Ms Müller, has coronavirus made the work of childminders more difficult?
Yes, childminders run their own small childcare business and have to comply with all the rules that also apply to childcare facilities. Implementing the hygiene and safety standards is a huge logistical and organizational effort. Everything has to be implemented and observed very precisely and responsibly. They don't have a carrier behind them. For example, they have to draw up a hygiene plan on their own and only one parent is allowed to supervise the settling-in of new children. You could say that our childminders already have a great deal of responsibility - but it is particularly heavy at the moment.
But there are also advantages: With childminders, there are only small groups anyway and very stable groups with no mixing. This means that a classic quality feature of child daycare is becoming particularly important in the context of the pandemic. Child day care is therefore particularly reliable and stable for parents.
Legislation has made the training of childminders more extensive. Will it now be more difficult to find childminders?
I think and hope not: No. The new administrative regulation has almost doubled the number of teaching units for the qualification from 160 to 300. This means even greater professionalization. At the moment, the new regulation is still very new. But we are definitely seeing that childminders see their profession more as a vocation and attach great importance to high-quality training. The mandatory further training courses are already being very well received by childminders. So I am confident about this.
Complete this sentence: Working as a childminder is still attractive because...
...it enables intensive work with small children in small groups and in a setting that you can design yourself. Perhaps this is also the reason why we have so many professionals among childminders - educators, social pedagogues. As a childminder, you can respond very individually to the needs of children and their families.
Info: Child day care in the district of Ludwigsburg is organized by the Competence Centre for Child Day Care at the Ludwigsburg District Office. There are currently 306 women and 9 men working as childminders in the district. 932 children aged between 0 and 14 are currently being looked after by childminders in the district of Ludwigsburg. The vast majority of these - 750 - are under the age of three. Anyone interested in working as a childminder can find more information at www.tageseltern-lb.de.
