To get annoyed at the way all the parents at the school gate do this....

[NeoMaxiZoomDweebie]

Instead of spreading out a bit and keeping the exit free, they all gather in a crowd inside the yard directly in front of the gates blocking it completely.

WHY!?

I hate sheep. I have tried to break the sheepy behaviour and wandered off alone into the VAST space that is the playground...hoping one of them will follow me...but no. They all huddle together, smack bang in front of the only exit.

As the DC come out, they have to cross the big yard to come towards this mass of parents...a hideous seething mass of Amandas and Richards...all lumped together. They might as well all wear one frigging waxed jacket....one enormous waxed jacket for they have become PARENT.

No individuality is allowed....PARENT moves as one....speaks as one...and always blocks the frigging gate! AIBU to be getting madder and madder about it daily?

get a ribbon and do this with all your space

Herd them! LOL

That's why I will turn up last to pick my son up. I get there dead on 9 at nursery and there's no crowds. Its great

I should! I have one of those....well it's DDs. I'm sure my DC would be thrilled by the sight of me expressing myself in the space.

I agree with quote. Her idea is the very dab.

I'd think you were wonderful and be resolved to make you my friend forthwith.

SP Sadly, I get a lift and the lift is ALWAYS early. I am happy to have a lift...but God. The bore of it all....I want to chase towards the crowd and say "Shoo! Shoo!" and watch them scatter like hens and cocks.

No idea, I sit in the car till I see DD and then do a quick dash and grab! Parent politics at the school gates? Can't be arsed!!!

Take a unicycle and ride it around in all that space

Pictish I am tempted to take a handful of them and make the other parents join in. We could do a flash mob for the kids.

[worryingly I actually want to do that but I won't]

Sp I want to I want to!

All parents at the school gate do this?

I have been a school run mum for 19 years and have never done this.

YANBU to be pissed off at the ones that do though, I find that accidentally clipping their heels with the buggy help.

Last year the parents came through the gate and spread out towards their respective classrooms.
This year they are clustering by the gate. There must have been a memo that I missed. I've also noticed that some of them form a new cluster on the other side of the gate as they leave and chat with the many many people they know. So the gate is blocked on both sides and you get a dirty look for being rude enough to interrupt their chatting and asking them politely to move a little.
I tried getting there really early and setting a new trend for standing away from the gate - but no, they left me stood like Nobby No Mates.

Take a big dog and walk through the gate. People will scatter.

The HT would have me pinned to the floor in a headlock before I could get passed the cluster. She's not keen on dogs on school premises at all.

or get one of those really large pieces of chalk,

draw a large half circle around them, and say "stay", with a hand signal,

and walk backwards away from them with your hand still up.

if anyone goes to step over the line say,"No" and point them back.

Ooh Blimey my DS's school must have some very polite mum's then!! The parents actually queue, yes queue outside the playground gates (that are inside the main reception gates) before they are opened up to allow access in to the bit beside the classrooms 5 mins before home time where they continue to queue. Then when the gates to outside the classrooms are opened (each classroom had a door opening straight to outdoors round the back of the school,) they form sort of double depth semi circles around each classroom door! Hmm obviously a naice area! Haha.

School collection seems to have got so complicated! Don't all these people filling the playground and blocking the gate have anything else to do?

Ours has become horrendous at one point with lots of the parents clustering around one door in a passageway about 3m wide there are about 60 parents whose little darling has to be the first to glimpse their parent and so end their long separation (all yr 3 and above) - I tell dd1 to come and find me somewhere in the expansive playground near dd2 classroom, we still have to fight our way through this bottleneck to get out. The school can't cope with a doubling of size.

You could buy a hula hoop and use the ribbons to tie it around your waist, giving you a non-invasion zone?

birthday God I thought that kind of thing stopped in year 1! Ours are juniors too.....we all stand miles away from the doors....but still humped together as one.

Our lot do spread out-until the teacher opens the door, and then you can guarantee that at least one will need to speak to the teacher and will block the whole doorway with their person, thus preventing the children from going in. Why they can't stand sideways on I don't know, or slightly to one side of the door.

It's a puzzle.

At our school the ones right outside the gate not only cluster, they also all light up and a cloud of smoke forms around them all for everyone to walk through

I rarely do the pickup, but I tend to wear headphones and stand apart when I do.

I used to be very outgoing, but I don't care to try and make friends as an outsider anymore.

midnight The topic of big dogs at the school gates could make an epic AIBU thread.