Tag: nannylife

What you aren’t expecting when living and working with children

Even if you’ve got experience with children, if you haven’t lived and worked with them full time, and you’re not a parent yourself, these may take you by surprise!

 

1. Bumps and bruises

 

It’s surprising how strong these little people are! Whether you’re playing a game, taking a trip to the park or changing a nappy, you’re susceptible to bashes, knocks, and bumps which means that you’re covered in bruises yourself (especially if you bruise easily). I’m always finding bruises and trying to remember where I got them – it could be from anything, the baby dropping a toy on your foot, or an accidental kick when pushing a child on the swings!

 

2. Sleep

 

We all know that not all children sleep through the night, especially when they’re young, but what surprised me was the amount of different things that can disturb the night. From bedwetting, to ‘I just can’t sleep’, night time feeds, illness and nightmares… And then they will be up early in the morning too!

 

3. All things slime

 

Who knew how much snot and dribble could come out of those little humans! If they’re a bit older, they’ll deal with a lot of this themselves, but for young children and babies, it’s a constant battle to wipe noses, change nappies, and clear up dribble!

 

4. Laundry

 

You might have heard about how much laundry a baby makes, but did you ever think that some of that would be yours? A jumper you may have once been able to wear a few times before a wash, now might not last a full day!

 

5. Creatures

 

If your charges are at school or nursery, it is likely that they will come into contact with all kinds of germs and parasites. Think headlice, worms and chicken pox. Sadly these things aren’t contained just to the child and will most likely be spread to you, which means nitcombing and medicine for you too! Yuk!

 

6. Getting attached

 

Even after all of that, you will grow to love the little monsters. They’ll make you smile, give you cuddles and do some very cute and funny things so if you take a holiday away, expect to miss them!

 

Thanos for sharing, Cate! If you have something you’d like to share just drop us a line on frances@nannyjob.co.uk

The importance of being professional

What makes a professional nanny? It’s a question that comes up time and time and time again and I’m yet to find a satisfactory answer. It’s one I’ve attempted to answer hundreds of times in the course of my job. When someone asks me what a nanny is, I can tell them. When someone asks me what a nanny does, easy peasy. Then they spring the million dollar question on me – what makes a professional nanny?

Nannies don’t have to be registered. If they were it would be easy. We could say that a professional nanny is one that’s registered. Job done. But the current OFSTED register has nothing to do with professionalism, and you don’t even have to be on it which means there are hundreds, if not thousands, of professional nannies out there who don’t need to go through the hassle because their employers can’t get childcare vouchers. Then, dare I say it, there are people on the register who don’t deserve to be called professional nannies at all. Anyone can spend a weekend taking a course, pay up for insurance, get a DBS check. Hey presto! You’re OFSTED registered, but you’re not professional. You may not even have a job.

But just having a nanny job, or even having been a nanny for a couple of years, isn’t enough to make a nanny professional either. Professional nannies take pride in their work. Professional nannies are the ones who are constantly observing and reacting to their charges’ needs. Professional nannies understand the importance of ongoing training and personal development. And there’s a whole unspoken code of behaviour that professional nannies adhere to as well. For example, no professional nanny works without a contract and no professional nanny leaves a job without giving the notice in the contract. No matter how much you hate the family, a professional nanny doesn’t up and leave. You can, professionally, negotiate a reduced notice period or offer to take any holiday due, but you don’t just not turn up for work. Of course you can rant and rave and threaten to walk out but when it comes down to it you wouldn’t. 

Walking out is just one sign of a lack of professionalism. A professional nanny wouldn’t go through their bosses’ wardrobe and wear their clothes. A professional nanny doesn’t socialise on work time without permission. A professional nanny doesn’t eat their employers out of house and home. It’s all about boundaries. A professional nanny knows where they are, and if s/he doesn’t then s/he is professional enough to ask the question.

So already a professional nanny is one who makes a career out of it, who keeps up with the latest guidance and research, who seeks to develop his or her skills, who has a legal employment relationship with the parents of his or her charges, who communicates in a clear, sensitive and timely way with their employers, who respects boundaries…. I could go on, but it would take me all day and it’s not really supposed to be the point of the blog post. No matter what you think being a professional is, being professional is important.

No nanny exists in isolation. Even when there are no other nannies in the area the actions of a nanny towards his or her change and his or employers represent all nannies everywhere. You may be the only nanny a person sees, and if nannies as a profession want to be taken seriously then all nannies need to act it. Next time you go to a nanny interview and the parents sit there and want to pay you a net salary without declaring tax and national insurance it’s your professional duty to explain why it’s wrong. When you need to discuss something that isn’t going well having a track record of acting professionally means that your employers or an agency will take you more seriously. And when you see unprofessional behaviour from another nanny you need to call them on it.

I know what you’re thinking. “Hang on a minute. I need to be professional but we don’t know what professional is….even someone from the association of professional nannies doesn’t know what it is”. Yes, to a point. But I’m thinking you know what professional means to you, and I’m thinking you have an idea of what is and isn’t acceptable behaviour for nannies. So even if my idea of professionalism and you idea of professionalism aren’t identical, I think we can agree on the broad picture, and I think it’s time to act.

Frances Norris is the Policy & Review Officer for the British Association for Professional Nannies. She is involved in representing nannies to the Government, most recently concerning the tax free childcare scheme and giving evidence to the Childcare Payments Bill committee. She is still working on an answer to get her million dollars.

Don’t judge a nanny by her weight

There’s a bit of a debate going on in a Facebook group at the moment about agencies asking for personal details like weight and height on application forms, and on our own Facebook page earlier in the week we posted a link to an article about a teaching assistant who was told to cover up her tattoos at school which got quite a reaction, so we’re wondering, why does appearance matter so much, and is it okay to ask these things?

Most parents will say they try to teach children not to judge people on their looks, and they’ll mean it. We all know that your height, which you don’t have any control over, is no indicator of anything other than the height of your parents! So we don’t go round judging people according to whether they’re tall or short. We also know that hair colour doesn’t affect how good someone is at their job, so we don’t tend to use that to make judgements. But people are often judged or stereotpyed for thir weight and expressions of their personality like hair dye, tattoos and piercings.

Apparently being over a certain number on the scales means you’re automatically unfit and unhealthy. You must have bad eating habits or be unable to run around after children. It’s understandable with all the concern around childhood obesity that parents want their nanny to be a good role model. The reality is that numbers don’t mean a lot, so that kind of information on an application form tells you nothing about someone’s lifestyle or their fitness levels. The only way to really find out is to interview them and ask alongside all the other questions, which is only fair since it gives them an equal chance.

Tattoos, hair dye and piercings are even more emotive. On the one hand we’re encouraging children to express themselves and ignore the boundaries society wants to impose, particularly regarding gender. On the other we’re telling nannies (and teachers, nursery workers and anyone else working with children) that they have to conform and hide their tattoos away and keep their hair a naturally occurring colour. There are some legitimate safety concerns about small hands and piercings, but just as sensible nannies avoid wearing large hoops or dangly earrings to work with children who are likely to grab them and pull, those with facial piercings will want to minimise any potential damage to themselves and wear small studs or bars to work.

So just like you shouldn’t judge a book by its cover, don’t judge a nanny by his or her appearance!

Dressing to impress

Sometimes office workers have it easy. Dressing for an interview is a matter of which suit to wear. Dressing for a nanny interview is a whole different ball game. What you wear says a lot about your personality, and personality is one of the thing you’re being assessed on when you to meet the parents of your (hopefully) future charges.

There are some simple rules:

– keep it modest: limit the amount of leg and cleavage on show and don’t wear a skin tight catsuit
– keep it practical: no heels you can’t run in
– keep it natural: go for fresh-faced and leave the false eyelashes at home

Colour psychology

When we first heard of this it seemed a bit ‘woo’. Does what colour you wear really affect how people see you? Psychology says yes. You can encourage certain feelings by wearing an associated colour. Blue encourages people to trust you, as does white, but orange, brown and red are not seen as trustworthy colours. Blue is also associate with high quality, as is black, and green encourages people to spend money.

To jeans or not to jeans?

Some people don’t like jeans at interview, even if you’re going to be wearing them every day to work. Others say that smart jeans (so no holes!) are fine. If you’re going for a high profile job, or an interview with a formal family, it might be best to avoid them and opt for black trousers instead.

I have an interview straight from work. Help!

Sometimes future employers just have to take you as you come. It’s worth telling them that you’ll be coming directly from your day job so they won’t be too shocked if you’re a little dishevelled or have a stain on your knee. Pack a spare top in case your current charges decide to sabotage you by flinging tomato sauce down your front and remember that at least your interviewers will be seeing how you’ll be turning up to work with them.

Above all be yourself, and good luck!

Sports day

Thank you, Louise for sending this to us. We’re delighted to share it.

It was my charge’s schools Sports Day today. I think times have changed and not necessarily for the better, and maybe you’ll agree, maybe you won’t but I’d like to share why I’m disappointed.

When I was younger our Sports Day was about friendly competition, about doing our best in races to go really fast and beat our friends. There were three races – the running race, the sack race and the egg and spoon race – for each and every year, with a long race and a short race for the older years, and no-one ever won all of them although we all tried. The best anyone managed was two and that was something to be marvelled at. Whoever was the winner won fair and square, no cheating allowed, and there were points for second and third place. We all tried our best to get points for our house. When you were in year 5 and 6 you got to go to the big athletics ground where we had Sports Day and try long jump, high jump, hurdles and very blunt javelin every fortnight in the summer term and there was a competition that everyone watched on the day itself.

Today there wasn’t a house system so there was no incentive to cheer on other classes. In fact I don’t think they were watching most of the time because each class was busy with their own event. It’s a shame that Sports Day is no longer a time for the whole school community to come together. Everyone got a prize for something, so the value of winning was lost, and the losers didn’t learn to lose gracefully or vow to do better next year because they got a medal for trying. I have nothing against trying but I worry about what children are learning when they get a medal for it!

There were so many events, some traditional and some not, and no consistency across the years, and that made me really think. We liked our simple races. The running races rewarded people who could run, but they often tried to go too fast in the egg and spoon. The sack race was down to luck on the day and not getting tangled in your sack and falling flat on your face. We were all desperate for it to be our turn to be in year 5 to do the Big Events and when we there we felt so special that it didn’t matter who won.

One thing I’m not sorry that they don’t have any more is the Parents Race. I think my charge would have made me run in it, and I like to think I would have lost with grace and shown her how to do that, but it was just too hot.