Job Responsibilities
My position as a family support worker involves going into houses
of families who have a child with a disability or special needs.
I go in to the house to give the parents and the rest of the
family respite care. Most of the time I go into the house to take
over the responsibilities of getting the child ready for school,
by getting them out of bed and get them bathed and dressed. As
most of the children I work with are physically disabled I have
to be trained how to use manual hoists to get the children out of
bed,in the bath etc. Most of the children can not eat there
breakfasts orally and have tubes going into their stomach which
also involves being specially trained to deal with this. Some
children are able mobile so I take them away from their home
settings to give the parents a break. I do all different kinds of
things with them such as,horse riding,swimming,out of school
clubs. The times i spend with each child varies depending on
their disablity. I work for about 5 hours with each child and
most of the time it is for 7 days a week. Hours also change when
it comes to schoold holidays.
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Job Requirements
When i first started with nch I had previously been to college
studying health and social care. There were no educational
requirements needed when I applied for the job. i think they gave
me the job as I had quite a bit of outside experience during
college. Even though i wasnt fully qualified I was given a lot
of training at the beginning of the job so I was sure about what
I needed to do. Lots of training is always available even if you
miss a training course it is sure that there will be another
opportunity to do it again.
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Uppers
The best part of my job is the rewarding feeling. i have helped a lot of
children in a special needs creche who either have a physiacl disability or a
learning difficulty. It feels really good when you have spent so much time with
these children and see the changes they make over a period of time. I always feel
happy during my job as I know that I have helped out a family in need of help and
give them time on there own.
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Downers
I think the worst part of my job can be the feeling of isolation.
It can be a lonely job as you only work with 1 child at once and
dont really have any contact with other members of staff. Most of
the time you are on your own with a child for about 5 hours,
sometimes it is very difficult to find things to do either in the
home or even if you take the child out ofthe home,as their
disability may stop you doing activities etc, with them. Apart
from that I dont think there are any other worst parts in my job
as i really enjoy it.
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Lifestyle
When in a job like this you must be prepared to be vey flexible with your hours.
As the children ae at school all day the hours you work with them will either be
early in the morning to get them ready for scool or when they get home from
school, so most of the work is in the evening till about 8-9 o clock sometimes
even later. Also it involves a lot of weekend work which ties your own lifestyle
up. You must be prepared to fill in hours for members of staff who go off sick.
I do alot of travelling for this job. I normally do about 1000 miles a month
depending on the hours and where I have to work staff do get a very good rate of
milage payment. This job does not really provide a dress code, just as long as i
am dressed appropriately for the job I need to do they dont really mind. There
are not a lot of social events in with this job apart from over the christmas
period where we all meet up and have a meal together but that is the only
opportunity i get to socialise with the rest of the staff.
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Compensation
this job does not include and bonuses,stock options or benefits.
I get paid a good annual salary
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Advice to Jobseekers
For newcomers in this job they would need to have very good
people skills as they will be working along side families who
have a lot of difficulty in dealing with their child having a
disability. They would have to have a kind and understanding
nature. listening skills are also important as some of the
parents like to ask for advice and can aslo tell you their
problems and ask how to deal with them.
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