Learning Difficulties

Children are known to be fast learners and thus pick things up more easily than adults do. But for some parents they may find themselves worried when their child still hasn’t started talking at age two, or is struggling to learn the alphabet at five.

Children with learning disabilities may show early warning signs by talking later than other kids do or will struggle to count to ten even with practice. Your child could have a learning disability, but this does not mean they aren’t smart just that they require a special method of teaching and patience to help them across.
Many people mistake learning disabilities for having a lower IQ, but psychologists agree that children who are slow require special attention early to help them overcome the difficulties they face. The problem usually has to do with the way he learns and not his intelligence. These children are almost always in the higher percentile of intelligence, but have a hard time absorbing information, and sometimes have a higher IQ than the others. They just have to work harder to understand the information. But once they do, they are on their way to successfully making it through preschool.

Early signs to look for in children with Learning Disabilities

There is no specific time that children are supposed to achieve important milestones, just an average age in months where children generally achieve certain goals. When children pass these average timelines to talk, walk, or pronounce simple words, they may be experiencing learning difficulties. Children with disabilities are categorized into three easy to understand groups; Reading difficulties, writing difficulties, and math skills. There are also a range of other learning difficulties associated with motor skills, memory, and coordination.
All learning difficulties are categorized with systematic counteractive measures to help children with special needs succeed through school. In most cases, a child will have just one type of learning difficulty, but it is not uncommon to have a combination of two or more.

Dyslexia is the term given to children with reading difficulties and dyscalculia is associates with children who have trouble with maths. Attention deficit disorders are not considered learning difficulties, but children who have learning difficulties sometimes have attention difficulties as well.
As a parent you may first start to notice signs of learning disabilities in your baby’s first and second year when they begin to speak, pick up words, pick things up and respond to simple commands. When any of these goals are not reached at the far end of the spectrum, your child may need some extra attention to help them learn absorb the information.

Delayed speech is the first sign that something may be wrong. In some cases, children may start to speak on time, but nothing they say makes much sense, they may pronounce words wrong, and will learn new words at a slower pace than most others. He or she may recite the alphabet without a problem but will not be able to identify the alphabet when shown. Coordination and motor skills may be noticed when they struggle to hold a crayon or follow simple commands as “come here”

Regardless of the learning difficulty your child has, we at Kids Island and Cocoon Nurseries follow strict guidelines set forth by the Early Years Foundation Stage (EFYS) UK to ensure that all children receive proper care and attention during their Dubai preschool years. We work very closely with parents of children to ensure that their time with us at nursery school is appropriately reported to give parents of children with learning difficulties enough time to plan out a course of action. Our highly regulated nursery environment is staffed by some of the most dedicated educators of young preschoolers, who receive constant training in their role as pre-kindergarten teachers. Visit our nursery Dubai to give your child the best platform to shine in his endeavours.

Keeping Children Safe

Raising a toddler is hard work. Although its commonly perceived that only the twos are tough, keeping your child safe and motivated to behave, live safely and learn for the first years of their life is a game you learn while you play. International Preschools Dubai have it easy, as we follow strict guidelines from the EYFS UK Framework and our caregivers are able to put their knowledge and experience to practice during school hours. However, when your little one returns home for the day, they may feel like letting lose, and losing focus.

Children are no different from us adults, who perform better with a hypothetical carrot dangling ahead. A little motivation can benefit your child in the long run, and can come from anywhere they spend most of their hours at, like home, family and at Kids Island Nursery. We at Kids Island like to form partnerships with parents to ensure your child receives a solid foundation for life.

If you have different aged children, then it a good idea to interconnect the responsibilities and rewards to ensure you always have one of your children looking out for the other. The old fashioned way of using a basic hand drawn chart to keep your children in check, works wonders. Although child psychologists recommend against always rewarding good behaviour, periodical rewards help them to understand that only good behaviour will receive positive reinforcements.

For a two year old, your main concern for behaviour would be his own safety. It can be difficult to make sure that she doesn't put her finger into a hidden electrical socket, or slide down the staircase railing because she saw her older brother do the same. One way to ensure both your children are safe would be to first, educate your two year old on the safety of electrical sockets anywhere at home or outside. A task, requesting him to bring any unprotected electrical sockets to your attention, will have him looking for danger and alerting you to it. This will not only keep him safe, but he may even pass on the knowledge to another friend or sibling. Knowing there is something he can look forward to for being good and safe, will keep him motivated on the task.

The same task can be reversed and your oldest child, will receive a check, each time, he took care of his younger sibling, a few turns and you can choose to reward him periodically for good behaviour and showcasing responsibility for his and his brothers safety. Interconnecting responsibility, relating the dangers, and rewarding their achievements, will have them coming back for checks boxes and looking for more ways to have more stars on the chart. You can use a chart like this for just about anything, including school work, milestones achieved, politeness to other children, or even helping you out at home.
Kids Island and Cocoon Nurseries, British preschools, day care and day nurseries are dedicated to child safety and wellbeing. We strive to ensure your child stays healthy, safe, and motivated, on being smart and happy. Visit us to have a tour of our nurseries and meet our staff if you are looking for a safe and secure nursery for your most precious possession.

Behavioural Problems

Kids Island Nursery and Resolving conflict and behavioural problems amongst toddlers
When it comes to young children and their siblings, even in the case of older children, conflict is a common phenomenon brought on by completely natural emotions. Jealousy, attention, insecurities, and not knowing what their own place is in the family can cause your toddler to become aggressive towards, you, his younger or older siblings, and even with his friends from school.

Acting out, throwing tantrums, depression, fear, are contributing factors to what might result in tantrums at Dubai preschool, at home or in public places. Sometimes children may seem stubborn even if you did take them out, or took them with you to the supermarket. These times can be trying for parents, who are trying to balance the need of every child, along with work life and alone time.

Some children accept and welcome another brother or sister, while other act indifferent, and for some others accepting another baby in to the family will take time. Patience and diligence is key in these instances, and what your oldest child may need, could as simply be just some quality time with just them. A new baby is quite literally a handful, but may be each parent can take turns spending time with both children. Watching a movie without outside interruptions, like phone calls, or checking your emails.

Sometimes children just need you to themselves and they have not mastered the art of communicating this need to you as yet. But with constant chats, and leaving the door open for them to approach you whenever something troubles them, will help your child and you adjust to new responsibilities and role changes.
Role change is by far the most prominent of all factors that causes young children to show aggressive behaviour. If you have toddlers who are close in age, like two and four, you may find yourself playing referee more often than you'd like to. Most often than not, one of them will dominate while the other remains submissive. This situation will probably find you yelling at one, while protecting the other causing more friction between the two. Its best to treat both children equally, and talk to them individually. Empathy is key, and making both children understand where the other is coming from, will aid in both children finding middle ground and coming to a compromise. If you feel at this moment that one may have been unfair to other, talk to them separately, explain to them how their action is wrong, and you have immense trust in them to be good, and that you know they are capable of being fair to their younger siblings. Talking to them in this way, will improve their behaviour at home, in public and at our nursery school Dubai, and you may even see a positive shift in their behaviour towards other children and their own siblings.

Bad Behaviour at preschool

Worried about my child's bad behaviour in preschool

Many parents are faced with this common dilemma where they are told their child is acting up, or being difficult. Usually when a child is around 30 months old, when they begin to form their unique personalities, they may display bouts of anger, anxiety, depression, or difficulty concentrating on a single task for long. As frustrating as it might be, and as easily as self-blame is, getting to the bottom of the problem is part of the solution.

When you are in charge of more than 15 children in a nursery classroom, as teachers we expect that the group will have varying personalities, shortcomings and some will have behavioural patterns different from the rest.
Although parenting styles do have some effect on the child, most often than not, there is usually an underlying problem that the child is having trouble in expressing their emotions. Some very renowned psychologists state that dealing aggressively with a differently behaved child will weigh negatively on the child and probably contribute further to bad behaviour.

Some studies show that children can show signs of varying behaviour at infant stages as well. Where you may have noticed your baby struggling to sleep, difficult to soothe even after a feeding, or becomes irritable throughout the day. There is however, a fine line between normal or average behaviour and one that might be considered difficult. Infants are inclined to cry and be irritable as it is their only form of communication with you. So feelings of humid weather, a bite, a scratch, an uncomfortable position, a wet diaper, or hunger are all communicated through crying. Therefore, it would not be advised to label your child difficult just from this alone.

There are various categories of children that may need extra help and close observation into their behaviour. Many expert child psychologists say that labelling children with negative terms puts parents and families under more pressure and feelings of guilt looking for cure or a solution. It also recognizes that children are inevitably going to be different and not the same.
Some children listen to instructions and do pay attention to what is happening around them, while others have selective attention. These children are generally more active than others in their playgroup Dubai. They will respond well to things like television or song and dance, but are unable to sit still through an art class or writing assignment. Some of these types of personalities are considered extremely smart and bright children, although they may not fare well with theory.

Unconventional children are those children who do everything different from an average group of children. They are more intense when it comes to showing emotions and therefore require organized routines to help them stay in control and have familiar territory all the time.

Difficult children who struggle with day-to-day tasks at preschools in Dubai, do not respond well to being yelled at, as it would increase their frustration even more. Instead, we try to look for patterns that bring this behaviour on, and come to a compromise.

We at Kids Island Nursery try our best to accommodate all kinds of personalities helping parents from various cultures adapt and accept a very multicultural society. Our teachers interact with parents to help those children find middle ground and achieve great success at our Dubai Kindergarten. If you have concerns about your child and feel they may have difficulty fitting in, talk to us today.

Illness Policy

Keeping children safe is as important as providing them with the right learning tools and resources. Your child's health is in fact at the centre of our priorities, as we understand that only a healthy child is happy, and a happy child, is an active learner. This is why at Kids Island Nursery we work with a strict Preschool illness policy to reduce the risk of healthy children becoming, infected as well as to ensure that the child himself rests and recovers completely.

Every disease has a different wellness and incubation period. Most minor diseases like a runny nose, or slight wheeze are not harmful to others while any condition brought on by a virus or a bacterial infection is considered contagious.

To reduce the spread of disease in our Dubai international preschool, we follow a strict illness policy in our all our facilities to be adhered by the staff and children. Most of our parents are in fact working parents and may not be able to stay home with their young children, however, taking a day off is not only necessary for the sake of other children, but also for your own, who might have a relapse should they attend nursery and play outside, if their symptoms remain persistent.

Little children are still learning to fight disease and common illnesses, as their immune systems are still maturing. With each new illness, they become stronger making antibodies to fight a specific condition. With good nutrition, proper medical care and plenty of rest, they are usually on the road to recovery anywhere from 12 hours to 7 days.

For a simple stomach bug, with symptoms of vomiting, or diarrhoea, your child might require a day at home, to recover and attending preschool may not be suitable. A stomach bug is not considered contagious, and your child can return after a 12-hour period of the symptoms disappearing. A mild cold, cough, or wheeze will require the same.

A more serious common cold or flu will mean your child rests for a minimum or two days or at least till the symptoms have disappeared. Most viral and bacterial illnesses need a longer incubation than the simple rash. If your child has caught the flu, they are usually contagious a day prior start of the symptoms. To prevent other children from catching the same, we maintain high standards of hygiene in and around our classrooms throughout the year. However, once the symptoms become full blown, it is a must that your child stays at home for two-to-four days, depending on how severe the attack. If you're not sure about the time you need to keep your child at home resting, talk to a doctor who will be able to give you an approximate period.
For more complex illnesses like chicken pox, German Measles, and mumps; these require a minimum of 7 days at home or at least until the scars have dried over. Conjunctivitis is only contagious for a maximum of three days, however, do make sure that your child's eyes have stopped discharging thick mucus before bringing them to school.

Kids Island and Cocoon Nurseries is international British Nursery in Dubai and we follow the EYFS guidelines for keeping your child healthy and safe while in our care. Every child is treated individually, and together with your family physician and our in-house nurse, we aim to ensure that they miss as little school as possible.

Nursery School Dubai

Most children are outgoing, make friends easily and are accepting of new ideas and ventures. These young personalities are enthusiastic in play and make friends easily. But for every outgoing nursery child, there is the shy one who prefers to sit outside the circle and is happy with little or no attention at all.

The outgoing children, who attend nurseries make friends fast, are leaders of the pack. But what about the child in the corner who seems uninterested in taking part? Well if you are a parent of that child and are concerned about her being left behind, your worries are only half justified.

Children who prefer to play on their own are not loners but are considered shy. These children will keep to themselves until they are approached or invited by a group of other kids. They will struggle to sharpen their social skills but it is important not to push her out of her comfort zone, she will rather prefer to be guided through it with patience and understanding.

As parents we would love to have our children accepted and active playing with kids their own age at preschool. It is important to work with her teacher to help her get comfortable in a new environment at school, without causing her anxious in the process.

Each classroom will have all kinds personalities and even the shy kid is part of the diversity one would find in a large group of preschoolers. Teachers and parents should allow these children time to want to fit in when they feel comfortable. Generally, shy or quiet children are happy to observe rather than take part and we need both kinds to make a classroom interesting.

As a parent of a shy child, a new school will be worrying; anxiety and nervousness is experienced, by parent and child. Its best to start the admission process early when enrolling your toddler in her new Dubai Nursery. If your son or daughter is shy and about to enter preschool , visit the school with them as often as possible. Let her be acquainted with the staff and her peers early on. This can happen during the admission process, make the appointments during interval, or lunch break when the kids are out playing. Children are naturally inquisitive of new people and will approach your daughter with the intention of making friends. She might pull back at this time, but the best things takes time.  As she doesn’t quite yet belong in the school, she will therefore have no corner to run to except you. She will make small talk before approaching you for comfort. On the next visit she is likely to be more familiar and will therefore attempt to make more friends. Eventually, after a few visits she will comfortable and happy to settle in to her new environment well before her first day.

Additionally, should she need a little more time, make arrangements to stay a while with her on the first day. It’ll give her the reassurance she needs, while other kids approach her and she gets to know her teacher.  

Maintain strong communications with her teacher and talk to her about the friends she made. If your child says, she didn’t make any friends or was too shy, gently coach her on her approach for the next day at nursery school. Eventually she will be returning back home with tons of stories about her peers and teachers.

Kids Island and Cocoon Nurseries in Dubai is a preschool that ensures all children are accepted into the family and are able to still be themselves. Our dedicated teachers work with each child individually to ensure they feel right at home in their preschool Dubai; Kids Island Nursery.

Dubai Preschools

Many parents wake up in the morning with plenty to do, and the most difficult part is getting your youngest child out of bed and ready for his or her day at preschool in Dubai. Parents always find that they are juggling a million things before the family leaves for school and work. Breakfast and packed lunches are the most time consuming and thought provoking, as moms try to pack a nutritious snack that their child will love.

Many children as young as two have already decided what they like and don’t like. They run away from the sound of vegetables but will try something new only if prepared to their liking. It is common for moms to find half eaten lunches after a day at nursery.

Young children require large amounts of calcium for their growing bones, minerals to keep them healthy, fiber and carbohydrates to provide the energy and protein to help in the development of their muscles. If you are a lucky mom, whose child eats “anything”, you probably find it easy to pack a school lunch. However for those moms who struggle to get their child to eat nutritious food, here are some convenient ingredients that is both nutritious and instant.

NUTRITIOUS FOODS

Flaxseeds

Flaxseeds are full of omega-3 fatty acids that help in the development of the brain. Flaxseeds are a category of plant-based food that can be added over baked goodies like pizza and pastries or substituted for flour in countless recipes like pancakes, waffles, muffins, breads, and buns.

Tofu

Although tofu is seldom considered as packed lunch, tofu is a great source of calcium, vitamin- B, protein and iron. Tofu is also a flexible ingredient, easily substituted in cooked food as cheese or meats. Tofu can be grilled or fried and added to sandwiches or eaten by itself.

Cheese

Most children love cheese and for good reason too. Cheese provides plenty of calcium needed for healthy bones, and teeth. Cheese alone or in sandwiches make great preschool snacks.

Peanut Butter

Peanut butter is full of nutrition and conveniently comes in a jar. Peanut butter is packed with fiber, calcium, magnesium, vitamin B-6, iron, carbohydrates, and mono-saturated fats. A peanut butter sandwich accompanied with a fruit will give your child almost all the nutrition they require during the day.

Nuts

Nuts contain a high nutritional value for adults and children who attend Dubai preschools. Pistachios, almonds, hazelnuts, pine nuts, cashews and walnuts are packed with nutrition; omega 3, proteins, calcium, unsaturated fats, and loads of minerals. Nuts are great for children, and are eaten as they are or topped on pastries, breads, and salads. Do consult your doctor however, as some children are allergic to nuts.

Fruits

Fruits are an important part to everybody’s health and wellness and it is no different for children. Many children are picky eaters as they are forming their opinion to certain foods and will only eat what they like. If your child does not like having fruits, introduce an all-natural fruit juice, or baking fruit pies that they enjoy.

Vegetables

It is common knowledge amongst mothers with young children who struggle to get their child to eat their vegetables. Vegetables do need to be disguised in other foods. To save on time in the morning, try baking vegetables along with cheese or tofu into a pastry or bread roll the previous night, and heating it up in the morning. The children are distracted by the convenience and cheese they will not notice the goodness of the vegetables.

Lunchtime at Kids Island Nursery is a fun activity where all the children identify and open their transparent lunch bags provided by Kids Island Nursery. Children are encouraged to open their boxes and talk about their snacks, which helps distract them from their dislikes. Our class teachers and assistants encourage your child to eat making sure they have received the nutrition they need to carry on for the rest of the day.