Investing in Your Child Minder: Psychological Considerations and Practical Skills

By Sibusiso P.S. Mhlongo

Childminding is one responsibility which is generally taken lightly. Child minders are often employed in a causal manner and there is often no synchronisation between the parenting style constantly used by the child minder and that adopted by the childs biological parent/s. Conscious investment is often not made on the emotional wellbeing of child minders. This book arms the reader with the knowledge and skills of recruiting, selecting, orientating, training, compensating, motivating and appraising the performance of child minders. The reader is further exposed to parenting needs for children of different developmental stages. The importance of investing on the emotional wellbeing of the child minder cannot be overstated. The reader is empowered with knowledge and skills of effectively making this investment. This book is a must-read for all parents who want to protect their children from the lasting negative psychological effects which may unwittingly or deliberately be caused by child minders who are given too much responsibility with little boundaries and guidance.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris UK
• Release date: Mar 18, 2013
• ISBN: 9781483609829

Sibusiso P.S. Mhlongo

Sibusiso P. S. Mhlongo is a South Africa–based counselling psychologist who has worked mainly in private practice for eight years. He has sat on both sides of the job interview table. These experiences have prompted him to devote his time in researching about the psychological aspects of job interviews. Basing his writing mainly on social psychology theory, he argues that job interviews are mainly about creating and managing impressions to interviewers. Throughout the book, the reader is assisted to appreciate and take advantage of psychological dynamics which happen before, during, and after job interviews. Winning in Job Interviews: A Psychological Perspective addresses the needs of both new job entrants and senior employees who need assistance in securing promotion posts.

Book preview

Investing in your Child Minder: Psychological

Considerations and Practical Skills

1.jpg

Sibusiso P.S. Mhlongo

(Counselling Psychologist)

Copyright © 2013 by Sibusiso P.S. Mhlongo.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

Rev. date: 04/24/2013

To order additional copies of this book, contact:

Xlibris Corporation

0-800-644-6988

www.xlibrispublishing.co.uk

[e-mail]

306201

Contents

Foreword

Acknowledgements

Introduction

Section A: Child Minder as an Employee

Chapter 1: Recruitment

Chapter 2: RSelection

Chapter 3: ROrientation

Chapter 4: RTraining and development

Chapter 5: RCompensation

Chapter 6: RMotivation

Chapter 7: RPerformance appraisal

Chapter 8: REmployment contract considerations

Section B: Child Minder as a Co-Parent

Chapter 9: RGeneral parenting skills

Chapter 10: RChildren and boundary setting

Chapter 11: RDisciplining your child

Chapter 12: RThe child’s self-esteem

Chapter 13: RInfancy stage (0-2 years)

Chapter 14: RHandling a toddler

Chapter 15: RGeneral motor and related child development

Chapter 16: REarly childhood (2-6 years)

Chapter 17: RMiddle childhood (6-12 years)

Chapter 18: RAdolescence

Chapter 19: RPsychological considerations when relating to children

Chapter 20: REmotional and Physical Wellness of Children

Chapter 21: RDeveloping Emotional Intelligence on Children

Chapter 22: Child Maltreatment

Section C: Child Minder as a Person

Chapter 23: Child minder’s overall wellness

Bibliography

Foreword

Children’s behavior is a manifestation of their genetic predisposition (personality traits) and their socialization (upbringing). There is limited scope to change their behavior through biological means but there is more room to alter it and address problems thereof through socialization. Raising children, especially child minding, is therefore essential in shaping the adults they eventually become.

This book takes the parent(s) on a rewarding journey of shaping and molding their child’s emotional and mental destiny. It empowers and equips modern day parents to recruit, train, and take care of their child minders whom they entrust with the physical and emotional well-being of their children.

Parents are seldom prepared for parenthood; let alone dealing with child minders. Written with sensitivity and deep insight, this book explores the mistakes parents make in the process of recruiting child minders and offers practical solutions thereof.

Last but not least, the book makes a clarion call for parents to treat child minding with the seriousness it deserves. Upon finishing the book, parents will be empowered to make the right choices, get the best out of their child minders and have rewarding years of parenthood.

Thokozile Mnguni (PhD)

Educational Psychologist

Acknowledgements

To God who have inspired and sustained the writing of this book be all the glory

My family has been a reliable and a consistent support base. In trying times, their comfort made me to stick it out. My younger brother Siyabonga, who is a graphic designer, pulled out all the stops to design the cover page of this book. I am deeply indebted to him, my sister Thembi, mom and dad for their support.

I fumble for suitable words to express fitting gratitude to people who have made various contributions in the writing of this book. Sister Khanyisile Simelane, who is an occupational nurse at Vryheid District Hospital, deserves singling out for her sterling contribution which focused on advising me on the ground which has to be covered on the medical assessment of new employees.

My last debt of gratitude goes to Dr Mnguni. Writing is a solitary activity which sometimes induces feelings of loneliness and doubts. As I read Dr. Mnguni’ s Foreword, feelings of solitude, loneliness and doubts were supplanted by feelings of encouragement

I thank you for choosing this book as your next read

Introduction

For families to stay afloat financially nowadays, most adults in a given household have to be engaged in some income generating activity. This would leave them with little time to invest in quality child-rearing. Dual-earner families make it almost impossible for parents to play a care-giving role like their forebears in the pre-industrial era.

The escalating cost of living means less time spent with children, and more time and energy expended in efforts aimed at raising money to maintain the minimum living standard. This reality leaves parents with no other option but to enlist assistance of child minders in looking after their children in exchange for a monthly salary.

Given the fact that maternity leave would often take four months, some parents find child minders while their children are still at their infancy stage. It is often when children turn seven or eight months old that they would start to fear strangers. Mothers should ideally enlist services of a child minder before this time, so that by the time they reach seven months the child minder is recognised as a co-parent and not a stranger. Admittedly, in exceptional cases, there are children whose temperament allows them not to fear strangers even after eight months after birth. This psychological reality speaks to the time when child minders become part of one’s baby’s life.

Child minders not only engage in co-parenting with biological parents, but also become important socialisation agents. They would bring into the parenting pot their parenting philosophies. Sadly, some of these philosophies may conflict with the ones upheld by biological parents and some may be destructive and biological parents may only discover this when the damage has already been done.

This book seeks to assist child minders and biological parents find an amicable compromise between parenting philosophies each has adopted and utilized over the years. The reader will be apprised of psychological reasoning that underpins parenting behaviour. When, for instance, a parent shouts at the child, the shouting would just be a parenting behaviour which would be underpinned by a specific parenting philosophy.

The underlying parenting philosophy could be that the child would only listen to you when you shout at him/her. To simply stop the behaviour is not sustainable when the underlying philosophy has not been interrogated and accordingly adjusted. The discussion of the child’s development from a psychological perspective will assist both child minders and their employers in detecting deviations, warranting intervention by relevant professionals.

The book further seeks to make child minders sensitive to the effects of parenting behaviors they carry out in each childhood developmental stage. It is appreciated that child minders could be relatives, friends or volunteers but this book is focusing on child minders, who are doing child minding as a job.

The fact that child minders are employed makes one better placed to select a child minder that would suit one’s needs. There should hence be a clear policy on recruitment, selection, orientation, training, remuneration, appraising and motivating a child minder. The discussion of the above mentioned aspects informs the basis of the bulk of the discussion that follows, and hence featured in the first section of this book.

It is worthwhile to note that the wellness of the child minder has a direct bearing on her productivity. In recognition of this reality, this book features a discussion on how to enhance your child minder’s wellness.

Section A:

Child Minder as an Employee

Case

After a long search, Ms Matshaba finally got a child minder, Ms Ndlovu, who was recommended by a friend. She was said to be good with babies. Upon arrival, she was only told that her main task would be to look after the baby and that she would be paid R1650 a month.

Two months later, Ms Matshaba started to notice that Ms Ndlovu had difficulty changing disposable nappies and preparing the bottle for the baby. There were days when she would not return as expected to work after weekends and would not even call to notify Ms Matshaba. Even though Ms Matshaba got fed up with these behaviours, she found it difficult to discipline or release Ms Ndlovu.

What do you think of Ms Ndlovu’s case?

If you were in Ms Matshaba’s position what would you have done differently?

There is a general tendency of treating child minders more as family than employees. This tendency usually results in one being lax on observing boundaries which would be observed in any formal employment arrangement.

While there are occasions when it would benefit the employer to have this arrangement, like when the child minder is asked to work extended hours, employers should be careful that this ‘family’ relationship has boundaries.

In any given family you are accepted as you are (unconditional acceptance). This is contrary to expectations in a formal employment arrangement which would be that one needs to meet specified work expectations to earn an income. If you don’t set these boundaries you should not then later complain of a child minder who tells you what to cook and how to treat your partner, who watches TV until midnight and who fights with your other children for the control of the TV remote control.

This section aims to introduce you to knowledge and skills that would enhance your effectiveness in your role as an employer of a child minder and to avoid common child minders’ employers’ pitfalls.

Chapter 1

Recruitment

How are you currently recruiting your child minders?

What is the common practice with regard to recruitment of child minders

Child minders are often recruited through friends, colleagues, family and relatives. There would often be a causal chat about the qualities one would look for in the child minder. The common request from people who are looking for the services of a child minder is that one wants a child minder who is good with children. It is also quite common that the recruitment would be hastily carried out a few days before one needs the services of a child minder. This then means little time spared in thinking through one’s recruitment process.

* * * * * * * * * *

Recruitment is the process of searching for a person to fill a specific post. The main recruitment objective is to come up with a pool of persons who are suitable for the position. The focus of recruitment is to get as many potential employees as possible, who are both qualified and available to fill the available post.

In South Africa today, child minders would normally not have undergone any formal training that would make them hold qualifications on child minding. This makes the recruitment focus to almost exclusively be on the experience one holds in working as a child minder. It is also because this is a low-skill job that one would have a large pool of people available for any available child minder’s post. The implication is that recruitment efforts would not be as stringent as it would be the case in high-skill jobs.

1.1 Recruitment methods

There are different methods that you may use to recruit potential child minders. Whatever method one opts for should suit his/her target group. For instance, email-based system of recruitment may not work for child minders who would largely be drawn from a fairly unsophisticated pool.

One other method that will not be suitable for child minders would be the use of recruitment agents. The costs involved and the low skills nature of child minding work make this an expensive exercise.

You may however use newspaper and voicemail-based system. You may also use job posting, where you advertise in the bulletin boards of different shops. In these adverts you should have, at the very minimum, job specification (this is mainly about the nature and length of relevant experience, knowledge, skills and behaviours one must hold to be further discussed shortly), and you must specify the period for which the post will remain open. You may also take direct applications. This would be drawn from those people who would be going around looking for employment and have left their curriculum vitae (CV) with you or with anybody else you know.

Employee referral is one common method used in the recruitment of child minders. It is also being referred to as networking strategy. Using this strategy one would ask a friend, relative, current or past post incumbent to help one find a candidate whom she knows can make a good child minder.

One downside is that one may select a person whom she knows to be desperately looking for a job, who may however be possessing less qualities that would make her effective in the given job. You may also ask a person who works for a trusted friend or family member, who has had a good working track record as a child minder. These employees would hence be putting their reputation on the line.

Another downside is that if you are looking to employ a second person and you ask your one current