Child Development – Case Study

Child Development – Case studies Mrs Roberts is returning to work after maternity leave. Today she has an appointment with a local nursery as she requires full time care for Timothy who is six months old. Mrs Roberts is extremely anxious as Timothy is her first born and she is feeling guilty about returning to work and leaving him in childcare. How will you ensure that Mrs Roberts and timothy are reassured? Explain the daily nursery routines to Mrs Roberts such as play sessions, toilet, and food.
Give her the Policy & Procedures booklet and ask questions about Timothy – likes, dislikes, special requirements. Be reassuring and understanding with regard to her apprehensions and explain that good communication between the nursery, parents and child are essential. Maybe suggest that she could stay for a while in the first few sessions to reassure her about how Timothy is handling the transition. How could their situation affect practice? You must be wary of the other children at the nursery – how may they react to a parent staying?
Set a length of time that she could stay and suggest for only 3 sessions initially. All Staff must be made aware of the situation and confidentiality be adhered to. Today is Bethany’s first day at pre-school. Bethany who is an only child has attended for short spells with her mother which went well. Bethany has woke up this morning with a tummy ache, her mother suspects it is related to going to pre- school and reassures her daughter. When Bethany arrives at pre- school she becomes very clingy to mum and when mum goes to leave she starts to cry and gets upset.

How will you deal with the situation? Reassure mum and Bethany. Be friendly and engage the child in funny conversation and/or involve them in play. Identify her favourite thing to do – distraction point. How will you reassure mum? Explain to mum that ‘Bethany will be fine’ and if there are any problems they will contact her. How will you reassure Bethany? Explain that ‘She will see mummy later’, show her the clock/time line and show when mummy will be back. Introduce her to some other children – meet a friend and distract with play, keep her busy.
Rosie and Jim are 4 year old twins today they will be staring primary school, the twins will be doing mornings for a week before going all day, their parents have decided to split the twins at school so that they can develop as individuals. The twins wake up very excited about going to school which pleases their parents, however when they arrive at school they become agitated and upset when they realise that they are in different classes. How are you going to reassure the twins? Explain to them the day’s routine and show them a time line, pointing out when the twins will be together – break times, story time, end of day.
Encourage them to meet new people and play with different things. How are you going to reassure the parents? Explain to them the day’s routine and tell them when the twins will be together – break times etc. Ensure that the parents are given positive feedback. What contingency plan could you have in place? Ensure that the twins will be together at least once a day. Show both twins where the other one is – classroom. Put a ‘buddy’ with them both – so they always have someone. Worst case – put them in the same class! by Jo Quinn