Au pair asked me how my day was

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Happy for you, ap. Unfortunately we are having the opposite experience with our new ap, who barely talks. We suffered through it before with our first, but now after a couple of good to great aps I won’t do it again. How can we address it or initiate rematch if it isn’t about her childcare or safety but just a bad personality match?

How's her English ? If that's because she can't speak it well, I wouldn't fire her for that and make sure she gets English classes to improve.

If it's not the problem and that's it's bugging you I'd ask her once to do better and if there's no improvement I'd let her go.

Former AP.

Np. Even if English is not great, there are ways to be friendly and communicative.

Not always true. I would've died for the kids but it would've never crossed my mind to ask how somebody's days was. Never even heard such thing asked in my mother tongue.

Then find a way to show you care. You are in the United States so you do need to adjust some. As a former peace corps volunteer, I tried to take on the norms of interacting with my host family in Morocco

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Happy for you, ap. Unfortunately we are having the opposite experience with our new ap, who barely talks. We suffered through it before with our first, but now after a couple of good to great aps I won’t do it again. How can we address it or initiate rematch if it isn’t about her childcare or safety but just a bad personality match?

How's her English ? If that's because she can't speak it well, I wouldn't fire her for that and make sure she gets English classes to improve.

If it's not the problem and that's it's bugging you I'd ask her once to do better and if there's no improvement I'd let her go.

Former AP.

Np. Even if English is not great, there are ways to be friendly and communicative.

Not always true. I would've died for the kids but it would've never crossed my mind to ask how somebody's days was. Never even heard such thing asked in my mother tongue.

Then find a way to show you care. You are in the United States so you do need to adjust some. As a former peace corps volunteer, I tried to take on the norms of interacting with my host family in Morocco

There are some things that you need to learn about common courtesy when working or living (or even visiting) another country. In Haiti, we would greet everyone with "Bonjour" in the mornings. To everybody. Would I say good morning/day to everyone I came across in DC? nope. But I needed to do it here so I took it on.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Happy for you, ap. Unfortunately we are having the opposite experience with our new ap, who barely talks. We suffered through it before with our first, but now after a couple of good to great aps I won’t do it again. How can we address it or initiate rematch if it isn’t about her childcare or safety but just a bad personality match?

How's her English ? If that's because she can't speak it well, I wouldn't fire her for that and make sure she gets English classes to improve.

If it's not the problem and that's it's bugging you I'd ask her once to do better and if there's no improvement I'd let her go.

Former AP.

Np. Even if English is not great, there are ways to be friendly and communicative.

Not always true. I would've died for the kids but it would've never crossed my mind to ask how somebody's days was. Never even heard such thing asked in my mother tongue.

Then find a way to show you care. You are in the United States so you do need to adjust some. As a former peace corps volunteer, I tried to take on the norms of interacting with my host family in Morocco

There are some things that you need to learn about common courtesy when working or living (or even visiting) another country. In Haiti, we would greet everyone with "Bonjour" in the mornings. To everybody. Would I say good morning/day to everyone I came across in DC? nope. But I needed to do it here so I took it on.

+1. If you can figure how which stores and outlets have the best deals, you can l arm basic ways of interaction

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Happy for you, ap. Unfortunately we are having the opposite experience with our new ap, who barely talks. We suffered through it before with our first, but now after a couple of good to great aps I won’t do it again. How can we address it or initiate rematch if it isn’t about her childcare or safety but just a bad personality match?

How's her English ? If that's because she can't speak it well, I wouldn't fire her for that and make sure she gets English classes to improve.

If it's not the problem and that's it's bugging you I'd ask her once to do better and if there's no improvement I'd let her go.

Former AP.

Np. Even if English is not great, there are ways to be friendly and communicative.

Not always true. I would've died for the kids but it would've never crossed my mind to ask how somebody's days was. Never even heard such thing asked in my mother tongue.

See this is the problem. As an AP, you need to build a relationship with the kids and parents. That’s the difference between mediocre and Rock star.