How many of you have children in day care?

[darren atkinson]

Hi

I am just conducting some research and wondered if you could help.

How many people here put their children in day care, and how would you feel about the nursery having a webcam installed which you could view online?

Most reactions to them have been positive so far, as long as security is tight.

Do you have any thoughts or feelings on the subject or know anybody who would?

Good to hear from you all.

Darren

[SillyJokes]

I have two with a minder, the other two are at school and at after school club.

I pay these people to do a job and I don't want to have to check up on them - I want to be able to work not spend my time spying on my kids.

I find this kind of thing rather smothering.

[Rob Holmes]

Yep - mother don't smother ;)

Personally - I think it sends the wrong message out either way installing a nursery webcam.

You'd be crossing too many Child Protection Boundaries IMHO - it's a minefield - for starters you'd have to have every parents permission to film their children - you couldn't have sound as no names should be mentioned - no sound and a video is easily misinterpreted.

Then one parent could just decide they don't want their kid filmed anymore and it would all have to stop.

Sorry to be negative - Absolute minefield.

Rob

[Claire B]

It has been done before though. Some nurseries have trialled it, although i don't think it is commonplace.

I think parents were able to log into the webcam from work, using a special password or somesuch.

[bitsnstuff]

I currently have no childcare arrangements in place, but am looking for the new year and to be honest, if I felt the need for that type of service, then I wouldn't leave my daughter in that establishment as it doesn't create trust. I want to feel that she is safe and secure in the environment without the need for webcam, etc.

Kate :lol:

[darren atkinson]

I currently have no childcare arrangements in place, but am looking for the new year and to be honest, if I felt the need for that type of service, then I wouldn't leave my daughter in that establishment as it doesn't create trust. I want to feel that she is safe and secure in the environment without the need for webcam, etc.

Kate :lol:

I see your point.

The thing is many parents do feel guilty leaving children in nursery, but have to do so to be able to work. Giving them the opportunity to be able to see the child any time they want does go some way to releaving this feeling of guilt.

Not all day care centres are run well either, recent tv programmes have shown this, a day care centre installing this facility shows prospective parents it has nothing to hide.

Views are split on the subject i agree.

Thanks for your comments

[multilingual]

Nice idea in priciple, but I agree with Matrixx about the legal and safety issues. I don't care how secure you make it, what you are doing is putting images of little children onto the web. I don't need to spell out the consequences of a local paedophile gaining access to those images.

Before we decided where to send our daughter, we went round about 14 different nurseries to get a feel for what was good and what was bad. We read all the ofsted reports and asked around for some honest opinions from other parents.

My little one now goes to a private nursery, which is part of the school that she will hopefully be attending later. They have their own little uniforms and mix with the older kids which helps to bring them along faster. The whole school gets together a few times each year at Lincoln Cathedral and it is great to see the sixth formers talking and mixing with the two and three year olds. I could not recommend them hih enough.

When she is at nursery I can relax and concentrate on my work.

Do your homework first and the need to constantly watch out for them should not arise.

JB

[darren atkinson]

what you are doing is putting images of little children onto the web.

Do your homework first and the need to constantly watch out for them should not arise.

JB

Thanks for your comments.

With regards to putting images of children on the web, absolutly no images of kids are saved anywhere, even if someone did gain access to a server there would be nothing to see as images are constantly overwritten.

A lot of people don't have the option of using private nurseries and the one you describe sounds brilliant, but I bet its either expensive, or full.

This is definately not an idea that suits everyone.

Thanks

[multilingual]

the one you describe sounds brilliant, but I bet its either expensive, or full.

Both!

We had to put her name down a year ahead of her going there!

However, if she starts in nursery then she is automatically registered for the whole programme right through to being 18.

If we waited until she was five and then tried to get her into the school it would be nigh on impossible.

JB

[Joyous]

I have four children who all went to the same private nursery. In the same way a previous poster said we traipsed round a number of nurseries before finding one we could trust with "our most treasured possessions". If you feel the need to check up on your child or catch the nursery in some wrong-doing then your child shouldn't be there in the first place.

As for the argument that the parent can still look at the child as and when the need arises they'd be better off with a favourite picture of the child in a prominent position next to their computer screen. Much less distracting than logging on to a webcam. In my experience putting in a good day's work or gazing longingly at your children are mutually exclusive.

Regards

Joy

[Greig]

This was actually in my local paper today, its being tried out at a nursery in Lowestoft where the parents pay an extra £5 per month and get a secure password and login to view there children by webcam.

[coxadmin]

My son is in pre-school five mornings a week. I havea great relationship with the staff and get feedback on what is happening daily when I pick him up.

They have a very strict policy on what happens if behaviour is not acceptable.

I would not want to "spy" on either my child or the staff. I enjoy the time I have away from my son and enjoy our time back together again. I agree with Matrixx's comment "Mother, don't smother".

[Magsite]

I have 1 child - (18monthold) currently at full time nursery (£600 amonth ah ah)

I love the nursery though - worth the 40 minute drive there and back

I would like to see a web cam installed, just out of interest.

[duenna]

We have a gorgious (I would say that!) 17-month old daughter, she has two days a week at nursery and has done so for 8 months. The nursery opened 19 months ago. We fell on our feet with them. Having said that they have considered the idea of web cameras, but I really do not feel the need for them to do so.

It still feels like Christmas when I come home from the office, you know the expectation and want to spend time with your child.

I trust our nursery.

[Dave Teece]

In our local paper there was an article about "Cherub" day nursery who where advertising the fact that parents could view their children over the internet by using a password. The nursery is based in Hull.

Dave

[darren atkinson]

Thanks for all your views.

To be honest I am finding many of your slightly negative perspectives surprising.

Many people who I have spoken with all thought it was a brilliant idea.

The idea is not that you 'spy' on your children all day, it is that if you have a spare couple of minutes on a break, you can log in and see your child at the nursery.

My wife as an example, when we have children she would really like to leave her job and look after them full time. The problem is that due to money constraints she will probably have to work part time. This happens in a lot of families. The idea of her leaving her children at nursery for long periods is not good for her. She says that knowing she could see her child is safe any time she wants would be an enormous benefit to her.

Yes I realise my wife might be a little biased, but she is definitely not the only person who has this view.

The benefits for the nursery are that if they are new then installing this system shows they have nothing to hide and are open with parents.

Despite what a lot of you might think there are a lot of nurseries that have lower standards, my nephew has been to some of them and we have witnessed it first hand. It is very difficult to find a good nursery and one offering this service at least goes someway to establishing trust between the nursery and parents.

I truly believe that in 5 - 10 years this type of thing will be common place.

Well my sales pitch is over...

Thanks again for your comments

Darren

[Rob Holmes]

Hey Darren,

Have you spoken to any nurseries direct to see what they think?

TBH - everyone discouraged me when I had a biz idea, bank, family, business link (everyone except Mrs Matrixx) I still went ahead and made a mint :)

Rob

[jen]

Hi,

I personally would feel at ease if the nursery have a webcam (so does other mums I've spoken to but again some reject the idea).

I don't think is a matter of spying on them, it's nice to have the choice of being able to see how your child is re-acting to other kids without your presence and how she's enjoying her time at nursery and yes also reassuring to see that the staff are good as they say they are. Some mums if given the choice would love to be at home looking after their child than having to go to work so if there is a webcam at the nursery, you could just take a minute or two to log in and see how your child is doing on her first days at nursery and not spying at all nor smothering.

I've seen some worried mums and dads when they drop their little precious one on their first day at nursery or school, so for me especially on those first weeks it would be great to see how my child is settling at that nursery without having to rely on what the nurseries say..because I know there are some good nurseries but also there are some undertrained staff and bad practice nurseries as proven during the TV series.

When you pick up your child at nursery, most often the staff would say, she had a fantastic time, she cried at first but when you left she was fine - no matter how good they look from outside but I feel that as soon as they close the door you don't really know how well they look after those children - I'm not saying that they abuse them or anything like that it's just an extra re-assurance.

For the nursery who has webcam - i think it shows that they have nothing to hide and that they're willing to share those special times the children have at the nursery with parents being able to log in from time to time and to make parents at ease.

As for children images bein on the net - the site is secure and only parents with code can access that. You see picture and images of babies and kids on the net, everywhere. And if there is a problem with paedophile parent who could have access to the site - that very person could also easily be at nursery picking their child up that to me is more worrying.


Regards

Jen

[darren atkinson]

Rob: Yes I have spoken with a few nurseries in my area, and have mailed out information packs on the system. I actually had a meeting with an interested nursery this morning, hopefully they purchasing the system from me!

I just really wanted to get parents views on the subject, that was the reason for this post. I now see that some are very interested and some are not. I guess if everyone thought it was a brilliant idea then there would be alot of companies offering similar systems already.

Jen: Thanks for taking the time to post an answer here, your words are encouraging to me. While I am sure some people see no need for such a system, I'm certain you are not on your own in your support of such a facility. Thanks again.

Darren