To think that there has got to be a better way, but struggle to find and implement it.

[jimijack]

The morning school routine.

Every morning I tell ds to get dressed 50000 times, get his breakfast 50000 times. You get the picture.
It's so frustrating.

How do you all have a stress free morning? Or do you all have this problem too?

We/I hate it. How can I make this better?
Suggestions all welcome.
Poor ds, I feel awful when he has gone to school. He is 10 btw.
Thanks.

Mine was the same, it's very frustrating especially when friends would tell me their dc would get up at 6am, dress and shower and prepare breakfast for the whole family

I the end, I stepped back a little, gave him a clock and told him the exact time he'd have to get dressed, eat, comb his hair etc. and eventually his panic over being late for school did the rest.

It's been a great improvement since secondary though. Good luck, I feel your pain!

Btw, I still have to make his breakfast and lay out his clothes, that's the next step!

what is he doing in the time he is meant to be getting ready?

If he is sleepy, it may be an issue with what time he drops off. You might need to think about what's in his room: screens, phones, etc?

If he is distracted, it may be an issue with what's available in his room to muck around with instead of getting ready. In that case it could be as simple as taking him out of his own room and leaving him in yours with his clothes to get dressed.

Breakfast- tough titty. If you don't eat in time you leave clutching a bit of toast and you are hungry all morning.

I have 2 school age DCs (age 5 & 8), I have to get out to work myself and we all have to leave by 8:25.

I have a chart with all the things they have to do every morning. If they do everything on the list then they get pocket money for that morning (10p per morning - I also have an afternoon & evening chart and they get all the money on a Friday). If I have to remind them to do something more than once then they get a cross (more than 5 crosses per week means no pocket money).

Also no TV or computer etc until they are completely ready for school with shoes & coat on!

God, that makes me sound like I run some kind of military prison.

It's actually quite stress free and has vastly reduced the amount of shouting in the morning!

My friend with six had one DS who was like this. One day he was marched all the way through the village to school with no shoes on, and told that tomorrow he'd be going in his pyjamas. (She did let him wear his PE shoes for the day whyen they got there). That worked :)

Seriously, 10 is quite old. He will be at secondary soon. Is he generally disorganised, or is this a morning thing?

I would give him a time that he has to be ready for and breakfast eaten. Say 10 minutes before you need to go out. If he is not ready he goes to bed 5 minutes early that night, 10 minutes the next and so on. Take all screens out of his room, but let him look at a book at night. I once taught a child who would not get ready for school and her mother carried her in her pyjamas kicking and screaming. She was always ready after that.

Is he just not getting on with it & dilly dallying or does he have problems with attention, organising himself, sequences etc?

Is he better with visual cues, would a picture chart help him?

I have reminders beeping on my phone every 5-10mins for every step of the morning routine to help keep me & them organised & on occasion they have only eaten half a breakfast in the car if they haven't got ready in time to sit down & eat properly.

There are very little distractions tbh. He doesn't have any electronic stuff, phones etc and is only allowed TV in his room on a Friday & Saturday night.
(Mean mum)
In bed by 9.
He dilly dallies, fafffs around, daydreams. Wants to chat but all the time does naff all about getting dressed, his breakfast and stuff.

Clothing is in a clean & ironed pile, breakfast he gets himself, he is 10 and more than capable, but there's a 10 minute discussion about what to have! He gets 2 choices.

He DOES however have an alarm clock in his room, I'm going to bring it down & set it to beep for timing each thing.

It's fair to say he has no sense of urgency about him at all!
Thanks ladies, glad it's not just me. Oh and I am not opposed to marching him through our village in his pyjamas. Love it!

Its difficult because he is 10 and soon he will be at secondary school. Soon he will need daily showers or he will start to niff a bit and homework is going to be upped. So a lot of input from you might be counterproductive. He needs to take over responsibility himself pretty soon. I would actually have a discussion with him about teenage life, and the opportunities that will open for him next year, and getting past his current (baby) stage of lack of personal organisation.

I have a DD with LD and dyspraxia so teaching independence is something I have done a lot of. I would encourage him to have a series of alarms on his own phone (if he has one?) and a BIG poster on the wall with the stages of the morning. Simplify the morning- make him get his packed lunch ready the night before and lay out his own clothes and pack his school bag. No more breakfast choices, he either has the same one every day, or it's a rota.

so, for instance, a morning poster might go:

BRUSH FANGS
WASH
DRESS
EAT
PACK BAG WITH LUNCH
GET COAT AND BAG
GO

and that's it- no more detail or stages. big writing. Phone alarms can be customised to say different things if his phone is posh enough and he likes that kind of thing.

My 9yo is awful.

"Weegiegirl, get dressed" - comes back with a guinea pig in her arms.
"Weegiegirl, brush your hair" - returns with the rabbit!

"Weegiegirl, get yourself breakfast!!" - "what is there?"
Mutters "same as every other fecking morning when you ask this"

Gives me the rage!

Make him a chart with the time and what he needs to do for example -

07:00 - Get up
07:15 - Get dressed
07:45 - Breakfast
08:00 - Schools shoes on go to school

I would tell him you will not be waiting for him to complete each task before moving him on to the next one, so if he is half dressed, no breakfast, no shoes on for example, tough he goes as he is.

Had mine half way out the front door in vest and pants when she was younger, she knew i meant business and was very rarely late again

lol at weegiegirl. rabbits and guinea pigs are much nicer than getting dressed!

I would not let her out of her room until she is dressed. Point out that the poor rabbit/guinea pigs will be LONELY and HUNGRY until she gets dressed and gets there.

As for breakfast, have just one thing. And then you can say "get yourself muesli" or whatever it is.

She's the great prevaricator! Also the rabbit is a house rabbit so sometimes in her room anyway.

She always asks about breakfast then has the same every day - toast & butter, plain yoghurt with a banana chopped in and a cup of tea!

But dd1 was like that at her age and now 13 she gets up 6.45, has a shower, dries hair, gets dressed and leaves at 7.35 (often with banana in hand!).

The best thing we ever did for mornings though is that every night after tea everyone (including dh!) makes their packed lunch. That's 15 mins stress gone!

Ah yes, vanity, the only thing that gets teenagers up and washed in the mornings

Doesn't have a phone. Alarm clock is the thing to do I think.

He has jobs to do every morning too, he is supposed to empty the dishwasher before breakfast for pocket money.
I've given up arguing with him about this now.
He has done this for the past 2 years with little prompting, recently though he has shown resistance.

Ahh well, God help us when teenage years hit.