Nursery staff ‘often hear children swearing’

MORE than one in 10 nursery staff say they often hear children swearing, a survey suggests.

Thirteen per cent of those surveyed said they had seen a general increase in the number of children swearing in nurseries, and 12% highlighted that they often hear children using profanities.

The poll was conducted by daynurseries.co.uk and received 1,125 responses from nursery owners, managers and staff.

Sue Learner, editor of daynurseries.co.uk, said: “These findings are not a surprise as swearing seems to be more socially acceptable, and if young children do not hear it at home, they can hear it in pop songs or on YouTube.

“However, despite it becoming more prevalent in society, it is still shocking and incongruous to hear profanities coming from the lips of a young child.”

John Warren, who has worked in the childcare industry for more than 30 years, from nursery practitioner to Ofsted inspector, said: “Swearing is definitely more accepted in today’s culture and the word ‘s**t’ has replaced so many words, for example, ‘This is good s**t’. So rather than introducing children to a world of beautiful language we are introducing them to a language, well, that is s**t.

“And this language is not reserved for less affluent families. It is also quite happily used on giant billboards such as the ‘B ****** s to Brexit’ campaign.

“We need to bring back the innocence in children’s lives, awe and wonder, the tooth fairy, Father Christmas, unicorns and fairies.

“Let them have fun with language, invent new words and don’t be so quick to jump on the child who says ‘poo, fart and bum’ and then giggles.”