Communication Journal?

[unregistered member]

Right now I send home an Infant/Toddler Daily Report each day (nap length, what they ate, how much they drank, what activities they enjoyed, & comments).

I decided to do a Communication Journal instead (a notebook they will bring back and forth in the diaper bags). This will save paper and hopefully will mean they will answer my written questions. They will need to initial it daily before returning. I don't like asking questions at pick-up because they are tired from the day and so am I! Also, once more children start I won't be able to discuss things in private (obviously unless we schedule a meeting). I'll still put down what their child's day was like (feeding, nap, etc..) but it will be an opportunity for myself and the parents to jot down questions or info we may not think about at drop-off/pick-up.

Anyone else do the same?? What do you include in your journal? My only concern is that I'll miss the typed form..

thanks in advance!!

[Blackcat31]

I do the notebook journal thing but I do not require parents to initial or do anything on a daily basis. I ask that they include anything that they feel uncomfortable telling me verbally and I will add updates, notes, news etc in it. It starts out working great but the better you are at communicating with the parents the less you need the notebook so it sort of peters out.

I do not really use it for documenting behaviors because any documenting I do, I do for me and hopefully not, but for possible use in the future if need be but those are papers I do not share with the families.

[Pammie]

I used to do a similar type journal - until too many parents would forget to send it back to daycare daily. Honestly, once I figured out it was more for me than for them, and that they really didn't care, I stopped. Not surprisingly, no one ever questioned why the notebooks weren't coming home anymore.

Personally, expecting them to "initial" the pages might be a bit too much. But that's just my opinion.

I do daily sheets but only for infants. Once they hit their first birthday I stop.

Again, I think even with these sheets it's more for me than for them - but it does eliminate the phone calls in the evening/weekend from dcps asking about their child's eating/diapers. It's surprising though how often I find a week's worth of sheets at the bottom of the diaper bag! Once I helped a dcm get her baby into her car, and I think every sheet I sent home was on the floor of the backseat.

Hope you have better luck with your logs/clients than I did with mine! I think it's a great idea if it works for all of you.

[jojosmommy]

I did journals and hated them. Only one parent read them, then she asked me all about eveything we did anyway so it never really helped. Everyone else just left them on the bench in the entry way.

I do daily sheets for infants but like already posted I have seen tons of them on the floor of the parents car when I help them get their older one in his seat (they are last to leave so I help more than typical just to get them on their way). Also, when dad picks up he lets the infant chew the paper and then mom calls anyway to ask what happened that day :confused:.

I think I might only do it for those who ask from now on.

[MarinaVanessa]

I used to do the daily note thing too but parents wouldn't read it sometimes and they would just get thrown away and thy were so time consuming and wasteful. I adopted Nannydes way and now if they want to know specific things about their child they can provide the forms and I will fill them out or they can provide the journal and ask what they want to know. No form provided? No specific info written for them. If they don provide a journal or forget it or don't write in it and ask specific questions to what they want to know then I don't write anything up either.

I notice that when I left it up to them to provide the material and bow they had to take the time to ask questions and write them down that the requests for these were all of a sudden not as important .

[wdmmom]

I went "green".

I post on a whiteboard at the entrance each childs name, how many #1 diapers, how many #2 diapers, when they were changed, when they ate and how many ounces.

I do this for 12 months and younger.

[boysx5]

I can hardly get them to sign in their child each day or bring a change of clothes let alone a journal

[SimpleMom]

I started out doing daily reports for all ages until K. Then, I realized that most were at the bottom of the diaper bags and it wasn't cost effective for me. So, I changed to daily notebooks. Then they really didn't use them to communicate back and would forget to check them, so I discontinued them. We get time to talk most days and it's better then paper. I know who really needs/wants more info and I will send a form home for them (always infants to age 18m), and some I will email each day. Saves me time and money and then the parents can respond back the best way that works for them. It works great here and I love it. Took me a good 5 years to work out all the kinks though