Went to DD's (Y1) 'sharing assembly' today. The back row was entirely filled by mothers with younger children and babies. These children proceeded to make the most tremendous racket throughout the assembly, to the extent that I actually couldn't hear anything of what was going on. DH went last week and had the same experience.
Now, I know that the mothers want to be there to support their school age children, and it's nice for the younger siblings to be there, and in any case there may be no alternative care in place ... BUT could the mothers not have taken the children outside when they got too noisy? We used to take DD to her brother's events. Mostly she was pretty quiet but, when she wasn't, we took her outside. Yes, I did miss quite a lot of half assemblies and plays, but DS knew that I had been there, understood about his sister, and really didn't mind. It was the fact that we had turned up at all that was important to him.
Am I being an old grouch?