<p>^^^ Agree with Marian across the board here. Some 9-year-olds are perfectly able to be safe alone at home. Supervising a 5-year-old, though, I would not risk it.</p>
<p>I know that it is common in many cultures for small children to care for babies. They may be comfortable with a level of risk that is unacceptable in my view.</p>
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This is the particular red flag to me. We know the “other staff member” is correct . . . how? Or are we playing the office’s version of “Telephone”?</p>
<p>Unless you are the mother’s supervisor, assume that what you’ve been told is gossip and let it go. Or tell the supervisor what you heard (making sure that the supervisor knows that this may be 12th hand knowledge) and then let it go.</p>
<p>The staff member who mentioned the information is very close to the employee and extremely reliable - no question that the information is true. There is a husband. He was out of work for a long period of time and was the stay at home parent. Last month he got a job, that is why the kids are now home alone. The other 2 kids are under age 5 years and are in day care.</p>
<p>Having the nine year old babysit every day seems like too much. Kids should be able to play without worrying about another kid every day.</p>
<p>But in general some kids are fine being home alone at that age. I am pretty sure I was already bicycling to the library or the park on my own by age nine. (Library was about 3/4 of a mile away, park was a mile away.) When I was a baby my mom had my second oldest sister babysit me, and she would’ve been about nine. But she would not ask my oldest sister (10) to babysit me–she was not as responsible as my second oldest sis. (She had a good reason for not taking us along with her on those occasions, which I will not go into as it’s a long story that would require a wall of text.)</p>
<p>I agree with BCEagle–it depends on the kids, it depends on the family situation. If you want to know more about this lady’s situation, probably the best way to find out is to ask her. It may not even be true that she drops her kids off at home everyday, office gossip is not the most reliable news source.</p>
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And this other “reliable” and “close” staff member hasn’t done anything about it? I’d question both the reliability and the closeness. </p>
<p>Something sounds fishy in this situation. Still smells like office gossip to me.</p>
<p>What are you hoping to accomplish? Seriously think about that.</p>
<p>If it this is against the law in your state, the children may be put into foster care. It’s not always better than being at home. In fact, it’s often worse. Mom and dad may have to pay lawyers to get their kids back, putting the family in a worse financial position. They may have to miss work to go to court–which might cost dad that new found job. </p>
<p>I doubt mom is going to leave a new born with the 9 year old, so the problem may resolve itself quickly.</p>
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<p>So this has only been the situation for the past month? Sounds like the family may be in a transitional period and you don’t know if they are working on other alternatives. Also, consider a moment in their issues they have 4 children, mom is pregnant, dad was unemployed. Maybe they have enough problems without a coworker spreading their business around the office?</p>
<p>I stayed at home by myself after school, and all day during the summer when I didn’t have camp since I was 8 years old while my parents worked until I was 13 when I went to work for my mom during the summers. When I stayed at home I had strict rules such as not going outside, and not answering the door for anyone. My parents also left me a list of chores that needed to be done before they got home to keep my occupied. I spent the rest of my time watching TV, reading novels, listening to music, and doing art projects. It was not a bad part of my life at all. In fact, I sometimes long for those days again when I am at work for 10 hours with 10 people demanding things from me.</p>
<p>Also, no many schools do not offer any after school day care or any transportation for that matter.</p>
<p>Depends on the kids and living situation. I do think there are situations where a 9 year old can look after a 5 year old for 2 hours. They come home from school, have a snack, do their homework, and watch TV. </p>
<p>My best advice for the OP is to mind her old business and stop the office chatter. There’s nothing more annoying and obnoxious then listening to people’s catty chatter about others behind their back.</p>
<p>According to above, the baby will be left at home also with the rest of them. It might get very interesting. But again, none of our business, nothing we can do about accident #5 and the others to follow…</p>
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<p>Why do you think so? The OP said that of the current 4 children, 2 are under 5, and the other 2 a 5, and 9. The 9 year old watches the 5 year old for ~3 hours a day and the 2 under 5 are in daycare. So why would they leave a baby at home and put two older siblings in daycare? </p>
<p>Here’s what the OP said:</p>
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<p>Maybe the family is making the most of limited resources by putting the two younger ones in daycare and leaving their “possibly” mature 9 year old to watch the 5 year old for a small portion of the day.</p>
<p>^So, there is a daycare and it is being paid. I was under impression that lady cannot afford any care. Still do not understand then, why others are not in some care. I do not buy than care is available only up to certain age. But again, I am not that curious, it just there are contradictions in this discussion, no logic, math does not add up. If a lady can afford paying for additional kid’s care, how is that she cannot afford care for older siblings?</p>
<p>Really? You don’t understand how you can afford 2 kids worth of daycare, but not 4?</p>
<p>Maybe she could afford it at the time that she got pregnant, but then husband lost job so now it’s not as feasible. Happens all the time.</p>
<p>“Accidents will happen…5 times… are we in Africa?”</p>
<p>I have read some pretty racist, insensitive comments made here on CC, this one is near the top of that list.</p>
<p>The average cost of center-based daycare in the United States is $11,666 per year ($972 a month), but prices range from $3,582 to $18,773 a year ($300 to $1,564 monthly), according to the National Association of Child Care Resource & Referral Agencies (NACCRRA). Parents report higher costs – up to $2,000 a month for infant care – in cities like Boston and San Francisco. </p>
<p>[How</a> much you’ll spend on childcare | BabyCenter](<a href=“http://www.babycenter.com/0_how-much-youll-spend-on-childcare_1199776.bc]How”>Daycare costs, nanny costs, and ways to save money on childcare | BabyCenter)</p>
<p>So if we take the average: $972 x 4 = $3888 PER MONTH or $972 x 2 = $1944</p>
<p>Hence, what I meant by the comment that they may be spreading limited resources by only putting the two youngest in daycare. By saving $1944 a month by keeping the 9 and 5 year old at home they can afford other things the family needs. It’s not the most “eutopian” situation, but hardly bad. And not child abuse.</p>
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<p>Agreed. How do we know they’re not just Catholic ;)</p>
<p>"“Accidents will happen…5 times… are we in Africa?”</p>
<p>I have read some pretty racist, insensitive comments made here on CC, this one is near the top of that list. "
-OK, this way over any kind of imagination. Different location of the globe are reffered as “racist”. What else? It is well know that birth control is not as widely used in Africa as it is in the USA. Yes, i will repeat it 10 millions times and every time you are free to call me racist, it is not any news in this country. You are free to attach this label to anybody for anything, I am happy to see that another one joined th choir.</p>
<p>Although it is true that large families are more common in developing countries than in industrialized nations, even in the United States, a 4- or 5-child family is not so large as to be considered a bizarre anomaly.</p>
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<p>That’s just your opinion. Most parents in my neighborhood were so busy working 2-3 jobs 6+ days a week just to make ends meet that kids…including myself became latchkey kids as young as 6. </p>
<p>Never had a problem with it and it taught me many valuable things like learning how to fix myself dinner or go off to visit neighborhood friends…and I grew up in NYC in the 1980s…far more crime ridden and less safe than the NYC of today or most well-off suburbs. </p>
<p>All you’d be accomplishing with your call to CPS is to bring more trouble on mostly working-class/lower-middle class parents who are doing the best with what they have. </p>
<p>In many ways, your perspective isn’t that different from sometimes oblivious wealthy voluntary social workers/doctors in the late 19th/early 20th century who imposed policies/“helpful solutions” derived from their Victorian upper/upper-middle class sensibilities with little/no research nor input from the poor/working-class as to what their actual problems were and what they actually needed. </p>
<p>It’d also strike many folks in my parents and older generations as absurd considering many of them were already working their first jobs at 13 and younger…whether afterschool or full-time and my father had to get by alone on his own wits from the age of 12 onwards due to being orphaned and the only one from his family to escape the oncoming Chinese Communist takeover in '49.</p>
<p>"Although it is true that large families are more common in developing countries than in industrialized nations, even in the United States, a 4- or 5-child family is not so large as to be considered a bizarre anomaly. "
-Anomaly and affordability are 2 different things. The point was that family cannot pay for care of young kids. Anomaly or not, this point does not have any logic as another kid is being added to this family that cannot afford taking care of them. And again, it is called the accident in the country with very cheap means of controling birth (here it is another racist statement, go ahead, call it)</p>
<p>I don’t know the mother in question, but this just seems like an accident waiting to happen.
Three kids ( including new baby) under five, a five yr old & a nine yr old?</p>
<p>Not enough money to pay for after school care for all of them and not enough of a support system to maybe trade off with friends?</p>
<p>Glad to hear there is a second parent, perhaps they can change their work hours in order to oversee the kids.</p>
<p>I also don’t doubt, that there are nine & five year olds that can behave appropriately under normal circumstances for a relatively short time.
But what if an emergency occurred ?</p>
<p>They are children- they think like kids!</p>
<p>When I was about six or seven, I was staying at my grandparents when my grandfather had a heart attack. My grandmother instructed me to go to the neighbors across the alley but I wasn’t sure which one she meant because their lot bordered two neighboring lots in the direction she was pointing. I didnt pick the house of their married friends, I picked the house of a single man who was very surprised at my appearance.
That ended well, but not everything that kids think was a “good idea at the time”, does.</p>