Reply to child injured due to the inattention of a caregiver

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[quote=Anonymous]I've been a professional nanny for twelve years. In that time, FOUR children I've worked with have broken an arm or a leg. But they never injured themselves while I was watching them. Every single time it happened on a weekend, while with Mom and/or Dad (and once, Grandma). Accidents do happen, and you have said nothing about the incident that makes the nanny sound negligent at all (as others have pointed out, he was just swinging and fell off, there was nothing nanny (or even-gasp- you!) could've done. Honestly the way you are reacting does make you sound like either a horrible MB or perhaps just someone stirring the pot here.

However, as for this three year old tipping over his chair nonsense: 
#1 I'm not sure I believe that MB was there since that detail was conveniently overlooked in your first post.

#2 Even if MB had been there, if you were on the clock, preventing serious injury is your job.

#3 yes, you got (in your own words) "lucky," but something like a three year old falling backwards in his chair onto a hard kitchen floor could result in a serious head injury, leading to concussion or even worse complications! If you cared about your charge at all you would've stopped it from happening beyond simply reminding him not to, because...

#4 despite what you say this situation (unlike the "falling off the swing" scenario this thread is about) was totally foreseeable and preventable. As mentioned above you could've moved your chair closer, or you could've moved him further from the table (at age three he likely has a booster seat with tray he could use?), or, I don't know....you could've actually been watching him closely like you're paid to do so the second he starts tipping his chair too far you can catch him or grab his chair so he doesn't sustain a concussion?? You could've also told him he isn't allowed to put his feet up on the table in the first place; I would've nipped this in the bud pretty quickly with something like "We do not put our feet on the table while we are eating, if you do that again then you're telling me you're all done with your food and are getting down." etc

This situation could've been handled MANY different ways. Just waiting until he actually fell over (and taking a chance on how badly he got injured) should not have been one of them.[/quote]

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