What’s the youngest age at which you would leave a kid at home alone for, say, three hours, in charge of other kids? Say the youngest is seven years younger than the oldest.
Assume things like the existence of pre-prepared snacks a-plenty, phone with immediate access to parents, parents no more than 15 minutes away, etc.
As a lad, I was put in charge of my sibs at age 11 after school before my parents came home, which sometimes was two or three hours. But I take it times have changed…
Not a parent but I have to say it really depends on the maturity of the children and how much you can trust the elder. 11 sounds ok though. I know I was babysitting at 11, but I was (mostly) a responsible child.
I was also a latchkey kid at 11 so I was in charge of myself for a couple of hours.
I agree that it depends on the children. Ours are 12 and 10 (about to turn 11). We started leaving them home alone instead of hiring a babysitter 8 or 9 months ago. They had demonstrated that they could take care of themselves, not do anything dangerous, and not fight with each other. We have friends with kids the same ages as ours who can’t leave them alone yet. One of the 10-year-old boys is too reckless. The other is too immature.
As an added incentive for the kids to behave, we started paying them $10 each to watch themselves. We had been paying $50-60 for a babysitter, so it’s a bargain, and the kids know that they won’t get the $10 if they cause any trouble.
Number of kids matters, as well. You have twins, right? Watching two requires a lot more maturity than watching one. It’s not just that they can get up to more mischief, it’s that dealing with complications can be a lot more complex–if one little falls and breaks an arm, you have to deal with that plus not forget to supervise the other little. If the kitchen catches on fire, it’s a lot more complicated to get 2-3 littles out the door.
I do think it’s really important to think about how a kid would handle an emergency, not just if they can be trusted with the day-to-day. There’s plenty of kids who aren’t troublemakers, by any means, but who would just melt down if someone had an accident and cut their scalp and started bleeding, or if the microwave started smoking or if the dog ran out and got hit. it’s not just about trust, it’s about competence.
When I was a year old, my brother was hit by a car, and my parents spent most of the next year at the hospital. My oldest sister, then 11, basically took over my care full time.
At home, I’d say 12 as a rule of thumb, but a 10-year-old might be responsible enough to handle it, if his/her personality is suited to it.
From a legal perspective, 13 is the age at which the IRS will no longer allow you to claim the child care credit for day care expenses. To claim a deduction on anyone older would require some kind of disability.
12 is the age at which my parents divorced and when I started taking over a lot of babysitting and child care duties for them. My brothers at that time were 11 and 5. Our biggest disaster was dropping a red Popsicle on white carpet and occasionally playing video games instead of cleaning the kitchen.
I think kids as early as 10 might be able to handle themselves just fine, but I agree with everyone else that it’s the maturity level and prior parenting that makes all the difference. You let the kids have slowly increasing levels of independence and authority. As long as they keep meeting the challenges responsibly, you keep giving them more.
My grandmother - the one who was a doctor and surgeon in WW1 - used to say that the best minders were the 6 year old girls.
These days, probably 14. I do not personally see anything wrong with a child as young as nine, but I wouldn’t want to risk government interference.
13 or 14, depending on the child.
There’s seven years between me and my sister, and I was trusted to babysit starting when I was 13. The worst thing I ever did was let her watch stuff like Beavis and Butthead when our parents aren’t around. How trustworthy is the eldest? Do they fight alot? Things like that matter most.
I was a regular caretaker for various babies and small children (no more than three at a time) for multi-hour church events starting at around 7. At 12 I was the full-time caregiver to my much younger brothers. By 14 I was so worn down that people were making assumptions that I was several years older and that they were my actual children when I was out in public with them doing errands.
I was very careful, conscientious, and did my best, and we were always fine. I also constantly felt overwhelmed and anxious, and it destroyed my opinions of them and myself to the point where I am just now starting to rebuild actual relationships with them, and I am still unwilling to have kids of my own.
A few hours here and there is one thing. Daily hours-long responsibility? Find a daycare or a babysitter. That sort of burden can warp kids.
Eta: my brothers are 7 and 10 years younger than I am.
I actually started babysitting at 9, but the situation was a bit extraordinary. The doc who lived across the street really needed to attend a counseling with his depressed, suicidal wife. They had four young children, all with the measles. I was the only potential sitter who had already had the measles. So the dad talked to my parents and me about the responsibility and viola, a babysitter was created.
This family lived cattywampus from us so if something went wrong, my mother (a nurse) would have been over there in a flash.
I wasn’t a baby sitter for my one younger sibling, but by age 11 I was babysitting (for pay) occasionally, for babies as young as 6 months old. At the time, that was considered perfectly normal. I left my daughter in charge of her brother for an hour or two at a time around age 10, daytime only.
Probably as soon as I could talk. As I got older I learned not to put a kid in charge of other kids.
Our 3 kids, age 7,9 and 11, stay home together once a week while we are out at fitness class. That’s an hour and a half. I wouldn’t be hugely comfortable with 3 hours, but… Maybe if there was a real emergency. I could maybe see leaving the Taller Girl with one sib if I had to rush the other to A&E for 3 hours, for instance.
So say 11 or 12
My youngest (and 4th) sib was born when I was 11. Shortly thereafter, I was often left in charge of all of them for a few hours at a time while Mom ran errands. We lived in a neighborhood of row houses and stay-at-home-moms, so help was literally seconds away.
By the time I was 12, I’d be left in charge when Mom and Dad would go out for an evening. Mostly we watched TV or played games, and everyone knew bedtime, so there wasn’t a lot of fighting about that. I’d end my evening by cleaning the kitchen and making a pot of coffee for when my folks got home. I don’t think I ever had to call a neighbor for help.
I was also sitting for neighbors about the same time. I had to call my mom for help once - the family up the street had 5 kids all under 7, and the oldest boy was a real handful. When he tore a bunch of paper into little pieces and flung in around the living room, I lost it. My mom showed up, read the kid the riot act, and I never sat for them again. But mostly, babysitting was easy - I rarely had more than 2 kids to watch.
Why people are more paranoid in the age of mobile phones, I’ll never know… but FWIW, I was about 10 when I started to look after my sister who was 5.
Thanks for the various suggestions.
What we’re pondering is the possibility of occasionally going out, nearby, to like a coffee shop or book store or maybe a movie, after the twins are already in bed, leaving my currently-10-year-old in charge. We’re pondering the question of how many years it may be before we’re comfortable with this.
To be perfectly honest I would do it right now. I have no personal qualms about it at all–the kid’s incredibly mature (and even the second oldest, about whom I have posted before in ways which some here may think certain conclusions could be drawn on this topic) has proven herself many times to be capable of handling this kind of situation in a mature way. (We have left the two of them alone a couple of times in the past, albeit comparatively briefly, in emergent situations…)
Anyway as I say, if it were just me, I’d do it right now, but probably it’s not really quite time yet.
But soon… (taps fingers together)… very soon…
My father became gravely ill when I was 8 and from that day forward, my mother’s attention was directed toward him and I was pretty much left to my own devices. I was an incredibly old soul as a child, so it wasn’t a problem. I did once leave the back door open, but we had a back yard with a six foot stockade fence due to our large dogs, so it would have had to have been a very observant burglar to have noticed the opportunity. Plus, the dogs…
My older son was 11 and my younger son was 9 when they came to me and said they thought they could watch themselves after school. My husband and I gave them a 3-week trial period to see how they did. We had our next door neighbor, an OR nurse, keeping an eye out for them (she only worked weekends and was home during the day), so if there had been an emergency, they’d have been able to get immediate help. After the 3 weeks had passed, our neighbor gave them a thumbs up, so we continued with the arrangement from that point on. The only problem we ever experienced was when my younger son missed his bus home. My older son called us right away and my husband went to fetch younger son and all was well.
I would advise, though, to be very careful with what you say to outsiders about whatever arrangement you make with your children. Government entities take a broad view of what constitutes child neglect and if you are reported, clearing your name can be difficult.
Because most phones these days have cameras and the pervs can take upskirts of the wee lads.