Category Archives: Child Care

Holiday & Vacation Reminders

“Rest and be thankful.” – William Wordsworth

Holidays and vacations are a great opportunity to rest, recharge and explore the U.S.

Memorial Day Weekend is the unofficial start of summer travel season. Here are some reminders about program rules regarding holidays and vacations.

Holidays

  • Host families are not required to give au pairs any specific holidays.
  • Each host family will make different arrangements on holidays, some au pairs will be off and others will be required to work.
  • Au pairs should not make plans for holidays without checking with your host family first.

Vacations

  • Au pairs earns 2 weeks of paid vacation during the course of her year.
  • Vacation time should be mutually agreed upon.
  • All vacation should be preplanned (at least 4 weeks in advance.)
  • All au pair’s friends and/or family visits/vacations should be pre-approved prior to purchasing tickets.
  • If an au pair travels with her host family, it should be discussed in advance whether this is the au pair’s vacation or if she is working.
  • If an au pair travels with the host family to work, the host family is required to pay for her transportation, lodging and meals.

Important: If an au pair is traveling outside of the U.S., she must have her DS2019 signed (travel validation) PRIOR to her departure from the US. More information about this may be found here on the Au Pair in America website.

Photo: torbakhopper (Flickr)

Helping Young Children Learn Language

Being an au pair is an important role in a child’s life. When you are caring for a young child up to 45 hours per week, there are lots of opportunities to help them learn language. Many host parents are eager for their children to be exposed to foreign language. If this is true of your host parents, you can try the suggestions below, in both English and your native language.

Below are a few tips to start with, for more ideas, check out Ready at Five.

  • Read – Read to them daily, point out pictures and ask questions. Even if they can’t answer the questions, this is still modeling conversation.
  • Talk – Point out objects around them, names of their body parts, explain what you are doing and places you are going. Long before babies can speak, they benefit greatly from being spoken to.
  • Sing – You can sing childhood classics or make up your own silly songs. If you are looking for song ideas, HERE is a great website with lists of songs, lyrics and links to YouTube videos* of the songs.  Children’s music is also available at the public library and even on iTunes.
  • Words – As children move from toddlers to preschoolers begin to point out written language.
  • Writing – Toddlers and preschoolers can begin to learn pre-writing skills by drawing with crayons or doing finger paints.

*The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends no screen time for babies under 18 months of age. For children 18 months to 5 years they recommend no more than 1 hour of high quality content. You can play the songs on youtube for the audio and not necessarily show the screen to the child.

Photo: Quinn Dombrowski (Flickr)

Handling Expenses

Host parents often ask for suggestions on how best to handle common expenses that occur as au pairs are caring for the children.

Miscellaneous Expenses

There are different ways to handle the little day to day expenses that come up.  Things like when an au pair takes the kids out for ice cream or picks up a gallon of milk.  Some families keep a cookie jar fund, a little cash that they set aside weekly or monthly for these types of expenses. Others give their au pair a prepaid debit card for this purpose. Below are some suggestions for avoiding problems with expenses.

Host Families

  • It’s important to be clear about how long this money should last and what types of expenses are approved.
  • Let the au pair know whether or not you expect receipts.

Au Pairs

  • Only spend the money on approved expenses.
  • If it is something you are not sure about, ask first.
  • Put your receipts in the cookie jar in place of the money to avoid any confusion.

Gas and Fare Cards 

Host families are responsible for the au pair’s transportation costs: to and from classes, cluster meetings and when driving the kids.

It is a good idea to figure out how much gas an au pair will use for these trips and either put gas in the car or give a gas allowance.   If your au pair is riding to classes or cluster meetings with another au pair, you should offer to share the cost of gas.

Au pairs are responsible for their own transportation at all other times.  You should replace the amount of gas used for personal use.

Photo: Andrea Travillian

Back to School Safety

Labor Day.  The unofficial end of summer and it’s back to school for our kids.

Review how to cross roads safely, even with older children.

When the weather is poor, or the mornings dark, make sure kids have reflective strips on backpacks, shoes, or jackets.

Discuss a back up plan in case you are late, and your child does not see you at the expected time.

Watch this quick video on driving safely with the big yellow buses.

 

Snow Day

A cry of jubilation could be heard all over Fairfax County as schools were closed due to weather.

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Kids slept late and stayed in jammies all morning.  But then what?  I asked some of the Au Pairs in our cluster,

“How do you entertain the kids on Snow Days?”

One Au Pair said “Build indoor and outdoor forts!”

“Baking.” replied another.

“Build a snowman, play hide and seek, make towers and bunk them, toy car races, board games, dancing contest, rolling on the snow, making costumes with journal papel (or any recycling material), organize shelfs or drawers, go trough the toys to see what they don’t use anymore, jumping race, etc.”

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“Warm bubble bath with glow sticks or food coloring  good way to learn kids colors its fun and no mess it also calms kids down after playing in snow!”

“Hide things or toys around the house and find them.”

Thank you to our fabulous and energetic Au Pairs for some excellent ideas for kids of all ages.

Happy Snow Days!

photo credit: girl Big Ben in Japan Flickr

Snowman Dan’l Burton Flickr

Au Pairs Celebrate the Holidays at Wolftrap

In December, the Au Pairs attended a cluster meeting at the Filene Center at Wolftrap.  This is a fun event which includes many local choirs, the Marine Corps Band and a cast of holiday characters for the kids. We had bells for jingling, and candles for a rendition of Silent Night.

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click here for more information on the holiday sing-a-long

This event is highly recommended for families.  Dress warmly!