Just been Lectured to by one of my mindees parents! Need to rant

[saltire]

Sorry, this is a bit of rant but i need to get it out of my system. I have just had a lecture from one of my mindees parents about me using "loud and intimidating" voice tones whne talking to his dd!!!!!!

Apparently one of his wifes friends overheard me shouting at the mindee last week, and told the parents. Then later the same day, the mindees Gran had heard me shouting at her. Apparently they don't raise their voice to her because it s
"threatening" "Unco-opertive" "aggressive" etc etc.
Well i did shout at the child, twice, for the following reason

She is a child who goes around in a dream everything takes for ever with her, the 6 minute walk to school takes 20 minutes on the days i have her. Well, on the way to school, which is when the granny heard, we had crossed the road, and X had stopped, in the middle of the road, and was singing and dancing going lalalalalala. I got over the other side, and shouted "X, get off the road", no response, shes still going lalalalala.I had to adandon my 2 ds, double buggy and toddler on roadside and go back into middle of raod to get her.

On the way home from school, again with 2 ds, double buggy and toddler, the rain came on suddenly. We were all standing round in the rain like idiots whilst she's dancing round the trees in the playground, an still going lalalalala. I shouted at her to come on, she did eventually, but i had to aske her three times and then go and grab her hand. I told her that we had all got wet standing around waiting for her.

At this rate i'm the one whos going lala. The dad wasn't pepared to listen to what i had to say and told me that they left thier daughter with me and expected me to treat her the same as i would treat my own. Well if my two were standing in the middle of the road i would shout at them too.
I am really angry, but now i have written it all down i can calm down a bit now, and take deep breaths. Sorry for ranting, i just get so fed up with childminding sometimes

Oh dear me The poor child will be ruined for life because someone shouted at her

I come from an Italian family where shouting was (and often still is) par for the course . Sometimes it was in anger sometimes not. The thing was we could always tell the difference. It is just a matter of style.

I think it is important to distinguish between really losing your temper with a child and shout AT them in an agressive way - by that I mean saying things about them in a personal way and shouting in an exasperated way e.g. "Oh for godness sake get a move on will you" sort of thing. They are very different things.

Shouting per se is not necessarily a bad thing. If someone can't hear you you may need to shout. It is more about what you say while you are shouting and the exact tone.

'Get a move on/out of the road etc.' in a loud voice is very different than 'get the f**k out of the road' said in a whisper.' I know which one I'd prefer.

I am sure that Saltire was not using the shouting as a way of being nasty to the child but as a way of getting through to her.

I do think though that a talk with the parents about your rules are in order and if they won't back you re holding the pushchair/hand etc. you maybe should think about giving them notice.
Minding children without good communication with the parents strikes me as almost impossible.

I didn't say she would be ruined for life. I said it was a poor standard of care. And it isn't the number of children that is the problem, it is this particular lady's inability to control them all at the same time that led to their safely being compromised and shouting being necessary.

MoM - I can't believe you just said that

Maybe I've misread this but I thought that the mindee did hold hands with saltire until the parents decided she was a big girl and didn't need to? If I've read this correctly and am right in thinking the parents have told the mindee it's ok not to hold hands then I agree that they have underminded their childminder! Therefore, it's not a question of saltire being able to cope or not, it's that she has a way of doing things safely and the parents have made it impossible for her with their child!

BTW, I'm a childminder too for those who didn't know. I actually no longer take the older children, just 3 under 5's as I was worried about me coping with them all. Having said that, I have childminder friends who handle their group very calmly and safely which I'm sure saltire does , just wasn't for me.

Well done for giving notice, I think you did the right thing in the circumstances!

Woah MoM - you are now going a bit far.

Hi MoM

I can see you point actually but I also believe that this was probably down to a lack of rapport/communication between parents and childminder.

If a child is told to hold on while crossing the road but says her parents told her she doesn't have to - and the parents agree with this, the childminder is left in a very difficult situation. As I can now see from the thread saltire has given notice and I think that was probably the right decision.

I still believe shouting isn't all bad - but maybe that's because it makes me feel so much better when I do - different strokes

OK, I'll bow out on this one then. But I understood this to be an open forum - and that really is my view. I think she was harassed and unable to cope with that child as well as her own. And I don't believe in shouting at young children. I find it hard to believe I'm the only person who sees it that way.

Saltire - you did the right thing!

Saltire
I'm afraid I have to say that I expect much MORE tolerance etc from someone who is looking after my child. I mean more than I even have myself.
I know this isn't going to go down well, but I would be really upset if my CM was so obviously irritated by the child. Don't shoot me down for saying this, but we're not talking about getting annoyed with one's own child, which happens in an environment where, hopefully, you love them more than anything in the world. You're the trained person who's paid to be in control all the time.
I've a feeling I might regret saying this - yikes. Sorry, I'm not meaning to get at you, just wanted to present another view.

It's pretty much what I was trying to say. As a professional standard of care, it's not good enough.

MoM - it is an open forum but you are IMO verging into the area where what you are posting could be construed as personal attacks on another poster. Saying you disagree with shouting when caring for children is very different from comments on the standard of care provided by a professional childminder.

Just to clarify, my comments are about the road thing, not saltire's feelings for the child. I'm purely saying that I think in this situation, shouting to get mindee out of the road was the right thing to do. IMO, no time for 'oh be a good mindee and come out of the road please, you'll get a nice treat'!!

I'm not keen on shouting either, but I think "get out of the road" to a child who is dawdling in the middle of one is incredibly sensible. It was, to my mind, an emergency situation.
In every other situation than in your own home, the care your child get may not be exactly as you would do it yourself. This is a fact of life & is completely unavoidable, unless you home educate and are with your child 24/7.
The most important thing is for parents & carers to work together to try to ensure that the care is as consistent as possible. These parents were not working with Saltire, they were undermining her in front of their child. This relationship was doomed because of that.

Not read thread

Sounds like things are out of control though - what about a buggy board for roads etc?

Personally if someone shouted at my child I would move them to another care environment though - I've only shouted when it's been me that's out of control.

But as I understood it Saltire has shared her experience in order for other posters to give their thoughts on it. Other people have commented on her handling of the situation too. The strongest thing I have said is that, in my opinion, she couldn't control all of those children at the same time, which is why one of them wandered out into the road and she had to shout. It isn't a personal attack. It's just my view of the situation she's presented.

But surely the problem is that Saltaire WAS providing a professional standard of care up until the point when the parents decided to undermind that level of care and thus the situation was created in which the child was put in danger.

meanoldmummy.
I cannot believe that you say i offer a poor standard of care , you don't know me, so you don't know what I offer. You also said in another post that it
"isn't practical to take 6 children to school and expect to be able to cope properly. If i were paying a childminder i wouldn't want those to be her circumstances"
Lets hope you never need to use a childminder then, because you may find yourself unable to find one who would only have your 2 children, and no others.

AnnieSG & MoM, do you really think that teachers, nursery workers, nannies and childminders are somehow endowed with a different kind of tolerance to the rest of us - a superior tolerance?
I don't think that any of these groups of people are more tolerant. They are governed by some rules of conduct or practice and they have choosen to work with children but at the end of the day it is very much a personal thing. Some childcarers will have buckets of enthusiam for outdoor activities, some for painting & creative stuff, some will be better with testing behaviour etc etc. All you can do, is try and get a good match for your child, but I think it is a little unrealistic to hope that any of these people are superior to the average parent.

AHHHHHHHHHH - I AM OUT OF CONTROL NOW. There that feels better - Sorry just being childish - couldn't resist.

Will now slink off and do a bit of work before going home to pick up ds from childminder. You can tell I'm having a slow day at work.

I do agree that the parents were undermining her. But I still think she handled the road episode badly, as a professional carer. I really will leave this alone now - this is pointless. I can't believe that expressing an opinion that differs from the common consensus could be described as a "personal attack", though. It so clearly was nothing of the sort.

4 what it's worth ...

my son can be incredibly annoying, disobedient, uncooperative etc. etc.

I would be completely gobsmacked if my childminder didn't have to raise her voice to him now and again (just as she does to her own dds).

BTW, ds can also be charming, clever, funny and a joy to be with, and his childminder loves him.

It also seems very odd to me that people dont 'shout' at their children at all in any circumstances because to me that seems impossible. I dont shout in a losing it, out of control kinda way but I can make myself heard and noticed when and where necessary and it has been necessary in the past. I do it in the same way that eg actor project their voices so as to be heard by a whole audience and the way they teach people to do it on Little Angels etc.

Agree Tarantula, there are a whole host of circumstances where shouting is actually necessary.
Broken glass on the kitchen floor
Dog poo on the pavement
You are breastfeeding or doing something that means you cannot leap accross the room and your child is about to hit another child
They run too far ahead of you
The list is huge & it is a shout to protect them or those close to them from danger - not because you are some kind of out of control carer/parent.

ahhhh as easy and trantula have said in their posts i think there is a difference between raising your voice and shouting. And one persons raised voice may be another persons shout all a matter of prospective i think.
Also thank you bugsy.....having been a nanny,nursery officer,mum and soon to be childminder with NNEB qualifications and 13 years experience in childcare i DO NOT consider myself to have more tolerance or be superior in anyway to other parents. We (childcare workers) are not some kind of super human race....well not all of us

Saltire - I'm also registered CM in Scotland and was also told 3 under school-age children and only one of which was under one. So I know you don't have too many kids, the regulations are differnet in England and Wales.

I think i would consider giving notice to this childs parents though, they obvioulsy don't respect you as her carer and this child is hearing too many things at home that she shouldn't be IMO. I can't see it getting any easier for you.
I would also shout/call/remove a child from the middle of the road if it was necessary. Its very difficult to judge until you are in that position and i would back my child's carer 100% if this had occured with my own child. Sometimes kids need a little shock when it comes to issues of safety esp the road.