Babysitters And Child Safety
What is a 'babysitter'?
Well, a babysitter is usually the least qualified of the child care takers. They are somebody who often times is a family friend. They're the one's who are actually paid the lowest. They have the lowest qualifications to watch kids and a babysitter's job is nothing more than a house sitter. They're not necessarily someone who will do anything with regards to your child's education, their health, or their welfare. Oftentimes, parents are hiring older children to watch their children. In a lot of states that's illegal. It's called child endangerment. These are usually kids. They are people who are going to get minimum wage or below minimum wage just to hang out with your kids.
Are there any federal or state regulations for babysitters?
There are government requirements for hiring a babysitter, but only with regard to child endangerment. You can't leave a newborn with a 5 year-old, and you can't leave a 12 year-old with any other kids. No matter where you are in the United States, it's child endangerment. There are slightly different age requirements - it's usually around 14 or older. A lot of parents are breaking the law and they don't know it, because they believe the local law enforcement that someone who is 12 years old, for example, is not qualified to handle emergency situations, to be a parent, or to be observant enough or experienced enough to stop a potential injury from happening before it happens. The only requirement that is the law about child endangerment is the average age of a babysitter, depending on what state you live in.
Should I do a background check on a babysitter?
You don't necessarily have to do a background check on every babysitter as it's difficult to do, and sometimes it takes a long time to get the information back. But the background checks aren't a guarantee anyway. You can have somebody who has been abusing children for ages and has never getting caught with no previous criminal record. So background checks are important but you don't really need to do one on every single babysitter. It's more important to use your own intuition and get to know them, to know their background, to watch the way they interact with your kids, to ask the right interview questions and to also make sure they understand your house rules and to make sure that they're followed.
What safety rules should I teach my child before leaving him with a babysitter?
Well, there are a variety of safety rules that you need to teach your children in general, depending on what age they are. You need to remember before that kids are invincible, and they don't like safety, they don't think the house is going to catch on fire, and they don't think they're going to get into a bicycle accident. So, you're talking to an audience that already doesn't think that they're going to ever get hurt. So you need to teach them some basic things. You need to make sure that they know how to contact you if they're of speaking age. You need to make sure that they know when to contact you, for instance, not every five minutes because the nanny doesn't want them to watch a TV show. They need to know what the difference is between a potentially dangerous situation and something that's not dangerous. So anything to do with home safety; fire prevention. Anything to do with medical safety; if the nanny were perhaps unconscious, it happens, or the babysitter. Sometimes adults lives are saved by children who know how to dial 911. You hear that in the news all the time. So I would make sure they know how to dial 911, and I would make sure that they know how to call other neighbors. I would put them through a little bit of basic home training about any type of medical emergency. And we have age appropriate information you can always get on our website about what to teach your kids. So if you go to csn.org you can download all the information that you would want to teach your kid before they're with a babysitter.
What house rules should I set for a babysitter?
The house rules for your babysitter can vary from family to family. Typical ones are: don't use the telephone; it's only there for me to call you, or for you to call me. Other rules are no visitors whatsoever, no boyfriends, no girlfriends. Also, I would make sure that they don't smoke when they're over there, because they're always going to be away from the child, usually, when that happens, and that instance puts a child at risk, anyway, because they're not being watched at that time. I would also make sure that they understand when bedtimes are, whatever process that you have before bedtime, that that's followed, that they know exactly what you do first, second, and third. I would certainly do it with them, if you can, before you leave your child with the babysitter. I'd go through the whole process with them. Some parents do things to get their kids settled down before they go to bed, so first they might take a bath and then they might read to them, and then they might get into bed. Whatever that thing is that they do, that's a consistent thing every night, you want to make sure that they follow your rules and do exactly those same things.
What are signs my babysitter has abused my child?
The signs that your babysitter has abused your child are going to come directly from your child. You're going to notice a behavioral difference. If it's a physical abuse situation where your babysitter says "Oh, your child fell down the stairs and that's why they have a black eye", you certainly are going to want to investigate that. Whenever you do find that there is something odd, such as the behavior in your child has changed and they're afraid to be around that babysitter or they don't want to talk about it, you should investigate it further. Babysitters can often, if they do something wrong, convince kids not to tell. It happens a lot. Kids are convinced to keep secrets from their parents for reasons that they think are going to be worse than telling the truth. What I would do is immediately stop contact between the babysitter and the child. You would have to think about whether you want to file a child abuse investigation case and call the local police department. What you want to do immediately is stop using that babysitter.
