School Leavers

[SportTA98]

Hi all,

I’ve just completed my first full year as a TA in a Primary School (picked a class year to start). I work within PE mainly, running the football team and things like that, so I’ve got to know just about every child in the school well, particularly the Year Sixes.

Now that they’ve left I’ve gotten myself a bit down thinking about how I’m likely not going to see the majority of them again. There’s one in particular who I’d taken a shine to, who’s had a really tough time of it lately and chose me as the staff member he wanted to open up to. He and his mother were in floods of tears last Friday as they left the gates for the last time, and I’m genuinely going to miss them.

Obviously I know children grow up and leave schools and that’s always going to be the case, but I suppose I’m writing this to ask whether those goodbyes get easier? Is it just because these are the first Year Sixes I’ve waved off that it’s getting to me so much?

Cheers for reading. Apologies if this isn’t the place for this kind of discussion or anything as well.

[balloonsintrees]

Sometimes it gets easier, sometimes it doesn't.
My last lesson with this years Year 13's started with us in a massive group hug and all of us in tears. They have been one of the best classes I have ever had and losing them in the way we did is heartbreaking and I still miss them now.
The Year 11's also a fantastic class who I do miss, but whilst a little upset, nothing like I have been with some other Year 11 classes.
Have been doing this for 20 years and you begin to realise that it is a good thing, you have done your best by them and it is time for them to move on to the next stage of their life.

[ohthegoats]

Yeah, it's a thing. There will be some children in every year group cohort that just get to you when they leave, and always some you'll be very glad to see the back of. I usually get upset about their future options... the furious one, the abused ones, the ones who really struggle academically. If you didnt get upset about some of this then you'd be in the wrong job.

[PumpkinPie2016]

Sometimes the goodbyes are easier, sometimes they are not.

My last two Y13 classes have been amazing and there were definitely tears shed when they left. This year, partly because of circumstances but both years because they were genuinely lovely people who it had been an absolute pleasure to teach.

I suspect it will be the same with the class I am taking into Y13 this year.

I picked up a Y11 class a couple of years back who weren't the easiest class to teach. Not their fault -they had gone through a lot of disruption due to staffing issues. I thought they wouldn't be too bothered to leave. How wrong was I! Two of the girls made beautiful cards and the whole class wrote little goodbye/thank you messages. That definitely brought tears to my eyes.

Then there's the kids for whom school is a safe place that I worry about. Had a lad this year whose homelife wasn't great. He often used to arrive to ky P1 before anyone else because he was usually too late to go to assembly. So he used to help menset up and I'd ask how he was etc. I'll never forget him saying to me one day 'you know Miss, you're pretty much the only person who ever asks how I am'

You have obviously built really good relationships with the pupils and that's great. You care about them which is why you feel emotional about them going. It's perfectly normal

[Juiceey]

It's great that you've built up good relationships. Every year I tend to have at east one that makes me so sad I won't see them again. I'm secondary so really aware that 16 is such a fragile age to say goodbye!