Nursery Trial #1

Today was our first attempt in nursery for Evan. Due to his developmental delays, I have hesitated where nursery is concerned (and I'm still unsure of how I feel about it). This morning was easy for him because I was in there the entire time and he also had his Grammy to play as well. There were a whopping 12 kids in there(just between the ages of 18 & 24 months) and several adults so it was nothing less than chaotic. I did appreciate the teachers who tried to speak to every child and use their names along with encouraging them to get involved or to sit down or whatever was needing to be done at that time. Since Grammy has plenty of experience in nursery, it was also interesting to see her involved.
Evan enjoyed the first half where everyone was playing. Toys were out and he just crawled around the room and was interested not only in the toys but in seeing what everyone else was doing. Then came snack time. I was impressed by the obedience that these 12 kids had in putting away the toys and sitting down at the tables and waiting patiently for the Cheerios, raisins and cups of water to be brought to them. One young lady has got the nursery snack time down to a science because she turned to an adult and said "more water" instead of getting up to get more of whatever she wanted.
After snack time came story time followed by music time and then the lesson. During these last few, its attempted to be a bit more structured with the kids sitting in a circle and participating, meaning they need to focus on something that isn't necessarily their own choice and usually not something that they can hold and play with. So for my little blonde, this time wasn't as easy to focus on and he was also getting tired. So even though the lesson was fun and about families and about loving brothers and sisters, he was not really into nursery anymore.
Evan has never had a babysitter that wasn't related to him or that hasn't spent a lot of time with him with me around. So another aspect of nursery is as a parent being willing to leave him in someone else's arms. I know they are loving and caring, but when there are so many children and Evan is a non walking, non verbal 20 month old, I kind of worry about him being left without me who can focus on him completely. A few more prayers of faith and we'll see what happens as time goes on.