Jourdanne Madeleine

You will find Jourdanne Madeleine in a little close knit community not too far from the Grand Anse petrol station, Praslin surrounded by quiet neighbours. She has been minding children for about 15 years starting with her own grandchild. She says the secret to her success is that she can easily adapt to the children’s different characteristics. “You need to adjust because children will not change for you, they will be themselves, that’s the way they are when they are small.”

Jourdanne has a novel idea to keep the children entertained; she makes them simulate real life situations. “They love it; they will cook pretend food or give you a ride in their imaginary bus. I try to do other activities with them but somehow they always seem to come back to playing pretend.”

She says her biggest setback is funding. “I can’t charge the parents too much, some of them are barely able to afford what they give me, and so I can’t charge them even higher prices.” She feels that district authorities are not helping Childminders at all “they should be helping us, because we are helping the community a great deal, if we were not there many parents would not be able to go to work.” She gives the example of Christmas parties for the children in December “you have to beg for a few scraps from sponsors, sometimes parents bring what they can but I want to organize the party for the children as my gift to them. I don’t want to have to ask their parents for contributions when they are already paying a monthly fee.”

Nevertheless, Jourdanne always tries to make her children’s experiences as memorable as possible and also ensures that her space is safe. She had to alter some parts of her home to meet the national standards. She had to buy new furniture for the kids, put the gas canister outside of the house, install a small sink for the children’s exclusive use and has to often paint the walls to keep them clean. She also had to install a water tank and a landline in accordance with the National Standard requirements.

Generally her biggest obstacle while setting up her business was related to finance. However, the setbacks does not discourage her because she still wants to keep minding children until she is no longer able. She asks other minders to register “it’s a good thing, you will get a lot of technical support and you will see how much you will develop your abilities.”