Having them dressed at pick up *rant*

[bright sparks]

I have three children picked up at the same time so they all need to be ready to go. Two of them are only 12 months and the other 17 month old has attachment issues so cries if it is the wrong parent at the door. It can be a chorus of cries and I find if they are all sat dressed and ready seeing each other being collected, that they are slowly but surely getting used to this routine and learning to be patient and well behaved. If I have them all dressed and calmly sat on the bottom step ready for pick up things go much smoother. I have made it clear to the parents why their child is ready and waiting for them and if their weren't multiple pick ups at the same time then I wouldn't do it.

All of my daycare parents are very clear on my behaviour policies prior to signing up with me. My house, my rules. I will not get into a power struggle with parents at the door because the child is trying to play us off against each other, so as long as they are in my house, I will enforce my rules regardless of the presence of the parent. I learnt long ago that most parents feel awkward about disciplining in front of me but I can not be doing with the ridiculous behaviours at pick up and the passive parent who does nothing at all or sometimes even worse, some half ass attempt to pacify the situation, which is not helpful and actually ends up making things worse in the long run. I have a 2 1/2 yr old who is picked up last, a good 30-40 minutes later than the others who is a handful. I used to care for his sister also until she went to jk and she was the same and in this case it really is a case of lack of discipline from the parents. I talk to the little boy a few minutes prior to pick to remind him of what the appropriate behaviour is at pick up and sometimes it works and other times it doesn't. I sometimes have him ready if I have zero tolerance for their BS at pick up time because his mother is a pain in my ass for not telling him off. I have peeled him off his mother on many occasion and put him on time out for climbing all over her when he should be getting ready to leave. Also when he has run away through my house and she has laughed at him, I have told her to not laugh at him because it encourages it and teaches him that this is a fun game. I do not work as hard as I do with these children, for parents to undo all this progress regardless of whether they pay me or not. If they don't like the way I do things, then they can find someone else. After a 10 hour day, I do not want to have to deal with a misbehaving child and a parent who can't discipline their child so I work very hard to be consistent and reinforce what I teach the child and take control of the situation in MY house!