person gives them a familiar friendly face to interact with.
Settling sessions:
- are an opportunity for a key person to spend some time with both the child and the parent
- allow parent, child and key worker to begin to get to know each other and feel safe
- give parents an opportunity to pass on information that will help you settle their child as comfortably as possible - for example, the child's current routines, especially eating and sleeping patterns, and whether she has any special comforter
- help familiarise parents with the ethos of the setting and allow them to share any questions or concerns they may have.
You are entering into a partnership with the parent, building a three-way relationship between the child, home and the nursery. The more parents' anxieties can be reduced, and the more positive the relationship from the outset, the better. If a parent is anxious, the child is likely to sense it and may struggle to settle.
The child's feelings ...
Day-to-day involvement with the children takes courage. An important part of your job as key person is to help a baby or toddler come to terms with her feelings and eventually learn to manage them.
To do that, you have to be willing and able to take in and absorb distress, to serve as the target of anger or frustration and to bolster a child's fragile self-control with the loan of yours. It sounds easier than it is.
... and your feelings
A child's sadness, fear or anger is infectious. When she yells at you in a fury of frustration, you'll probably feel like yelling back, and if her anger about being left by her parents is vented at you, rather than at them, you are likely to feel angry too.
You are the grown-up, you have to manage your own feelings as well as the child's, but it isn't easy. It helps to acknowledge that having such feelings (though not acting on them, of course) is absolutely normal, and that they need to be recognised and discussed with colleagues. Anyone who says she never gets cross with the children or has her feelings hurt by them is either avoiding the truth or keeping herself safely detached.
Sometimes caring for a child brings up ghosts from your own childhood. If you find yourself feeling jealous when one of your key children runs to his mother at the end of the day, or rejected when a baby holds out her arms to another caregiver, don't be ashamed to admit it.
The rejection and jealousy you're feeling today may be a replay of your feelings when you were very little, and your mother had a new baby who seemed to receive all her care.
RAISING NURSERY STANDARDS
You are not only a key worker, or one of the adults in a particular room, you are also part of the nursery as a whole. Even if you are a junior member of staff there is much you can contribute to high-quality care for all the children, not least by joining in with their play and having fun with them.
Babies learn from birth and you can help them. A planned 'educational' programme must be an integral part of care in a registered setting, even for the youngest babies. The aim is not that children should be taught 'subjects' or even that they should be directly taught skills, but that each should be offered and encouraged in a wide variety of play activities tailored to his particular development and changing with it.
More senior caregivers should discuss this planning with you and help you to begin to plan for 'your' children. If they don't, do ask.
It is stimulating and appropriate play that helps children learn about the world and their place in it: about how their bodies and playthings and other people behave, and what they can do with them. The games that you play with hands and fingers and toes help children to learn about their own bodies, and naming the emotions that they are experiencing helps them begin to understand those too.
When children recognise that what they are feeling is cross or bored, sad or happy, angry or affectionate, it helps to build their self-awareness, self-control and self-esteem.
What matters to early play is not so much the available toys (most nurseries have lots) as your willingness to play with children on their level.
For example, keep building so he can keep knocking down. It's fine to build a block tower for a nine-month-old, but when you've built it he'll knock it over - and then want you to build another. Quell any irritation. Control boredom by watching him closely: every time he knocks down the castle he seems to be discovering vital pieces of cause and effect - 'I do this and that happens'.
Repetition is a vital part of early learning and the knocking over is part of the game, as is emptying out; not only boxes of toys but cups of juice, bowls of food, and your handbag if he gets the chance.
Providing practical help to children's playful investigations is important but your genuine attention and applause is what matters most. At any age, and whatever we're trying to do, it is other people's interest and appreciation that motivates us, while having people trying to interfere or 'know best' is frustrating and discouraging. Just being with a child and interested in her play can sometimes be much more valuable than 'doing', so try to restrain yourself from always stepping in to show her what to do.
Help children discover everything that's available. However much a baby enjoys the clockwork swing, for example, five or even ten minutes in it at a time is plenty; after that he'll probably enjoy being on the floor to practise sitting or crawling, or on your lap to look at a book, while another baby has a turn in the swing.
Leaving that first baby in the swing and rewinding it for half an hour, even if he is happy there, means that you are keeping him safe but not much more.
Make sure you give children respectful care that helps each to build a strong sense of herself as a valued individual.
There is room for respect in the minutiae of everyday life with small children: listening to them and really trying to understand the communication of babies who are not yet verbal, or toddlers whose talk is fast and inaccurate; responding readily not only to signs of distress but also to affection or humour; helping children to manage things for themselves rather than saving time by doing it for them, and, perhaps above all, avoiding not only the scolding or punishments that can feel like bullying, but also the sarcasm and the teasing that can so easily humiliate.
Even a one-year-old has a sense of personal dignity. Laugh with him by all means but never at him.
Practise the inclusion that your nursery preaches. Nurseries take trouble to ensure that books, toys and ceremonies reflect the cultural diversity of the nursery and the community, and that they are positively non-sexist and anti-violent. That kind of 'inclusion' has an important effect on the quality and sociable atmosphere of the centre so it is important to all parents, irrespective of their own background.
What you do and say will have much more impact on the children than what is printed in the brochure. It's no good having black, brown and white dolls and family figures if the white ones are always the best-dressed. And it's really important that both sexes are encouraged to play with all the toys and dress up in all the costumes, and that all the children join each other's ceremonies and holidays - Diwali as well as Easter.
Find out as much as you can about a child's cultural identity before she starts, such as the family's religion, languages spoken at home and any important celebrations.
Finally, of course, these little children who love and trust you will take notice of what you say, which means that you have to watch what you say and avoid sexist remarks, like 'boys don't cry', and teasing like 'is she your little girl friend? When are you getting married?'
COLLEAGUES, FRIENDS AND SUPPORT
The chances of you being happy in any job depend a lot on how comfortable you feel with other people in the workplace and the friends you make there. That is especially important when you work in a nursery.
After all, colleagues are the only people who can fully understand why you're upset about a child you find really difficult or a family that does not seem to trust you, as they too are likely to have faced similar situations themselves and can help you think about how to cope.
However, making friends in nursery may not be easy. You may not have many people to choose from and it may take a long time to get to know anyone other than the two or three people who work in the same room as you. Even then, you'll probably find that there are few opportunities to chat or talk away from the children.
Try to arrange to meet up for breaks or lunch or for a drink after work, so that you can exchange news and keep up with the gossip without talking over the heads of the children, ignoring them.
If all your breaks have to be taken one by one, meaning you and your friends are never free together, ask management if they will consider timetabling a monthly get-together.
Professional development
The more experience you have of caring for different children, the easier the daily routines of the nursery will become and the more competent you will feel.
It is not only the practical minutiae, like how every kind of nappy fastens, every type of buggy unfolds and all the toys work, that become effortless; you will also build up a repertoire of techniques for defusing conflict between toddlers, feeding babies foods that are new to them or helping children say goodbye to a parent. And so those difficult bits of the job become more manageable.
You can't expect practice to make perfect, though. Childcare isn't that kind of job. Your work is all about relationships: yours with children and their families, theirs with each other and with you.
Since every relationship is unique, something unforeseen, and possibly stressful, is always around the corner, and you need someone on your side who will support you.
If you are to be a calm, reflective presence in the face of a baby or toddler's extreme emotions - from despair to delight - you need someone to do the same for you.
If you are to tolerate criticism from parents without retaliating, you need someone to help you through the personal pain to where you can objectively weigh up what is being said.
If you are to be a firm but kind authority figure to children, able to set secure limits without being punitive, you may need someone to help you understand and tolerate the angry feelings certain children or behaviours arouse in you.
Don't bottle things up. In some nurseries, the need to provide support for the staff is recognised and met by individuals within the hierarchy, such as an Early Years Professional. In others, support or discussion groups run by outsiders may be offered to staff.
If there is no formal support structure where you work, and especially if the schedules make it difficult to meet regularly with colleagues, talk to your manager about how such a support system might be developed.
When it's time for you to move on, leaving children you are very close to can be almost as stressful for you as for them. It is worth discussing your reasons - especially any discontent - with your manager.
For the sake of the children, nurseries really try to keep their staff turnover low and that doesn't only mean doing what they can to improve salaries, holidays or shifts, but also listening to and supporting staff and providing for their professional development.
Your feedback on what you have felt about working in the nursery may be really helpful.
Penelope Leach PhD is a psychologist specialising in infant development. Her books include the classic 'Your Baby and Child' and her recent research includes co-directing the largest study of UK childcare (The Families, Children and Child Care study: familieschildrenchildcare.org). This article owes much to the inspiration of Dilys Daws of the Association of Infant Mental Health. A version of this article is due to appear in the forthcoming Department for Children, Schools and Families CD-Rom for the Early Years Foundation Stage
RATIOS AND GROUP SIZE
The more children each adult has to care for, the less close and positive the relationships that she will have with each child and the more detached - even punitive - she is likely to be. You're likely to find it much easier to be warmly responsive, patient and sensible with each child if you aren't trying to care for too many at once.
How many is too many? Government and early years professionals generally agree that no one caregiver should be responsible for more than three babies or young toddlers.
If you are caring for babies less than a year old, a ratio of 1:2 is better, especially at points when your personal attention is most crucial, such as when the babies are greeted at the beginning of the day, at meals and nappy-changing times and when they are put down for naps and then got up again.
Group size
Group size also affects the relationship between adult and child. Twenty different one-year-olds wouldn't do well in a room together, even if they did have eight or nine adults among them.
Working with so many colleagues might be fun for the grown-ups, but very small children do better in small groups in small rooms - say no more than six babies (and two adults) and maybe nine young toddlers (with three adults).
From around 18 to 36 months, the usual recommendation is an adult:child ratio of 1:4 and a group size of up to 12 children (still with three adults).
It's worth knowing the recommended ratios and group sizes, even though it won't be up to you how many children you have to care for. If you know that you're caring for the maximum recommended numbers, you will feel less obliged to volunteer to take on an extra child or two when colleagues are off sick.
And if you do find yourself responsible for too many children and struggling, understanding that the blame lies with the numbers rather than your competence will leave you better able to talk to your manager about the need for extra help.
CONTINUITY AND CONSISTENCY OF CARE
It's touching, flattering even, when a worried new arrival finally crawls on to your lap and then looks for you each day when his mother says goodbye and he is distressed. It's easy to feel that only you really understand him; even to feel critical of the parent for leaving him. But your job is not to replace the departing parent, so that the child doesn't mind any more, but to acknowledge and share the child's distress and offer yourself as a life raft on which he can float through it.
Parents
Try not to compete with parents. When two or more people take care of one child, there's bound to be some rivalry, sometimes; it even happens within families, between mothers and fathers, or between parents and grandparents.
Do your best not to join in a 'who does he love the best?' competition, though.
If a child is to get the best out of the care you and his parents provide, you have to feel able to work closely with them - and sometimes, with some parents, that can be surprisingly difficult.
Parents want children to be happy in childcare - but perhaps not too happy. Although a mother is probably grateful and flattered that you love her child, that will not stop her worrying privately about how much the child loves you. And, of course, when the inevitable day comes and a tired balky one-year-old doesn't want to go home, the mother (who is probably also overtired) is all set to decide that you've stolen her prime place in her child's affections.
Independence
You don't get less important to a baby as she gets more independent. Although you may feel most important to a baby or child when she first arrives at nursery and you're helping her to separate from her parents and settle in, you're no less important once she's settled.
She has settled partly because of her relationship with you and her security at nursery, and therefore her ability to use what the nursery offers - exploring, playing, learning - depends on you being there and available to her, even if she no longer needs you all the time.
Key working and team-working
You can't be available every moment of the day, of course; only within the limits of your working hours, shift patterns, breaks, holidays, training days and sick leave. What's more, a child who is 'full time' in the nursery probably does a longer day than you do, so someone else has to care for her for the last couple of hours of each day, just when children tend to be most tired and liable to be unhappy.
Fortunately, although you are a key person you are still part of a team - although the team works in a different way. Each member has special responsibility for her key children rather than any adult doing anything for any child. But it is still vital for all of you to work together as a team, with collective responsibility for all the children.
No key person is going to ignore a child who is about to hurt himself or someone else, just because 'he's not my key child'. Having an effective key-person approach means having a team understanding about what it means and how it works too.
When you are not there, your colleagues may have a hard time with your key children, who may be upset and cross that you are unavailable and take it out on whoever is around, just at they may take it out on you when their parents leave in the morning.
Your colleagues need to understand why children are upset and not see it as you 'being too attached', your key children being 'spoiled' or themselves being 'not good enough'.
Your special relationship also needs backing by colleagues who are well enough known to the child to stand in for you when necessary, rather as a grandmother or aunt may stand in for a mother or father at home. Some nurseries refer to this as a link or buddy key person.
When two small groups share a room, two key workers can deputise for each other since they will both already be well known to all the children. However, that means that one of the key workers will be temporarily in charge of twice the usual number of children, so each key worker will need to have an assistant.
Ideally, it is those familiar assistants, rather than unknown stand-ins, who provide that end-of-the-day care, fill in if there is a staff sickness crisis and can be there for 'your' children if you move to a different job.
INFORMATION
A multi-agency group has been developing a new model of training for nursery staff that deals specifically with emotional well-being in nursery. For more information, please contact Peter Elfer, Roehampton University at: p.elfer@roehampton.ac.uk