To think 2 and a half weeks 'lead in' to school is mad!

[fifitot]

DD started reception. The children have 4 days consisting of 2 hours, 4 days the following week from 9.30-2 and then it is not until the following week they start full time.

It's madness. Most of the kids in her class have been in the nursery anyway and hardly need nearly 3 weeks to bed in to school!

Talk about inconvenience for parents. I'm all for a gentle introduction for the kids but think this is ridiculous. Every other school near us does a couple of half days and then away they go! How people who work full time manage it I do not know.

It will be half term and they will have hardly done a full day in school!

Well there seems to be even worse situations than the one our school has set up so should count myself lucky I suppose!

I appreciate that some kids need a settling in period but tbh I just think there should be a compromise about being all about the children and taking into account the childcare nighmare these situations throw up.

Some parents HAVE to work, have no family nearby to help and may have very limited leave. Luckily that's not me but lots of others I know are really struggling.

Just think it's daft and agree with Faaamily that it can be counterproductive in some cases.

curlymama getting a childminder for a short time wouldn't be possible round here. I had to recently find a new childminder and in a reasonable sized town had a choice of 1 person who could do the hours I needed and could do ds1's school pickup. Luckily she has enough soace to be able to do the extra hours until ds oes full time.

albie what could have caused a problem with the part timeness for us if it had gone on for more than 2 weeks was my work. If the childminder couldn't have had him for the extra times on the 3 days I work dh would have had to take unpaid leave from work (no holidays left due to his work being a pain, but that's a whole other story) because I'm a teacher and so can't take time off and we don't have any family close enough to help.

I think a short part time bit is good as even being used to full days at preschool I think 5 full days in a row would have been hard on ds.

booyhoo the LA (the LEAs disappeared yonks ago) get their money from the taxes - it doesn't magically appear from nowhere.

curlymama - the school could give the parents the choice as to whether they left them all day. Then those who are not used to daycare could go home. It is not about the cost of daycare in most cases - I am a SAHM (a work at home mum actually) but not everyone has grandparents etc who can pick up their children. If you do not work locally to the school then how are you supposed to get your child from the school to the nursery at midday?

I can't see how being picked up by a frazzled parent who has either had to use up all their annual leave (so no family holiday) or who is completely stressed dashing right left and centre can be better for a child who is already used to full time day care.

We are doing half days until Christmas!

I'm off on adoption leave anyway, but it would be a real pain if I was working.

albie the problem is finding someone to pick up a child at midday. Around here (in the sticks) most parents do work and they work about an hours commute away (in the nearest city). The nursery runs drop offs and pick ups at the local schools but only at the standard start and finish times. They will not do the staggered times - they are all different (my ds was 12 for the last 2 weeks, now he will be at 1 for the next two weeks etc). IF I worked I'd be completely stuffed - who would pick him up? Most people cannot get 4 - 6 weeks off work and IF the child is already bein gdroped off at nursery at 8am and picked up at 6pm then they can easily do a day at school. It is hard enough to get a childminder (or a nursery place) with the right notice etc. Getting a short term one would never happen.

It is about choice.

a lot of younger children, even if they've been to nursery, do find full days at school (even the half days!) very tiring.

Our schools do full time from day one - but you can't start until the term after you are five.

Why are today's children so delicate? I started school as a rising 5 in 1968 and went full time (8.45 until 4pm) from day one. Although I'd been to playgroup it was only 2 or 3 mornings a week.

DD1 started school at 4 1/2 in 1990. She'd been to playgroup 4 mornings and one afternoon a week, plus a whole (school) day at nursery, then went FT to school from day one.

If children have been coping with FT school for at least the last 40 years why do they now need to have a long phased entry? If it's because they are starting younger then the obvious answer is to go back to 3 entry dates a year (Sept, Jan and Easter), instead of taking them all in September.

DD2 starts school next year. I work FT and she has been at nursery FT 8am-4.30pm since she was a year old. Her nursery is near my work- so about 20 miles away from her school. How do I get round doing 2 hour bursts of school for several weeks?

I don't believe they are "delicate" - we're just more aware of the fact that children aren't as robust as we always like to think they are.

Fact is many children can't cope with full time school (I remember going home crying when I started school, I was tired and exhausted, and confused, and really no-one except my mum cared - and even then she said "I'd get used to it". I did eventually - but it didn't help me settle in/enjoy school - and that was back in the mid 80's

My ds1 started 2 weeks a week and a half after the rest of the school. He's doing 2 hours a day for 2 weeks - 1.10 to 3.10. Then fulltime. I think that ott especially as most have done far more hours than that at the local preschool.

shoulg have been started this week part time for 2 weeks!

My children are 23,20 and 18. Wehn they startedschool all those years ago they did half days for 2 weeks. I found that although all 3 had been to nursery it helped them settle into thier new environment,

I like the Ozzie system. Kids start school later (compulsory school age is 6 and you can choose whether to start them as younger or older in their year group depending on what you think would suit them best) and off they go to school F/T from day 1. You rarely see tears in kindy (reception).

I think it is better to get them all in in Sept. It must be hard for the younger ones to settle in when the rest of the class have been in school for ages.

When ds started school last year they had 3 intakes based on birthdays. 1st Sept to 31st Dec started 1st week of Sept and did a week of mornings before going full time. 1st Jan-31st March started a week later doing afternoons until the beginning of October & 1st April-31st August started the same week as intake 2 but did mornings and didnt go full time until the week before half term!

Obviously ds was in the last group, as will dd1, dd2 is in the first group to that will be nice and easy!

My Grandson has just started and he is doing 3 afternoons a week from 1.10pm til 3.15pm. That's a total of 6 1/4 hours a week which is the equivalent of 1 full day! My daughter also has a 2 year old and a 1 year old. It takes her half an hour to get to the school then half an hour back to have just an hour at home before doing the whole journey again - that's not allowing for the time it takes to load them all in the car. I think it's ridiculous and getting the afternoon is a really bum deal IMO (they've split the class in half and the other half are doing mornings) as they don't really do much in the afternoons. He won't be full time until after half term! Crazy...

I agree that just doing the afternoon is ridiculous and mornings till one with lunch is far better. Saying that years ago we all just 'got on with it' isn't helpful...kids got shoved off to work too years ago but we eventually realised that wasn't good for them! Having to work around it, as working parents, is pretty shit, granted and I have to do it too. But I still think 4 is too young for full time school. Childhood is too short as it is without having to put in a uniform all day and every day when you are just 4!

YABU. Count yourself lucky!

My friend's DTs start school FT at Christmas . She knows someone who will have to pay about £3000 for a nanny to cover the three months of fannying about while she works.

Another friend I know, in the village next to mine where the children are PT until half term, is having to use up ALL HER ANNUAL LEAVE to cover the afternoons.

Dd1 had to do 6 weeks of messing about, but I was a SAHM so it didn;t matter so much. Now with dd2 starting I'm working and am having to call in favours, I've been lucky so far and thankfully the school has reduced the period to four weks.

So two weeks of dealing with this bonkers system is not too bad!

of course working parents should complain about inconvenience,it impinges upon work

I think for a lot of children a really long settling in period can be counter productive, particularly when they are the confusing 2 hours in the morning, then 2 in the afternoon next week kind. I'd prefer that the first week was half days then after that full time, much better for working parents and better for a lot of the children (getting into the routine straight away).

There is one school round here I would never send my children too, summer born children are part time until Easter. My friends DD is summer born and she hated having to go home in the afternoon when others in the class got to stay. There were tears every day at pick up time and the school was completely inflexible, going only off the birth dates rather than the child's needs (friends DD was not tired, just upset that she couldn't stay and have fun in the afternoon, she's a big fan of school). It created a bit of a divide in their class as well, as there were only 5 children this applied to and they felt different to the rest of their class. I can't see how that long a settling in period can be helpful at all, maybe in individual cases but certainly not as the norm.

I think 1.5 to 2 weeks is about right. I know someone who was 5 the week they started, had been at the school nursery for 18 months and was really settled there but still struggled the first couple of weeks, it's such a big change. Some kids don't need it though so I think it would be better if you got to choose for the first 2 weeks when you wanted to start full days.

Curlymama said: 'The parents that work have been paying for childcare for a long time anyway, surely getting a childminder or something for a few weeks won't make that much difference for them'

Well I thought that but it is not true. In our school the settling period 'depends on the child' which sounds fantastic at first. But the practicalities of this were a nightmare. We did not know for the first 3 months (and my child was a winter born one) what the programme for the week was. We had to check the bag for notes about how long she would be staying every week. She started full time the week before the Christmas break.

I could not plan childcare at all. I have another child and I work. It was very traumatic for my dd. She had to get settled in the school, plus she had to get used to a childminder, plus there was no clear routine for many, many weeks. It is not always the best for the child to do take this individual approach thing. I would have been happy if they would have told me from the start what the plan was. The assumption was that the mother does not work and therefore we are available and flexible for any timetable for an indefinite period of time.

But parents had no say on this. School knows best and they decided on my child's welfare. We all suffered and we all survived too. The good thing is: this happens once in a lifetime... well if you only have one child. For me, only one more to go.

DS (Summer born) has just started his 2nd week of afternoons, starts mornings in October but doesn't go fulltime until the start of December, so. Not only does he have to get used to school but a new childminder too....

Finding that childminder was a nightmare too as most don't want to take them as they use up an early years space ontop of the fact it'll only be for a few months...

some of you get it easy! i'm in germany where ds1 is still not at school despite being nearly 6 but when he does go next year he'll only go 3 or 4 hours for the whole of the 1st year and some of the 2nd year. at the most they go for 5 hours at primary school so dd (9) will be home in 20 mins!

but i agree that chopping and changing it is what makes the trouble for parents. If you knew that your dc was going every day for half the day till whenever then i'm sure you could work around it somehow.