Parents are faced with a great deal of anxiety and responsibility at the start of a new school year. If you are making use of an au pair to care for your child this year, there are a few things that you can do to ensure that the year is easily navigated by your au pair, your child and of course yourself.
Having an au pair doesn’t exempt you from any of the responsibility and stress. It just means that you have someone picking up the slack and helping with the day to day tasks and communications on your behalf. Below are a few tips to help:
- Make sure that your child’s school is aware that you have an au pair who is actively involved in your child’s life. Setting up a time to introduce your au pair to the school and teachers is a good starting point.
- Ensure that you obtain a full and detailed daily schedule of your child’s classes and extra mural activities from the school. Both you and your au pair should have a copy of this schedule for easy reference.
- Chat to your au pair about being prompt and responsible. You want your au pair to be on time with collecting your child from school, transporting them to after school activities and ensuring that they are safe and sound at all times.
- Have a set schedule for home work and studies. Your au pair will undoubtedly be involved in your child’s homework and studying tasks.
- Make sure that you are on the same page when it comes downtime such as television watching, computer games, socialising and so on, after school hours. The au pair must be comfortable with enforcing both study and relaxation hours.
- Getting enough sleep the day before school will help your child to feel energised and ready for the school day. Your au pair should ensure that bedtime is enforced nightly, but particularly so on the last night of the holidays and first day of school. Getting back into a routine after late nights can be a testing time.
- If your au pair will be involved in meal times with your child, make sure that you have prepared a list or menu of nutritious meals that are to be created for your child. This also refers to the items that are to be included in your child’s lunch box. What your child eats for breakfast, lunch and dinner will have direct bearing on their healthy lifestyle and development and how they approach their studies too.
You and your au pair can work together to ensure that 2016 is a year of great success for your child. Want more tips and advice on how to better navigate the new school year? Contact us at Au Pair Extraordinaire today!