Children’s tooth brushing programme is a success, nurseries claim
A tooth brushing programme, which was undertaken in nurseries across the country, has been a success, participants claim.
The Smiles4Children scheme, which was trialled by 68 nurseries and 20 childminders around the country, was designed to identify the best ways to encourage young children to brush their teeth. The nurseries involved in the programme were run by 4Children, Bright Horizons and Toad Hall Nursery Group, and the scheme was set up by Public Health England in association with 4Children, which is now part of Action for Children.
Participating nurseries carried out trials to determine how easy it would be to incorporate supervised brushing, when it was best to do this during the day, and how they could make children more willing to clean their teeth.
Research carried out during and after the pilot scheme revealed that children were now less reluctant to brush their teeth at home. Staff members also suggested that it was easy to add supervised brushing into the nursery day. They also found that talking about brushing, singing songs, and making teeth cleaning more fun were beneficial. Some nursery nurses also commented that parents seemed more eager to learn more about dental health, and many said that they were going to take their children to the dentist more frequently.
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