your child at home

Preparing Your Child to Stay Home Alone - Top Tips

Once you've checked with your local laws to make sure you're not in any kind of violation, you can decide whether or not your child is ready for this big step. It's not always an easy decision. 

If you've decided that it works for your family to let your child stay at home alone, it is important to prepare everyone in the family - but especially your child. Here are some top tips for preparing your child to stay home alone.

1. Start Small and Short

Begin with very short times at home alone. Run across the street and chat with a neighbor, or take a short walk but don't go far. These first times alone can be as short as 10 minutes or as long as 30; it depends on your ultimate time goal and your child's temperament. Then you can work up to longer times and going farther away, such as running an errand across town or something similar.

2. Emergency Contacts

Sit down with your child and go over a list of emergency contacts. Post this list next to the telephone, or on the refrigerator. This list should include the following numbers:

* Your cell phone number

* Other family member's cell phone number

* 112 (young kids may need to see this written down to help keep them calm)

* Poison control

* Nearest relatives' phone numbers

* Your own full name, address, phone number, and car license plate number (your child may need to give this information an emergency situation)

For younger children, pictures can help with quick identification of numbers (a fire truck by 911, for example, or your picture by your cell number). 

3. Responsibilities

An idea for keeping kids out of trouble is to have a list of chores and/or responsibilities your child has to complete, and then a list of privileges. If your child does the chores first, he can do the privileges. Make it clear that, if you come home and he's engaged in a privilege (like video games) and his chores aren't done, then he'll lose that (or some other) privilege. 

4. Practice

For younger kids, why not practice a bit? Have your child call your cell phone while you go outside, for example, and then ask him to pick up when you call. If possible, you can arrange with your local emergency officials for a tour of their facilities (like the fire department and local ambulance service), and a discussion of how the 911 system works and what kids can expect if they call 911. 

It wouldn't hurt to let these emergency workers know your name and address, and the approximate times your child will be home alone. 

Preparing your kids can help ease the transition into staying home alone, and everyone will likely be calmer and safer in the end. 

Daycare - your child

How to Prepare Your Child (and Yourself!) for Daycare

Are you dreading the day you take your child to daycare for the first time? Are you more excited instead? For many parents, this is one of the biggest decisions they'll make regarding their child. It helps for everyone to be prepared - including you!

Here are seven tips on how to prepare your child and yourself for daycare.

1. Get Ready...

Preparing yourself is an important first step. If you're confident and cheerful about your choice to send your child to daycare, it will go a long way toward encouraging your child to be more confident, too. If you're doubtful, it may make your child feel insecure. 

2. Choose the Right Daycare

It's not too hard to be confident in your decision if you've chosen the right daycare for your child. Do your research and look for checklists and guidelines as to how to choose the best daycare for your family. Once you're sure you've got the best possible situation for your child, you can be honest when you say they will have a good time, the people are nice, and so forth.

3. Bring a Friend (for Your Child)

As you prepare your child for daycare, scheduling playdates with other children destined for the same daycare can help. Then your child will see a familiar friend when he or she goes to daycare. You might be able to carpool together, too. 

4. Get Familiar with the Facilities

Bring your child with you when you tour the facilities and meet the staff. In fact, visiting multiple times and interacting with the staff and teachers is not a bad idea. This can help familiarize your child with his or her caregivers, and also give you peace of mind as you meet the people who will be caring for your child. 

5. Adopt a Similar Schedule at Home

Find out the daycare's schedule and see if you can adopt elements of it at home. What time is snack or a meal served? What about naps and playtime? See if you can implement some of the same routines so the change in schedule will be minimal when your child goes off to daycare.

6. Find Out What's Expected and Encourage Your Child 

Many daycares have requirements for the kids in their facility. Make sure you know what these are, and encourage your child in these areas. For instance, are kids expected to eat with spoons or can they use their fingers? Will your child be required to wash his hands independently or be totally potty trained? These are important things to find out ahead of time so you can get your child on the right track.

7. Talk Positively about It

Take opportunities to talk positively about daycare as often as possible, preferably every day. As you adopt some of the schedules and routines of the daycare, you can say, "This is the way they do it in daycare" or "Let's try this - I got this idea from Miss so-and-so at daycare!" Mention how nice the staff members are when you can, or talk about how much you like the facility. 

Is my child stay home alone

Is My Child Old Enough to Stay Home Alone?

As children grow up, parents begin to wonder if their child can stay home by themselves. After all, child care can be a lot of trouble and expense. And during the summer months, parents may really wish their child could be home alone for at least a little while. 

Of course, all children are different, and some kids are ready to be left alone at a much younger age than others. Your child's maturity level, home environment, geographical location, and other factors all play into the issue. And there are also certain laws on the books about this as well. So age can be determined in a somewhat general way, but there are other considerations than your child's age. 

So to answer the question of whether or not your child is old enough to stay home alone, it's important to look at various factors.

1. Your Child's Age - How Important Is It?

First, look into your local laws. You must follow those guidelines first and foremost.

And there are some obvious things in the age department that can determine how independent your child is. For example, it's never okay to leave a baby, toddler, preschooler, or kindergartener home alone, even for a few minutes. Once your child gets to gradeschool age, though, it gets to be more of a gray area. 

2. How Long?

How many hours your child will be home by themselves is another key thing. Children in gradeschool - the "latchkey kids" as we came to call them - may be fine to be at home for an hour or two. But leaving a gradeschool-age child at home alone all day is not advisable. A general guideline is, the younger the child, the shorter the time home alone. 

3. How Safe Is Your Neighborhood?

If you live in a high-crime area without any trusted friends or relatives nearby, then leaving your child home alone at a young age may not be a good idea at all. A quieter neighborhood with family down the street is another matter altogether. So your location has a lot to do with your decision.

4. Evaluate Your Child

In addition to age, your child's personal character traits have a lot to do with whether or not they are ready to be left alone. Here are some things to look for and ask:

* Does your child listen and take directions well? If so, he or she may be mature enough to be left alone a bit. He will need to know how to follow directions when you're not there.

* Does your child tend to panic or be anxious? High-anxiety children may not be good candidates for being home alone. 

* Is he able to fix food for himself?

* How does your child feel about being home alone?

* Has your child exhibited responsible behavior in the past?

* Can he make independent decisions?

5. Evaluate Your Home

Your home will need to be safe for your child to be left alone. For example, if your home is heated by firewood and it's cold out, you'll need to make sure your child is old enough to handle that without endangering himself. Your water heater will need to be turned down to a safe level, dangerous areas need to be locked off, and your home will need to be safe enough not to pose any danger of injury. 

As long as you are within your local laws, the final decision is up to you and your child. If you're not certain, try leaving your child home alone for very short periods at first, and then work up to longer times.