to think this woman is either badly organised or bone idle?

[Rosieeo]

My eldest went back to school yesterday, to reception class. She attended the nursery last year. A woman whose eldest child is in the year above my DC was complaining to us at the gates.

Last year this woman, who has three DC, was consistently late for school. At the earliest running up as the bell went (fair enough) but more often than not 10-15 minutes late. In the end the school gave her a bollocking (they're very hot on timekeeping), wrote to her, had meetings, but it never made a lot of difference.

Yesterday (first day) they were just over 5 minutes late and she said that the teacher had already pulled her up on her timekeeping. She felt that the teacher was out of order and that no one appreciated how difficult it was to get to school for 8.50am with three DC. Her younger ones are about 3 and 1.

I don't have a lot of sympathy, I'm afraid. I know it can be difficult and frustrating getting out of the house in the morning, I honestly do! Plus, I only have two kids. But at the risk of sounding like Miss Smug, I have NO problems getting to school for 8.50am (we're normally up at 6.30/7am) and when I have to be at work we're out the door at 7.45am. That's hard work, but still! This woman lives a ten minute walk from school and doesn't work. I'm not trying to start a SAHM/WOHM debate, just saying that she doesn't then have to get somewhere else.

I didn't say anything, because I don't really know her that well, but AIBU to think that she's either badly organised or bone idle and totally unfair to her son who gets into bother almost every day because of such bad timekeeping?

that sounds a bit more like it

I think the woman referred to by the OP is probably quite disorganised but there are much worse traits in people.

I am generally never late for things BUT I do find being somewhere early in the morning consistently every day for long periods of time very very difficult.

I am seriously not a morning person and I have had 25 years plus of a career in offices and management where I generally get into work quite late and leave late. That is my natural rhythm and I am very efficient when I work to my natural rhythm.

Luckily every one of my 5 bosses in that time has been fine with my "late starts" because they can see I still do the work and that I am actually very conscientious and reliable, something not immediately obvious from my work tart times. Not one of them has ever insisted I start at the "official start time".

I generally am on time for the first couple of months in a new job so that my new boss can see I am reliable and not taking the p* and after that I usually have them trained by month 3 or 4 to accept my new "bumblingbovine friendly" work times

I really think I could never have one one of those customer facing jobs (like teaching) where you absolutely have to arrive on early every day. It is quite exhausting making yourself work to a schedule that doesn't suit your body clock and I can really only keep it up for a couple of months at a time at the most without getting really tired.

However I never late for meetings or for things that are time sensitive and meeting friends etc is fine as this is not usually early in the morning.

Luckily we live very close to ds's school and we don't need to leave until 8.45am which is just about OK for me and we are never late. I'd really struggle if ds had to start school at 8am though!

work "tart times" - hmm perhaps I should read through before posting next time!

I should imagine working tart times are fairly easy to maintain for a more flexible, non-morning person

flight you are being oversensitive.

It is ridiculous that (exceptional circumstances aside - and that caveat of course has to be applied to every AIBU) a grown woman with three children under 6 cannot get herself together to be at school on time, on a regular basis.

It is part of being a parent of primary children that mornings are often dreadful but everyone else deals with it.

You will see form my previous post there is no smugary about it - it is hard work and my DC have to be closely supervised at every stage. But the fact is it is good for my children and good for the other children in their class if they are encouraged to work within the rules and get to school on time.

I have 3 dcs and always manage to get to them to school in plenty of time(but we are only 3 mins walk away!) but my neighbours dd is ALWAYS late(even when she drives her there.)
Annoys me(yes I know it shouldnt) cos I am very punctual person(cant help it!) but also her mum is a real glamourpuss and gym bunny and think this is why her dd late so often cos she too busy caring about herself rather than getting her kid to school on time.
And before I get flamed for being a jealous cow I am would also never leave home in morn without decent hair n bit of slap but still put my kids first(plus she got killer bod but a face like an old boot!

As AIBU threads go, I think that this one has been pretty reasonable

It is very unfair on the poor DC to be late. Unfortunately the same DCs are late all the time and they get a name for it, when it isn't their fault. As a supply teacher I take the register and if someone is missing I get a chorus of 'they are always late'. I always wait as long as possible before I mark them absent because I don't think they want all the 'lates' on their record.

mamatomany, how did you putting her in the car in her pjamas and taking her not work?
Genuine question, not a go - surely when you'd done that she was at school??

I have a similar problem in that I sometimes struggle to get DS to put his shoes on - so I pick him up, strap him into the car and do it then.

the woman in the op is struggling - one way or the other.
let's have a bit of sympathy
i think being told off by teacher on day one is hardly going to motivate her if its an attitude problem.

Maybe she's not struggling. Maybe she just doesn't get up early enough or doesn't show them who's the boss, like mamatonomy or is disorganised.

Because lemme tell you, my 6-year-old does not control me and my timeschedule, it works the other way round. That is part of my job right now as a parent, to see to it she gets the best education she can, and that includes getting her ass to school on time no matter how much she doesn't like it. It doesn't make me popular, but I'm not her friend, I'm her mother. I can't see how that and that alone can make her childhood a misery. FFS. That's really setting them up for a big fall when real life bites them in the ass.

And quite frankly, if I had so little control over my daughter at that age, I'd consider myself up for some serious problems when that kid become a teen.

At any rate, I'd have thought Social Services would get involved if it's a consistent issue.

They would here!

OP - YANBU to think that.

I think that teaching children from a young age about these basic social requirements are a fundamental part of being a parent. I think it is irresponsible of her to consistently flout the school rules.

And my pet hate is people who are late for everything. And they somehow try to pass it off as part of their charm. What utter bollocks. It is rude, plain and simple and very often inconvenient.

Maybe i've given the impression it's worse than it is but the school have never made an issue about time keeping, they really aren't concerned because we've addressed it in that we take the older ones in first so madam and i'm aware she's a madam doesn't cause them to get a late mark.
At the end of the day the constant battles were making her life a misery so whilst she doesn't rock up at 10am i am not going to pour water over her to move her along which was so helpfully suggested further up the thread.

She gets nudged along and as i say some days we get their before the bell, other days we don't, lessons haven't ever started before we arrive.
As for being a bohemian parent, I don't think so, the children obey the law, they don't hit others, they don't hurt other peoples feelings, steal, lie etc but we don't sweat the small stuff and this really is small stuff in the grand scheme of things but it shows how ingrained being good and doing as you are told is even with adults which i find just plain odd.

It's called being courteous and respectful to others mamatomany. It's what being part of a society is all about.

And in any event, what on earth are you going to do as she gets older when it really will matter? Do you hope she's going to grow out of it?

I agree with Lady and Expat.

Mama - it may not seem impirtant now, but as your dd gets older being on tine WILL be important, and she isn't just going to start getting up in the morning because she has stepped over an imaginary line in the sand where school punctuality crosses over from being unimportant to necessary.

And why is she up so late? Surely getting her to sleep so she is able to get up in the morning is the key.

I agree with IagreewithLeQueen2.

(I am getting a bad feeling about this now.

No I hope she'll be faced with consequences which do bother her and she is therefore motivated to do it for herself. Not getting a sticker isn't of any concern to her what so ever.
Those you who think you can bully and control children to enforce your will are the ones who'll get a shock IME they have to want to do it themselves otherwise forget it.

Bully and controlling?

Nope. Not at all. I have a 14 year old who gets up, goes to school, does well and is happy.

It is called motherhood.

Can't imagine your dd will be doing so when she is 14 if you carry on as you are.

Right back atcha with the brickbats, mate.

She'll sit reading or playing in her bedroom, nicely her older sister will be asleep in the room.
She is up so late because she cannot sleep, she's put to bed at 7.30pm and stays in her room, but she won't sleep.

The woman who lives opposite us has 2 dc's and lives 5 mins away from the local primary. Every day I see her leave at 9:05 to take them to school. Her eldest started at middle school this week and I can only assume he missed the bus on his first day. They came back from the bus stop at 8:20, her mum then came and picked him up at 10am to take him in!
She doesn't work, has no fella and lives in a council house. Her neighbour works with dh and said she can normally still hear the kids running up and down the stairs until gone midnight(although some will say that makes no difference, make of it what you will)

It's not about bullying and control, it's about showing them gently that society works best when everyone pulls together and does their bit for the greater good. It's about making them realise that life isn't all Me Me Me, or one long party, and we all have a social resonsibility to one another if civilisation is to work at all.

There are hundreds of thousands of utterly useless, unemployable, marginalised young people in this country because someone has told them they don't need to do anything they don't to do, and they can't be 'bullied' and 'controlled' by people in authority.

There is also another woman down the road who zooms past with her dc in the car at about 60mph at 2 mins to 9 every day (again a 5 min walk away)

Well we are going for the self motivated method that teaches them self reliance so they are still capable when we aren't around, it's worked perfectly well for the older 2 and i've no reason to believe the little one won't get there in the end too without everyone getting their knickers in a twist every morning.

I'm not one of the early mums myself but up till last year I always used to see another mum hurrying along to school even later than us - we were late for being on time - she was late. I always used to wonder how she managed to be so consistent I don't see her anymore because she died last year just after her youngest son had started reception. Being on time is important, of course it is - but there are other much more important things in life.

We used to be late for school quite a lot so now I set the alarm half an hour earlier, there is no TV in the mornings including DH and I shout quite a lot.

There are few people who are always late and I know I've failed if I see them on the way to school and not on the way back!