Would you leave a 15 year old in charge of younger siblings?

[Bobnobob]

Age 8 and 4. All girls. 15 year old is reasonably sensible although she does clash with 8 year old sometimes but I think it might be different if she was officially in charge.

would you do it? I haven’t but just wanted other opinions.

For how long? Does the 15 year old want to do it?

For how long? But yes a 15 yo old can take care of siblings.

I was babysitting at that age so if she wanted to, yes, would probably treat her or give some cash. I wouldn't expect it though.

Yes. I was often in charge of 3 younger siblings from 14, and cooking dinner for us.
If she wants to there’s no reason why she couldn’t.

Yes

How long for? Couple of hours, an evening, yes. Loads of 15 year olds do babysitting. Overnight or longer, no.

Yes. Both my dds have been babysitting other peoples children for money since they were 14.

Yes but I used to pay dd for babysitting and be clear to all that dd1 was babysitting and not just a sibling. Worked for us but paying changed the dynamic. Some siblings it wouldn’t work for but with that age gap I’d expect it to be fine.

if you trust her and are t going for too long yes, for a late evening possibly not, more because night time could be an issue if the child was upset

Oh yes, good point, the op hasn’t actually said whether the plan is to go abroad for a month or a night out!

That would be ok with me if 15 year old was happy to but I wouldn’t leave them overnight

Yes if she’s happy.
At 15 I was babysitting for loads of families, one I started looking after their baby from 4 weeks old!

My concern would be how a 15 year old would deal with an emergency such as a child choking. My 6 year old daughter got boiled sweet stuck in her throat whilst we were on holiday. She could not make any sound to cry for help. Luckily I saw her in distress and whacked her on the back. Boiled sweets are now banned in our house. So ... if I were to leave a 15 year old in charge of a 4 year old, I would need to be satisfied that she could deal with various emergency situations, or perhaps more importantly, identify dangers in advance to prevent accidents from happening. This is of greater importance if the babysitting becomes a regular occurrence, because the probability of an incident then increases. Having said that, I have found most 15 year old girls to be incredibly mature and capable.

I think that the NSPCC considers 16 to be the youngest sensible age for a babysitter. It is also worth noting that parents will be held responsible if they leave their child in the care of an incapable person.

Given the choking incident our daughter suffered, we attend a First Aid for Children course, so that we would be prepared if any such thing happened again. I would strongly recommend this for anyone with young children. In our case, we only had seconds to react.

Depends how long, and what the children are like. DD is 14 and I'm fine leaving her in charge of her little brother (7), she babysat him until late at night once last year when she was 13 and did a great job of it and is always asking when she can babysit again (because I pay her and she always need money!)

Yes, as long as she doesn’t have plans with friends. I’d give her some money for it.