When the El Xumet nursery school opened its doors in Mataró in 2006, the fact that it offered a webcam service in its classrooms was a plus that differentiated it from most nursery schools. “Around the time I was starting the daycare, television reported on some cases of centers in which ugly things were done and I thought that if I were a mother I would be worried and I would like to see and know what happens where I leave my children. my son, so I installed cameras to convey that in this school there is nothing to hide,” justifies Encarni Ortel, its director.
In 2008, when Nemomerlin's activity started, “having web cameras in our schools was another differentiating element compared to the competition,” explains Oscar Díaz, the Director of Operations of this business group that integrates 41 nursery schools throughout Spain.
In 2016, when Leo Messi had cameras installed in his son's school to be able to continue supervising what he did as in daycare, the existence of webcams in children's centers was still a minority and sparked controversy. Today, video surveillance systems in nursery schools have spread as a practically “essential” complement to the services they offer. At Happy Way schools, the webcam system is mentioned as part of the five reasons why parents should choose one of their centers for their children. And on the website of the Trastes centers it can be read that “the webcam is a complement to the fundamental service for their early childhood education centers.”
What drives parents and educators to turn children's classrooms into a kind of Big Brother? Ortel and Díaz assure that the experience of having cameras in the daycare is positive because it gives confidence and peace of mind to families, especially when it comes to first-time parents.
On the other hand, the neuropsychologist specialized in child development Álvaro Bilbao assures that these cameras are a double-edged sword because they seek to offer parents peace of mind but often generate more anxiety than calm.
“My experience is that when parents are anxious and experience separation anxiety when their children go to daycare, they become obsessed with the webcam and are constantly watching what the child is doing, and if they cry or fall - something that is normal for it to happen at those ages-, they become very distressed," he details.
He points out that there are parents who become very obsessed, especially during the first weeks of the school year, where they experience anxiety without this contributing anything to the child or his adaptation. "The peak of views through the camera occurs in September-October; then the visits decrease because the parents no longer feel as much need to supervise, although they connect from time to time and also other relatives, such as grandparents," corroborates Díaz, from Nemomarlin.
The director of El Xumet, for her part, assures that parents' use of the cameras is very unequal: "some enter every day and others perhaps do not do so throughout the course, and last year we had a mother who connected every day from the TV at home to watch the child while she did the housework.
Like Bilbao, M. Rosario González-Martín, philosopher of education, expert in ethics applied to education, member of the Observatory of Children's Play and professor at the UCM, believes that turning daycare centers into a Big Brother and trying to calm anguish or parental fears with constant surveillance and supervision is not a good way to lay the foundation for a child's education.
“Schooling in nursery school occurs at very early ages, at a time when the attachment to the primary figure is strongest, so when you leave it in that space you not only have to calm the child but also You, father or mother, have to calm down, because what we call the anxiety of separation occurs,” he explains.
And he points out that if this anxiety is calmed with continuous supervision and control instead of calming it through trust in educators, the child is being deprived of a key and fundamental experience, which is “the process of sharing parenting with other people who will be important in the bond with the child, which will allow them to interact with others and open them to other visions and educational styles.”
Because, González-Martín emphasizes, “it is important that the gaze on the child is not only that of his father or mother – who see him as unique and that is how they will treat him; the educator sees him as one more and provides that other complementary vision” and contributes to better socialization.
In the opinion of this specialist in emotional and ethical development and family therapy, parents should calm their separation anxiety first by choosing well the daycare in which they are going to leave their son or daughter.
“The criterion for choosing the school should not be whether it allows me control and surveillance, but rather an adequate educational project and, above all, the relationship they establish with me to see what the child and the family are like, if they work on that relationship of trust with the family and they have accessible and natural means of communication to know if they have eaten well, how they interact with other children, if they have pooped, if they are strange... because that is what a baby needs," he says.
She exemplifies that, in her case, what gave her confidence to choose a center for her month-old child who was breastfeeding was the open-door policy: "Knowing that I could enter the school and the classroom whenever I wanted gave me peace of mind, even though then I never went."
The second key to calming anxiety once the child is left at daycare, says González-Martín, is observation. “It is important to pay attention both when picking him up at school and when we take him to the park, at how the game continues, what his relationship is like with other children and also with other adults, if he becomes fearful or anxious in front of them or if a striking change occurs. ...there we can have signs that he has felt something that is not appropriate," he points out.
Álvaro Bilbao also emphasizes that the job of parents is to choose a nursery school with a team that they trust and, once they have it, not to constantly check what they do, "because there are parents who become very obsessed, especially during the first weeks into the course, and those who have a more anxious personality and tendency to overprotect become obsessed and distressed by any situation in which they do not have one hundred percent control," and they will have many of these situations throughout the course. the lives of their children.
González-Martín adds that, at the height of attachment, parents can choose the path of trust or surveillance. “Choosing the latter does not mean that they choose the path towards overprotection and an unhealthy relationship, but it does mean that they are going down a path that does not help to establish a path of communication and trust and it will be good to redirect it,” he concludes.
Bilbao points out that the function of fathers and mothers of children of months or a year is to protect them, and that instinct comes out and it is normal to want to have them under control. "It is not something pathological in itself nor something for which any father or mother should be stigmatized; what I do tell them when they have that urge to monitor them from the cameras is that this is a good warning that they have a tendency to anxiety and overprotection and they have to relax because throughout the child's life they will experience many situations in which they will not have control," he concludes.
