I don't typically involve the parents in behavioral issues unless it has reached the point that I have run out of ideas. I've only done this for 6 years and only keep 4 at a time, so I'm sure the numbers are in my favor. I've had 1 like you mentioned. By that point, my dialogue was "I need follow through at home. He's had 7 timeouts today and screamed bloody murder through them all." He was a handful from the time I started keeping him at 11 months though... The parents would give him consequences or rewards at home based on his behavior with me. There was a lot more to it with him though- both parents split and remarried within a year, Mom wasn't consistent with discipline and comments she made sometimes told me that she didn't always follow through at home. I eventually just told them he "needed more than my program offered" and he moved on to Preschool. Otherwise, I just say "good day, good appetite, good nap, no poops" or something similar.

If there's a negative, I'd say balance it with a positive : "he hit his friends a lot today, so several timeouts... but he's the only one who ate all of his broccoli today, so there's that!"

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