f6twister

Until now, my wife and I have relied strictly on our mom's and my sister to watch our kids, a 2 y/o boy and 11 week old girl. While having free babysitting is great, their schedules are hard to work with so getting them to watch the kids is often difficult. We are tempted to try finding a teenager to watch them but we find ourselves lacking the trust we need to leave them with someone besides our family. We have asked around and no one seems to know any reliable teenagers we could talk to.

If you had a teenager watch your kids, how did you go about hiring them? Did you do any time of police record check? Did you ask for references? Anything else?

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maleficent

I'm not a parent - but i was a teenager who watched other people's kids... Starting at about age 11 or 12 - -i started as a mother's helper type... where mom or dad would be around and I'd come over during the day to give mom a break and play with the kids.. and still get paid.. sooner or later - the kids gave me gold stars and started leaving the kids with me and would go out in the evening.. (probably at age 12 or 13 i was doing this) I babysat for everything from newborns to pretty darned near close to my age... (I think it helped that I was a tall kid)

Other parents would often call me based on referrals from other parents I babysat for...

you might want ot check out your local high school if they have a child care program (mine did - not for teen moms but it was an easy elective) or ask other parents in the neighborhood... Asking for references isn't unreasonable... but before I entrusted my nonexistent kids to anyone -I'd watch them interact withthe kids - while i was still there... especially the baby...

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snowy

As a former teen babysitter, I got jobs mostly by word of mouth. It also helped that a good friend's mom was an elementary school teacher and would refer people to me. It wasn't uncommon for them to ask me to come over and interact with the kids for a while before entrusting them to my care. Of course, I also had stellar references.

Some questions to ask: Have they taken any babysitting classes? (Don't necessarily hold it against them if they haven't, I never did.) Do they know First Aid? Child/infant CPR? How long have they been caring for children? What ages do they have experience working with? Treat this as a job interview. Give them some hypothetical situations related to childcare (things that might come up over the course of the evening), and see what their responses are.

Do you attend church? If so, asking around your church would be a great place to start. Mal's suggestion of the local high school is also a good one. Furthermore, if you have any coworkers that have teenage kids, that's also a good place to start--even if they themselves don't have children interested in babysitting, their kids might have friends interested in childcare.

Oh, and also make it VERY CLEAR what your expectations are. I once babysat for a woman who was terribly upset that I didn't clean her house. Um...I'm there to take care of your child, not do dishes. I cleaned up after myself to the point of putting the dirty dishes in the sink, but I'm generally unwilling to do more than keep things tidy as it takes away from time spent with the child. Wouldn't you rather have a babysitter who watches your child closely versus one who's overly concerned about keeping your house neat as a pin?

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maleficent

I had taken a bunch of these courses at the YMCA thru the Girl Scouts - my 12 year old niece just took the same course.. so you might want to either checkwith the Y, or your local girl scout chapter for referalls...

those will be younger girls though...

also - in this day and age of the pedophile around corner... be prepared to offer to talk to the sitter's parents as well - would you want your 13 year old at the home of an adult you aren't familiar with?

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Daoust

We've used friends and acquaintances of my mother- and sister-in-law when the aforementioned were not available to babysit. We also knew those acquaintances from church. We would never use anyone for a babysitter that we had never met or had no prior knowledge of.

I have a question that might be a bit of a threadjack, but I'll ask nonetheless:

What do you pay your babysitters? How much per hour? What's the average?

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snowy

In my experience, that totally depends on 1) the babysitter's level of experience, 2) their negotiating skills, and 3) how old they are.

As I got older I earned more money because 1) I had the experience and 2) I could have easily made minimum wage at another job. It also depended on the client: some were more capable of paying than others, and so I always took that into consideration. Some times, if I was going to be doing a considerable amount of childcare for them over a period of time, we would agree on a single payment to be made versus an hourly wage.

When I first started babysitting my guideline was $3.50/hr +$1 extra per child, per hour. So say there's only 1 child to be cared for, then I only earned $3.50/hr. 2, $4.50, and so on. This, of course, was when I had no experience and wasn't able to work "a real job". As I got older I could easily make $60 babysitting 3 boys for an afternoon (3 brothers, ages 9, 7, 5...little devils but I loved 'em).

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martinguerre

i worked in college...and i got all of my jobs by word of mouth, or from alumni.

frankly, i think it's for my protection too. I want to know something about these folks...namely that they aren't off the deep end, and that i'm not walking in to a situation.

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Bacchanal

The only person I've had watch my son that isn't in the family was a 14 year old girl, but I also happened to be dating her mother, so I'm not sure how much that counts.

She seemed to do a pretty good job with the boy, and he really had lots of fun with her, though he probably didn't do too much that could be considered "productive" or "educational". He was only 3 at the time so I wasn't too worried about it and I do plenty of that with him anyway.

As far as pay, I gave her $15/day, and that was only while I was working, so she never had to watch him more than 9 hours at a time. She offered the price, and though it seemed like I was getting off easier than I should've, her mother insisted that that amount was more than enough.

I realize now that this probably isn't helping much for the original poster seeing as you're married...

f6twister

Thanks for the help. The pay was going to be my next question. For those who posted rates, how current is that info? I'm trying to find current rates to use as a basis for hiring/negotiating.

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maleficent

you might want to check with other parents around to see what they pay their sitters... it's really going to vary by experience... location... competition... etc... number of kids and amount of maintenance the kid requires...

For instance, if both yours are in diapers, that requires a little more attention, that would translate into more money...

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Toaster126

Why aren't you people paying at least minimum wage for your babysitters?

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snowy

Because some babysitters are under the age at which they can legally work--in my state, it's 14 (though until I was fifteen they discouraged youngsters from working by requiring a work permit). So since they can't legally get a job that requires a minimum wage, they get paid less than that.

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raeanna74

I do home childcare and the going childcare rate in our area is only $2.50 to $3.00 per hour. If you had to pay minimum wage for someone to watch one kid and you worked a minimum wage job what would be the point of working. I tend to pay my babysitters about $2.00 to $2.50 per hour for babysitting since they are younger and aren't qualified to work professionally in childcare usually.

We have had many different people babysit our daughter. Most of them are from our neighborhood or church. I've had kids babysit who's parents I got to know. When we moved it was a while before we were familiar with our neighbors and we're fortunate to have 2 reliable teenagers as neighbors. It helps a LOT if you know the parents of the teenager as you'll get a better idea of what kind of values they have been raised with and how disciplined they are.

Maleficent's idea of checking with the local childcare training program is excellent. I have one neighbor girl who is barely 11 yrs old and is begging to watch our daughter. She likes playing over here. I have told her I couldn't leave her to babysit for very long until she has taken the class. I have let her stay here with my daughter (who is 5yrs old - probably wouldn't do this if she was an infant) while I ran to the post office but her mother is right next door and home at those times. The rule in that case is that she has to call her mom to check in every little bit. Her mom will sometimes come over and check up on the two as well so in a sense it's her MOM who's overseeing. It's a good way for her to start with just a little responsibility. I think she'll be more ready then after she takes her babysitting class.

Also you could check with the local Family Resource Center. The one in our area keeps a list of local daycare providers. It's possible they could at least know of where to go to find qualified babysitters.

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Toaster126

That's not a good reason to pay them less than minimum wage.

There wouldn't be one.

At least that's a reason. I personally would pay more.

__________________
"The question isn't who is going to let me, it's who is going to stop me." (Ayn Rand)
"The truth is that our finest moments are most likely to occur when we are feeling deeply uncomfortable, unhappy, or unfulfilled. For it is only in such moments, propelled by our discomfort, that we are likely to step out of our ruts and start searching for different ways or truer answers." (M. Scott Peck)

raeanna74

I have been known to pay much more but it depends on the job done. If I come home, the place is a wreck and the kid didn't get to bed until 11:00 or is still up at 11:00, THEN they get the bare minimum. I have even paid $20 for 3 hours though. That was when she fixed our daughter supper and did the dishes from said supper as well as picked up all toys played with while we were gone. There wasn't a thing out of place and the kid was in bed on time. A sitter will get paid what they're truely worth.

I only charge $2.75/hr for childcare and I'm CPR certified and have a bachelors in elementary education. That's the going rate around here. I am aware that the going rate in other parts of the country is usually a good bit more. I found that I even charge a little more than some people in my area are willing to pay.

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My Karma just ran over your Dogma.

Toaster126

Wow. Ok, we are just in completely different frames of refrence, then. Things are quite different here. My bad. For some reason I assumed this would be a generalized thing.

__________________
"The question isn't who is going to let me, it's who is going to stop me." (Ayn Rand)
"The truth is that our finest moments are most likely to occur when we are feeling deeply uncomfortable, unhappy, or unfulfilled. For it is only in such moments, propelled by our discomfort, that we are likely to step out of our ruts and start searching for different ways or truer answers." (M. Scott Peck)

sexymama

I look for teenagers to babysit who have younger syblings of their own. I pay my sitter (daycare providor) $3.50 an hour or $30 a day. For evening care, I plan to use "big sister." I will pay her if/when she has to turn down another job to babysit for us.

Note: for those of you with babysitting age children. I got called back to babysit constantly. (In those days I made 50 cents and hour and felt terribly guilty when I started charging 75 cents -- lol.) I thought it was because I was good with the kids. As an adult, I now know it is because I always cleaned the house when the kids went to bed. Tell your babysitting children to clean if they want consistent work.

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CaliLivChick

It's been about 13 years since I babysat regularly, but back then, I was charging $5/hr. I'd probably say $7.50 to $10/hr these days. Of course, I grew up in the SF Bay Area. =)

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Anexkahn

i dont understand why you would charge (or pay) minimum wage for a sitter... you're purchasing a service, not hiring an employee.

abaya

I wonder if hiring teens to be babysitters is an American thing? It's unheard of in my mother's Thai family... you just don't ask non-family members to watch your kids. I never had a babysitter, as a result, and I also never had the chance to babysit other kids (I lived in a relatively rural area with no young kids around, and I'm an only child). Sometimes I wish I'd had the experience, since I am still rather intimidated by small children... but I guess that comes with my own children, eventually. It's true, I've never changed a diaper!

Also, how many boys get hired to be babysitters? It seems unfairly limited to girls, because of the expectation that they will be more "domestic" and responsible. I sure know I wasn't capable of cleaning house and wiping butts when I was in my early teens.

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f6twister

I rarely hear of a male babysitter but I guess I was considered one for a while. I watched two half brothers who couldn't be left alone together. Even though they were 12 & 13, the ad was placed for a babysitter. With the way they acted it wasn't too far off. Anyway, as I am now the parent, I've always wondered what my response would be to a male babysitter and I still don't have an answer. I'm not sure why but I always feel a sense of mistrust when I think about a male babysitter, but not a female. I guess there is still a gender bias in that job.

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ClostGoth

Everyone has had awesome responses to this, and I don't have really much to add. I just wanted to say that I trust my teenaged MALE babysitter more than I trust my own family with my kids. It didn't start out that way - he was referred by a friend with 6 kids. I had to meet the kid, see him interact with my children, and then have a couple of "trial runs" where I spent a movie or two just totally unable to concentrate or have a good time. Once I saw that my kids were comfortable with him, and ask for him if they know we're going out, then I knew he was taking good care of my kids and I would recommend him to anyone else needing a sitter. He's about to turn 17 and (being homeschooled and finished with his high school curriculum) he's about to head off to college. We're going to miss our sitter! Sometimes our kids are even disappointed to find out that we're not going out on a given weekend. "Mom, can't you go see a movie or something? We haven't seen Andrew in WEEKS!"

I'd like to add that minimum wage (at least) is usual for the sitters we've looked into. Andrew only charges us $2 per kid per hour since we have such a houseful. It can add up quick, but he's worth it. He cleans my living room if he's here after the kids are in bed (he's great with bed time battles) and even does cool things like help me carry in groceries if I'm struggling with them while he's running his paper route... Good teens are out there. I've met some pretty irresponsible silly ones I wouldn't want near my kids too, though. I think it would have to depend on the kid and how your kids react to them...

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