Between Lectures and Lullabies
For many students, babysitting is a practical and flexible way to earn money while studying. Typically fitting around a student's busy schedule, balancing education with a steady source of income. To some, it may not be the most money in the world, but it's good pocket money to others. Babysitting also teaches valuable life lessons, such as responsibility, patience and time management, serving students inside and outside the classroom.
For students pursuing degrees in fields like education, social work or psychology, babysitting can serve as a source of informal training. Even for students outside of these studies, babysitting offers a break from the mundane tasks of memorizing and note-taking at university and gives them something else to do with their day apart from their normal routine. For a few hours, a student can stop being a student, but a mentor and a playmate.
The expected babysitting experience in Paris
From the perspective of an international student at The American University of Paris, babysitting seems like the perfect opportunity to practice French, especially with children. Think of the way children learn languages: with basic, simple words and phrases.
Coming to Paris, the thought sounds amazing. Aside from the required French courses taken at AUP, students can babysit on the side, practicing their French with a cute little French child. It is a great experience, creating a bond and a friendship with the child you are caring for.
Amelie Goulds, an AUP junior, says that with her experience in babysitting, although speaking French was discouraged, on occasion, when the little girl she taught English didn't know the word, she would say it in French. This way, Amelie would learn the French words for a few things here and there.
For my first year at AUP, I got the opportunity to watch a little French girl after school. When I finished my courses for the day, I would take the metro to where I would pick her up as her school day finished. We would walk to the park nearby, and she would run off playing with her friends. I would sit and watch while occasionally reading a book. Even though I stopped routinely watching her after my first year, I still often watch her when her parents need me.
Like other students at AUP, I originally had the intention of being able to practice my French while babysitting. Picking up phrases here and there and being able to apply the little French I already knew in the real world. Amelie's initial intentions were "to make a little extra side cash" as well as being able to "immerse [herself] in the French language, as well as teaching some English." In a way, she was able to do both.
Reality of babysitting
For most families in Paris, hiring an international student isn't just about finding someone so they can go out on parent date nights twice a week. The reality of babysitting in Paris is that the child gets to practice and improve their English with a fluent or native speaker. The family that Amelie worked for hired her as an English teacher; she was told by the family to correct grammatical errors and overall sentence structuring. Something interesting is the family wanted their daughter to "pick up my accent," Amelie says. As in an American accent, so that she doesn't have a French accent when she speaks English.
In a city like Paris, where having a bilingual education is highly valued, parents see having a foreign student as a babysitter as a good opportunity for their child to be cared for and get free language classes in addition. It's not just the fact of wanting the student to speak with the child in English; some families tell the student not to speak French at all.
This arrangement shapes a student's experience as a babysitter. It means that their goal goes beyond just caring for the child but also acting as a cultural bridge. Introducing songs, games and stories from their place of origin. Blending playtime with language immersion.
With babysitting, speaking English has become a professional asset. "There is this specific website called Momji that is specifically for parents looking for English-speaking babysitters," Lucy Voelker, an AUP junior, says. Websites like these are open to the public, whereas the AUP student job search database is used specifically by students. Many other AUP students, like Abby Glass an AUP junior and Lucy Voelker, have used the student data place as a babysitting searching tool. "But I hoped that the families would want to help me learn French as much as I help their kid," Lucy says. Ultimately, the demand for English-speaking babysitters outshines a student's desire to learn French.
