Honest insights into career as a childmindrr

[Blondie87]

Hi there,

I'm currently employed as a teacher but on maternity leave. I have a toddler and baby. I'm thinking of re-training as a childminder for various reasons but one big appeal is working from home. What is the reality of life as a childminder? How do you balance it with your own family? Best bits and worst bits? Thanks very much.

Watching

Are you in the UK OP? It might be worth noting that if you are, you will only have space for one other child during the day time as you are only allowed 3 children under school age at a time. Depending on where you are in the country, that would bring your between £30-£45 a day. Once you've added in the cost of food, play groups, resources and things it's even less.
The alternative is that you have lots of older children before/after school and during the school holidays... but how would you feel about lots of very excitable older children crashing around your home, and more than likely taking a lot of the attention away from your own 2?
Just a thought

That's a very good point. Thank you!

The financial change would be massive I imagine. There was a poll on a Facebook childcare group I go on and the majority of childminders don't make minimum wage, from the top of my head it was something like 250+ miners don't, while 4 did. It is ridiculously low paid once all the expenses have been taken off. You might be able to balance that out because you won't be paying childcare costs yourself, but that incentive has now finished for me as my youngest is well into her primary school years and my older two wouldn't need after school childcare if I went out to work.

There are lots of pros to being a minder and working from home, but sometimes those pros can become cons too.
I sometimes read on here that a pro is never missing school assembly/sports day/parents lunches. That has not been my experience at all, it is really not practical to take three small children/toddlers/babies to a school assembly, pretty much impossible to keep them all quiet for long enough.

My children have always had play mates in the holidays and I probably do more with them in the holidays than if I did other jobs, but I think that does wear a bit thin after a while, when they are having to share you with half a dozen other children and they can't bring their favourite lego downstairs in case the baby eats it, that kind of thing.
I would recommend childminding as a career, but your home will always be full of toys, even when your own children no longer need a high chair/buggy/car seat, you have to keep all the baby stuff in case you get a baby to look after. That is probably the bit I struggle with the most, the amount of stuff we have because of my job.