I saw your nanny, who appeared to be a youngish African woman, with another nanny of the same description at the Chicago Ashland McDonald's on February 11th about 4:40 with a very well dressed little boy in a jogging stroller, an older girl in pink, and the second nanny with a much younger boy in regular stroller.Your little boy (wearing a navy cap and jacket) was wailing, thrashing, and clearly very unhappy. Your nanny did absolutely nothing for 15 minutes, neither consoling him nor even acknowleding him. They left at 5 p.m. heading down Paulina.
26 comments:
Guess what little kids throw tantrums for no reason all the time. If you ever had or worked with kids then you should know to let them relax/ignore the behavior.
What did you want her to do? Beat him?
I think it's a very good post, but for a few details. How old were the children? Any more description you can give? I think it would be hard for a parent to know his/her child from this post.
We have OP describing a "thrashing, wailing" child as unhappy. Although we don't know the reason why, you would think most would at least try to console the child. If you have a child that isn't calming down even a bit after 15 minutes, clearly something is wrong! Maybe he didn't feel good, had a tummy ache.. who knows.
Personally, I don't believe in ignoring a child. I will pick them up/talk to them and try to console them.
These sightings are not posted for you to ridicule them. I think there could be more details included in this post, but unless you are the parent of this child, you have no right to decry the treatment of this child as "just fine".
You are part of the problem.
What happened? Did you get fired for mistreating the child in your care? Are you perpetually clueless as to what good care is? Do you not understand how to comfort, respond to or even acknowledge a child?
Pull the quarter pounder out of your ass and go take a childcare class. Then, get back to me.
For all we know this nanny knows this kid like the back of her hand and pulls this kind of stuff all the time.
I have ignored many a tantrum in my career as a nanny and as a mom as well.
"What happened? Did you get fired for mistreating the child in your care? Are you perpetually clueless as to what good care is? Do you not understand how to comfort, respond to or even acknowledge a child?"
I doubt this is the case but I often wonder how many sightings people see of parents or child care providers with children being ignored as part of a program. Confused? I work with Autistic children (ages 2-5) in various areas on the spectrum and part of ABA is to take children out into a social setting, especially if it causes certain behaviors and acclimate them to it. Part of behavioral therapy in regard to this is ignoring a behavior (as long as the child is safe and not causing harm to themself or others)
I know that there are probably more bad parents and care providers than there are chances of seeing this, but it's still a good point.
And this applies to non-PDD children as well when they are older. If their needs have been met and they are just experiencing new behaviors, as in finding the metaphorical lines to be drawn, ignoring it can eliminate it (hopefully.)
And on that note, I will say again that I doubt this was the case but who knows.
My charge throws tantrums, and yes the can last more than 15 mind ( he's a determined little guy!) and I ignore him, I find we less and shorter tantrums because he isn't getting the attention he is seeking from doing so.
....oh. I fail to see the problem here.
umm its called being a kid..get a clue..my daughter tantrums all the time its called being a four year old..I cant even believe that this was even posted its so annoying
I thought there weren't going to be comments allowed from the peanut gallery on bad nanny sighting posts anymore?
If you think the situation as described is normal and OK then you shouldn't be doing childcare. Really not much more to say.
PeopleStillShockMe,
Actually, as a MOM I would prefer that my nanny ignore a tantrum, too. This strategy does make them few and far between.
As many others have said, there's not enough detail to make this incident seem like anymore than that. If something did happen that required attention (the child was ill, not throwing a tantrum but had another issue, etc.), OP, please fill in the blanks.
HOWEVER, I WOULD fire my nanny for feeding my child McDonald's. THAT is a threat to the child's health.
Ok you must not have kids or be around kids because its apart of a child's development to have a tantrums..and how is it the NANNY'S fault that the child was having a tantrum. If a child is throwing a tantrum you are suppose to ignore it until they stop. If you sit there and try to make the child feel better while they are they are tantruming it makes the situation worse. Like I said my daughter has tantrums I leave the room let her scream it out and when she is done I sit down and talk to her. When we are in public I remove her from the situation we go to the car let her scream it out and we resume our activity. What she did isnt wrong. What was she suppose to scream at the kid..then we would be complaining that shes a "horrible person and she shouldnt be working with kids" and how are people crazy for agreeing. The kid was in a stroller wasnt in danger. A kid having a tantrum is a childs way of expressing how they feel at that moment. If you are mad someone lets you rant, or say what you have to say why would you stop a child who has no other way of expressing themselves from doing that. Like I said get a clue...
LOL! wow, some people sure have their priorities out of whack! You'd fire your nanny over a big mac, but not for ignoring your little boy for 15 minutes?
OP, I think it would matter a whole lot if you could give us this little boy's age. If he's having a tantrum at 2-3, I can understand maybe ignoring it for a few minutes, but any younger? Absolutely not!
This thread is a good example of the pros and cons of allowing comment on sightings.
I learned something from Chrissyma's post, I wasn't aware, when I've seen people out and about that,
"part of ABA is to take children out into a social setting, especially if it causes certain behaviors and acclimate them to it. Part of behavioral therapy in regard to this is ignoring a behavior (as long as the child is safe and not causing harm to themself or others) "
On the other hand, people are attacking the poster. Yes, this child may be having a time out for bad behavior, and if so, most would agree that the nanny should not give attention until he calms down, Or, she may be ignoring a distressed child. It is really up to the parents ultimately to decide if this is the case, or not. A heads up may cause them to have someone checkup on the nanny in the playground.
Puh-leeze said:...
"HOWEVER, I WOULD fire my nanny for feeding my child McDonald's. THAT is a threat to the child's health."
Amen to that!
I have never taken any of my charges over the years to any fast food place!
Some of the kids have gone to a chinese buffet with me and they ate Brown Rice, French Fries and California Rolls with me.
jojo bear,
Until you can learn to speak without resorting to personal attacks, a clear violation of ISYN Comment Policy, please don't comment on ISYN.
It is worth noting, another could say much about one's fitness for childcare when they resort to such attacks.
Food for thought, of course. All the best.
Puh leez, haha... I LOVE IT! I'm a NANNY and i wouldn't feed one of my charges McDonalds. Gourmet food for us!
As for the posting: OP, how do you know this was a nanny? Maybe you mentioned a difference (you probably mentioned it) in race and I didn't catch it. I ask this for a couple of reasons:
1. This area of Chicago is very eclectic. (I work right around the corner). There are lots of kids, mom, nannies. I've mistaken several moms to be nannies!
2. I'm white, my husband is black, our children are dark skinned. What I'm getting at is you can't just go off racial differences.
So the child was screaming and crying ... and the "caregiver" was unresponsive. Like others on here I fail to see the harm in the situation, other than annoying you during your ... food.
a reader
You seem to get offended quite easily. You complain about trivial things and bark that posters are breaking the ISYN's 10 commandments, and you ask people that ruffle your feathers to stop posting.
PLEASE, don't do that! If someone bothers you, pass them over. We need everyone to post! We want to read differing opinions, especially controversial ones. Otherwise, this blog would be pretty freaking boring!
Honest Nanny - I find you somewhat annoying and I will tell you why. We are so over the is it a nanny or not discussion. This individual submitted a posting after watching the situation. She submitted a short summary of what she saw. Perhaps she didn't capture the magnitude of what troubled her so far, but unless you are this child's parents, please don't dismiss a sighting. This person felt badly for the child involved and this person would not want her children treated like this. Maybe it would be aokay with you. Who knows? I've worked for sadistic and abusive parents, I know some of you enjoy watching your children squirm and burst in to tears. I don't and OP doesn't and just maybe the parents of this child wouldn't.
If I was the mother of this child I would feel that a VERY important piece of information is missing from this siting. What did the nanny do during the 15 minute tantrum? To me (and I believe in ignoring tantrums, for the most part) there would be a huge difference between what I see as "active ignoring" (which would take the form of disengagement from the child's behavior, but still being there as an active participant with an eye on the kid so that he doesn't hurt himself/others) as opposed to texting on your cell phone, talking to a friend, reading a magazine, etc.
So, OP, while the nanny was ignoring the child, what was she doing?
What is so wrong about ignoring a tantrum? As long as the kid is safe, let him scream!
I do not believe in mollycoddling children who thrash, scream, wail, kick and generally misbehave just to get their way.
If the parents are aware that their kids are eating McDonalds, then this is a non-event, and I'm sure it will be in the parents eyes as well.
YOUR SUPERVISOR:
wow!
i didn't dismiss this sighting. i merely pointed out to the OP that i failed to see what troubled her, as many other people posted. (why did you sing me out?) as others have said, more details would be helpful in this case, if i was the parent of this child i probably wouldn't do anything from the information given. but if there was more detail to it then it would be helpful to know.
the part where i brought up is it a nanny or mom was more for discussion sake. i'm rather new to this blog so if that was done and over with last year i had no clue!
calm down and stop attacking people.
If I were that child's parent, I would be grateful for OP's info. I do not agree that kids throw tantrums for no reason. They may seem illogical, and may well be unavoidable, but there is usually a trigger. And the nanny or whoever she is could be totally blameless (although I would tend to trust OPs' gut feelings in general, there is so much you can pick up in a scene that you can't necessarily describe), but again, if I was the parent, I would want to know.
I hate this post. How dare anyone assume that the nanny is bad or wrong for what probably was a very appropriate response to a temper tantrum!
It's too frustrating for someone who actuaally is taking child development classes to even go over all the countless reasonings. It should be obvious.
For those of you who want to console a screaming, angry manipulating child, please raise your children far away from me.
The bottom line is, this post is absolute crap and no nanny should ever have to be reported for ignoring a temper tantrum.
just curious, does anyone on here watch Supernanny? Her episode on Friday dealing with the Sachs family was focused on little boys who throw repeated temper tantrums. If you didn't watch the show let me tell you, she advices not to give them what they want or bargain with them. You are to firmly state, NO YOU MAY NOT HAVE THAT (or whatever the case may be) and then go on with your activity. You do not feed into the tantrum.
Just thought that was relevant to this posting.
If you are interested in watching the episode it is posted on www.abc.com.
I think that most of us know what a regular tempter tantrum is and understand that you might effect a better result by ignoring said tantrum. I have done this MANY times, and sometimes in public. I don't think anyone would ever report me to ISYN because I am not some angry freaking bitch and I think that is what the OP saw- something that gave her cause to be concerned. Maybe it was anger, maybe it was apathy.
Let's give some credit to the OP, okay?
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