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THE HEALTH OF BARKING
The clinic of the future must be sufficiently spacious to have running at one
and the same time a child welfare clinic, a creche and a post-natal clinic. The
mothers are willing to take their children to the infant welfare clinic and if there were
a creche at every clinic and a post-natal clinic running at the same time I believe
a much larger number of women would avail themselves of post-natal examinations,
Day Nurseries.
You have three such nurseries—Castle Green, Eastbury House and Lodge
Farm. The average daily attendance during the year was 40, 60 and 36 respectively
The demand for places has been much greater than the accommodation available.
To relieve this situation permission has been obtained to convert the Castle School
at Rippleside into a further nursery. At the same time I am hopeful it will become
possible to erect a further prefabricated nursery.
There has been much discussion as to the value of day nurseries. The amount
of woman power released for industry is not as great as might at first appear, since
the number of mothers who go into industry must be balanced against the staff
required to run the nursery and the work involved in building or conversion and
maintenance.
A certain proportion of cases are admitted on medical grounds, for examplechildren
not uncommonly tease anxious parents by eating very poorly. How they
love to watch their parents' consternation, in consequence of which they occupy the
centre of the stage ! If these children are admitted to a day nursery, the sight of
others eating heartily is too much for them and they soon join in.
Most medical officers are agreed that the incidence of respiratory infections is
higher among children attending day nurseries than in children of the same age
groups generally. At the same time these nursery children are somewhat above the
average in weight. With regard to the mental development of nursery children,
it is felt that there is a definite advantage in that they learn how to mix socially at
an early age. On the other side, it may be that this easy social intercourse is
achieved at the expense of the development of the individual personality.
If a child is to be happy, it must learn discipline. The right way to discipline
a child is to give as few orders as possible. Think if it really matters before saying
"No" or "Stop it" to a child. Make sure your order is within the child's
capabilities. But once an order has been given see that it is carried out however
inconvenient it may be for you to do this. Now if a mother has a house to run and
say two small children to care for at the same time she will usually find herself very
harassed and will forget the simple rules of discipline upon which a fair measure of
her children's emotional development depends. I cannot but feel that when
economic pressure no longer makes it necessary for mothers to go out to work there
will be a very real need for nurseries where a mother can leave her children for
say three hours daily. This relief would make it possible for a mother to take her
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