we had to sack our nanny!

[SindyW]

Hi everybody. This is my first post (sorry long). I am hoping to get some advice on hiring a new nanny as we sacked ours today. I was a SAHM for 12 years have 4 lovely daughters aged 14, 12, 10 and 8. The 10 year old is severely autistic. All are home educated. They are lovely, polite and well behaved girls (apart from the usual problems with the autistic child who is quite demanding). Our nanny had been with us for 18 months and I thought everthing was fine till last night. I work away from home most of the time, spend a quarter of my time abroad but my husband is off work on long term sick so is around most of the time. Until recently, nanny had sole care of children 8am - 5pm but the last few months my husband has been renovating a house so we can move and has been away as well for 3 days a week. The nanny had to work 4 days, 3 nights. She had her own room and bathroom. On her days off she stays with friends in London. Yesterday evening we rang the children and asked in passing what they had eaten. It turned out after much stalling that my youngest had cereal in the morning (made herself) and a frozen pizza in the evening, made by 12 year old. The nanny has been refusing to cook for them and only cooking for the disabled child. We came home last night and sacked the nanny this morning. I just cant believe that she didnt feed my children. I feel so angry and upset. I just couldnt even talk to her or look at her. We paid her until the end of the week and told her she had 2 weeks to remove her things. I just dont understand why the children didnt tell us. They are very upset at losing their nanny. How can you tell if your children are covering for a bad nanny?

OK, not clear on all the other stuff, but I'm going to have to disagree about an ex primary school teacher not being the right person to home educate.

Although why she's doing it for £250 p.w. is a puzzle...

if she's an ex primary teacher (how ex are we talking here??) is she qualified to teach a 14 and 12 yr old? genuinely curious as i would think not but are there different rules for home educating?

But parents with no teaching experience are allowed to home ed. Not a problem.

There's more than one issue here. From what I can make out everybody seems to have been happy with the situation. The children didn't want the nanny to leave. The nanny was willing to do what she was required for the pay offered. It suited the parents for what they wanted to do. Now whether there is more to it than just the fact that the mother had a seemingly knee-jerk reaction to the older children doing their own meals I don't know. It's not a situation that would suit me for my family but we are all different. I would want much more involvemnet with my children's lives. However, if the nanny thought it was too much for her then surely she should have said. Remember the nanny didn't put her notice in, she was told to go. She might have been quite happy with how things were.
The home-education thing seems to be a bit of a red herring.

Sindy - I don't know whether this thread is a wind up or not, and some of it doesn't quite add up - but I have to say, it you're for real, you've shot yourself in the foot sacking a nanny who would do all of this without complaining, and keep the children happy as well.

Some of you haven't read the thread properly. The nanny (ex teacher) was not employed to home educate the children. The father was supposed to be doing that but he was away for 3 whole days a week. The nanny was supposed to do everything else and act as a teaching assistant to the father if needed.

Sindy, what were you expecting to get out of posting your initial message?

"I am hoping to get some advice on hiring a new nanny as we sacked ours today."

Don't think anyone has really given you any advice on hiring a new nanny. There are some general posts about hiring nannies on this board, and some of us on here know a fair bit about employment matters lets call it, so if you needed help with drawing up a nanny contract including duties, paying nannies (including possibly classing the nanny as a carer for disabled child, and thus using DPs) then I am sure we could give that - though perhaps best to start a new thread for each specific query. Also for things such as DPs posting over at Special Needs can help, as mumsnetters who post there have a lot of experience with getting DPs sorted out and know what can and can't be claimed for.

When posting on mumsnet, try to stick with facts as much as possible leaving out non-relevant information. Always better to add information to a thread, than to try to explain a situation which isn't part of the real issue at hand.

"I just don't understand why the children didn't tell us. They are very upset at losing their nanny. How can you tell if your children are covering for a bad nanny?"

To answer that question... you can't tell if your children are covering for a bad nanny (as you put it). Children will tell you what they feel you want to hear. They may have a lot of attachment to their carer and although their carer may not be perfect, they feel the situation is acceptable to them and thus they keep quiet. Better the devil you know than having to get to know a new devil!

Should you have sacked the nanny - no. Should you have given her a written warning - yes. Should you have discussed the situation with her and the children fully - yes.
Did the nanny fail to feed the children - no, not from the information provided. Did the nanny fail to cook for 3 of the children, yes - but lacking information as to why... perhaps the children never eat what the nanny cooks!

Finding a nanny who will take on the job will I think be quite hard. Not many nannies I know will take on teenagers. Perhaps this is a good time to rethink childcare plans.

It would be impossible for 1 person to home educate 3 NT plus 1 severely autistic child at the same time? High functioning? yes in some cases. severely?, sorry no.

When ds1 was in mainstream (disasterous) he had full time 1:1, no way could the teacher have coped with him plus the NT children. Actually she couldn;t cope with him anyway-0 didn't have a clue- specialist training is very very important. Now he's in a special school with a ratio of 6 severely autistic children to at least 4 adults at all times. For some activities the ratio becomes 1:1.

At home here I can't occupy 1 severely austic child plus 1 or 2 siblings. DS1 needs fulls time 1:1.

I'm sympathetic to home education btw, and understand the home ed law etc, but really to home educate a severely autistic child you need a very high ratio. That may not be the case for high functioning children. Given that the autistic child in this thread needs 2 people to go out & about (as ds1 does) I'm guessing that compulsions & attention span, understanding of expectations are major problems. I really suspect that expecting 1 person to do the education/night duty/cooking etc is unrealistic. Even if it's temporary. School holidays are temporary. I have 5 people booked up to help me out, I have at least one person in every day, because I find one day with my own children impossible, because severely autistic ds1 needs so much supervision, and because we're stuck in. It's incredibly difficult. Would I do it for £250 a week? For one week only, no more because I would need to see the end in sight.

Direct payments are a very useful way to get extra help. And if someone has been assessed as being in need of a service the LA has to provide them. In this situation I'd go down the direct payments route.

What does NT stand for?

neurotypical ie 'normal', typically developing etc.

I dunno, my sister was nanny to four younger children, twin babies, one at nursery part-time with SN, and one primary school age. Single parent was an air hostess so sister often had to stay overnight for up to three days in a row. Child with SN did not have autism, though - guess that would make situation pretty difficult. And home edding was not an issue.

I do think you were expecting an enormous amount of your nanny and not paying her properly to reflect her onerous duties. At least my sister had a break from the older child while she was a school, and the second oldest while at nursery. And she didn't live in except when mother was away so had some real time off.

I do think you have broken employment laws, though, by going for instant dismissal rather than disciplinary procedures. Instant dismissal is only for gross misconduct so unless her contract specified failure to cook for the older children was gross misconduct, you are in trouble, should nanny realise it.

"By juuule on Sat 30-Jun-07 19:28:32
So has no teacher ever had a severely autistic child?"

yes but not without 1:1 support from a learning support assistant. In the school I work in, there were 2 lsa's to support the SEN children as well as a teacher and teaching assistant

I think is terrible you sacked her for not feeding the children in your opinion correctly, and agree with other posters that as they are being home educated then they should be able to cook a meal.
If both you and your DP work why aren't the children at school?
and surely your child with SN should have 1-2-1 care.

How many children were in the class? I admit that I don't know what would be involved in the care and education of a severely autistic child. I gather that 1:1 would be the ideal in a classroom. Surely it must make a difference, though, that the nanny is 1:4 and it is not a classroom situation.

Are you implying that school-educated children shouldn't be able to cook a meal? Why should home-educated children?

i'm not implying that at all - i was at school and could cook a full meal for my family at 10

So you think they should be able to cook a meal regardless of where they are educated. That's okay then Just wondered why you'd included the home-ed bit.

My understanding is that a severly autistic child requires 1 to 1 support, not 1 to 4 or any other number.

a big, fat

juuule....

29 children

1 with asd and has 1:1 support from his LSA
1 with EBD (Emotional Behaviour Disorder) and has 1:1 support from his LSA

this means that the teacher and TA can concentrate more on the other 27 children

a child with severe autism needs 1:1 support. The nanny was supposed to just assist but both parents have full time jobs so I'm not sure who is teaching the children.

My 8 year old daughter can cook simple meals so I'm not sure why the OP was upset at her older children having to cook?

OP also said the nanny was having a bath at 4pm....she needs to have a bath at some point in the day and maybe that is a "quiet" time for her to have a bath? She has 4 children, one with SEN, and is there without a break for 4 days and 3 nights. When should the poor nanny get a break or a bath?

This position sounds like it should be a governess position and therefor, the pay should reflect that.

Ds1's home teaching programme requires 1:1 and is very full on and very intense. Very hard work. We showed his school some video of it and they said they couldn't replicate it because they didn't have the staff ratios (and their ratio is 6 children to 4+ adults). (We knew they couldn't btw and would never ask them to). The sorts of things that are done without 1;1 (but with 1:2 max) at ds1's school would be things like snack time. But often one child does require 1:1 whilst the others sit and wait for their turn (and some can't do that- hence the4y take up a few staff emmebers who are dealing with getting them to wait). It would be a very slow pace for NT children. Other lessons I've observed without 1:1 basically consist of the children taking turns in being 'taught', the actual teaching bit would be 1:1.

The problem we have at home is that when ds1 doesn't have someone working with him he is completely unable to occupy himself, so he's climbing things that he shouldn't climb, asking to walk up and down the street, raiding the food cupboards. It's why he requires full on supervision at all times. And one reason why it's so exhausting even without other children. Add other children in and it becomes impossible.

Children who have some capacity to work alone, and have a decent attention span could work independently for a period of time, autistic or not, but neither of those things tends to go with severe autism. TEACCH is a teaching method that aims to get autistic children working independently, but ds1 doesn't manage much more than about 3 minutes in a very structured environment- and its taken him years to get to that.

ditto gess. Apart from the basic employment alw contraventions here, DS3's home ed is also 1-1 and the unit he may well be attending is 1 adult to 3 children (a school for non verbal children)

His home ed schooling until he has aplce around Easter will be tun by me and and also will require 1-1 and lots of prodfessional input from varios therapists.

Tahts note ven counting DS1 (also SN, HFA) and DS2 (NT who go to school.

We may get a Nanny in a few years time (probably the only childcare open to Sn kids) and we are wella ware that we need to pay above the odds and be very very generous with hours etc if they will cope. We are happy to do that fro the right person, and that would only be a part time after school posting.

And paid holidays aren't a bonus they are a legal right

Very illuminating. Gess and Peachy - hats off to you both.

Ah no credit to me, I don't really do much of the home programme myself (I can't because of having 2 year old ds3 at home still; he tries to join in 'me do work' and does it faster than 8 year old ds1), we pay psychology students to come in (paid for my social services). Hats off to his school though, I've been in his classroom quite a bit this term for a research project and they do a wonderful job.