should I care - shocking spelling, grammar in nanny CVs

Luckylou, my gods, you'd expect the grammar thing to pick that up surely?!

I hate the now/know thing rolls eyes

When I made a living as a freelance proofreader, I used a paragraph in my advertising material that went something like this:

'Do yew knead a proofreader two cheque you?re work! Know aye don?t think sew. If there are any mistakes, ewe can use spell cheque?'

Apart from 'proofreader' (spell check prefers proof-reader), no spelling mistakes there! Although the grammar check used to suggest 'Does ewe' or 'do ewes' instead of 'do ewe'.

My CV is 5 pages long and everyone I've ever shown it to has loved it . It's not your run of the mill CV, more pictures and arty stuff. I've even been offered positions on the strength of my CV lone. It took hours to do my CV so no I do not think YABU to expect a more professional approach from your potential nanny.

*informal email etc !

Great minds think alike ! lol
Twas me that started the thread on NJ

Glad I am not the only one to @ many CV's / job ads online

shocking
on a forum or an informal etc then fine,often typed quickly etc
but a CV should be well laid out and correctly spelled etc!

also agree with the spoken language too,hate it when people do not pronounce the H or T in a word / at beginning of word etc argh!

But to be fair, the grammar check would highlight the other bits, like there/their/they're... at least mine does I'm sure of it? I tend not to need that function though

To be fair Chandelina, if the person who made those errors had run a spell check, only ?prepair? would have been highlighted.

As for periods/full stops and quotation marks/inverted commas - if the full stop is part of the quotation itself, it goes inside the quotation marks; if it governs the sentence as a whole rather than the material being quoted, it goes outside the quotation marks. This appears to be as true of American English as of British English.

Sorry, should have elaborated

I described my current job and my last paid job, which was PGL. That got it down to two pages easily. I only done the original 6 pages so that I could fill everything out (using that CV builder lol), and then I polished it all down and got rid of irrelevant job information for the childcare positions (saved it though so that if I went for a shop position at the weekends I could delete the childcare bits obvs I cheat!)

I asked what they wanted me to put in and they said bullets of my duties in each position. Why would my charity shop and volunteer in a pool tuck shop job be of any relevance to a childcare position rolls eyes I emailed back asking why they would need details on my two completely irrelevant positions apart from the basic "work in tuck shop serving customers sweets and drinks" and "work in the shop out back organising donated goods" with dates but they haven't gotten back to me. This was well over a week ago now which makes me think that yet another website has dropped me! And this one was an agency!

Getting fed up with this couple job bollocks! I give up and will go back to PGL instead

Where I come from it is "run on". (American English)

'I believe you have posted a run on sentence.'

That should be 'run-on'.

if you want to write duties, maybe just say you did nursery duties/anything to do with children

My CV is 2 pages.

Page 1:
Name/contact details/date of birth

"Competence/skills statement" kind of thing (who I am, what I'm good at, what I want)

Education

Additional training/quals

Page 2:
Employment history since I left school. Each job is just dates/job title/brief description (sole charge, live in position caring for 1 year old twins/volunteer at after-school club)

References on request

PixiNanny - you shouldn't need to write more than a line or two about each job. I just put the basic details, and then go into more detail and highlight any relevant experience in a covering letter.

Your

You're CV should never be more than 2 pages. I've just written mine and I've managed just about to fit it on to 2 pages. I haven't included all of my jobs though because many aren't relevant to the posts I'm applying for. There are also no gaps as I often have 2 or 3 part time jobs at a time.

6pages - thats a lot

my cv is on 2 pages (thats 18years worth)with at bottom of 2nd page

references upon request

under each job, my info is basic

its something like this

feb 2000 - oct 2005

I was in a sole charge position looking after a baby of 5weeks and older brother of 14mths. I left as both children were at full time school and the family didnt need a full time nanny anymore

Maybe you need to write a bit less about each position. Or play with the format to get it on 1-2 pages. Or maybe describe two position in one and least each job more like you would multiple projects under one position.

6 pages is way too much. Eve a seasoned professional with years and years of experience doesn't need to fill 6 pages.

Thanks for the link, thats the CV help I've read. It's not hugely great but thats where I got my basic format from.

Thing is though, it tells you to write about the positions you've held for the past two years, but because of my voluntary positions, I have 6/7 to write about! It's ridiculous, I had 6 pages when I'd finished and that was bullets! I went through and deleted most of it but when I sent it to an agency they said that they needed the descriptions rolls eyes

My spelling and grammer can be really bad (English Lit degree student ).

However, my CV/job apps are always checked, double checked and then checked by someone else.

I would bin any not up to scratch. It's quite normal for most employers I believe.

" I know we all make mistakes, but if you are going to post on a thread like this demanding particularly high standards of English from potential nannies, at least try to post using correct puntuation and grammar. "

I believe you have posted a run on sentence.

SOLOisMeredithGrey - unfort Mn doesnt have spellcheck

Incidentally, my dyslexic brother has managed to put together a presentable CV.

This is a show stopper for me. And that goes for nannies as well as job applicants at my real job. If you can't be bothered to write a proper CV, I can't be bothered to talk to you.

And grammar is important. A nanny of a 1 year old will have a lot of influence over his/her speech development. And i most certainly about my children learning to speak properly. That is part of the job. And if a nanny can't/won't speak properly how she possibly teach the children and lead by example. She can't, obviously.