To think Mumsnet is mainly south of the border members?

[frankie80]

I've been on Mumsnet for about 8 years and I've seen so few posters who say they are Scottish, and none whatsoever in my area (just outside Glasgow).

I've been on the local group (which is dead). It would be great to meet someone near me as I'm bloody lonely. I tried the meet a mum on the other mums website, that's dead too.

You'd think there were no mums in the west coast of Scotland or maybe they are all part of some super amazing website / group that I've yet to hear of!

Scottish mummies, where are you???

Site stuff thread here.

There is hunners of glaswegians on here I am not 1 of them but Scottish we all gather on threads like this for a blether

hi i'm also a fifer

Another Fifer here.

Yay there's a few of you near the bridge and/or in e Dunbartonshire which I could maybe get to. Feel free to PM me if anyone wants to meet up!

Has anyone posted on site stuff yet re: mawsnet?

I'm not Scottish but live here now. Can someone please explain the schools comments to me.

Squoosh I am in your part of the world this morning. DH's office is near them all too. That said Gerard Butler walked past us in hynland over the festive season and it was DS who spotted him .

Yes posted

Hairy what don't you understand?

*Hyndland... Ruddy autocorrect!!!

I have just read give them a sandwich send them to school

Painted, what the difference is between Scottish schools and the rest of the UK schools.
Sending them off with a sandwich?

If it's the 'give them and sandwich and send them to school' it refers to the fact that generally children go to their local schools, without all the trauma some poor souls (including my sisters) are going through trying yo get their kids into a good school.

Gerard Butler! Oh Hyndland's gone dow(a)nhill!

Hairy - in most of Scotland the angst over which school the DC go to and whether to pick the closest one with a worse OFSTED report or a further away one with an outstanding one...or DC not getting places in preferred schools, or in fact in any school..

It just doesn't exist, there's a school, you're in catchment, they go.

Ah, traditionally your morning snack (playpiece in Scotland) was a jeely piece (jam sandwich)

HairyHandedFucker, there's a lot less angst around school placements here cos we don't have daft lottery systems/applications etc. In the vast majority of places you will have a catchment non denominational primary, a catchment catholic primary, a catchment non-denom secondary and a catchment catholic secondary. You are automatically entitled to a place at the catchment school. You can also apply for out of catchment places and some people do, but it's much less of a chaotic process and (certainly when I did it) applying out of catchment didn't mean you lost your catchment place - if the out of catchment school said no, we're full then your catchment place would still be there.

Of course people still try to live in good catchment areas, especially in the cities where there are more schools, but it seems far less troublesome than down south.

xposted with a few folk!

We don't have to apply for secondary or sit SATs either.

If you want your kids to go to a 'better' school however you define it you move to an area with a good school or go private.

You can make placing requests but they aren't that common and they are often hard to get accepted.

Joking aside waiting to see if your child has got a place at the local primary must be a nightmare

I'm in West Lothian but am desperate to move back to Edinburgh.

Ah! Thank you so much for the school explanations!

'Ah, traditionally your morning snack (playpiece in Scotland) was a jeely piece (jam sandwich)'

Not by the time I went to school it wasn't, my mum is English and thought she'd cracked this whole piece/playpiece thing by sending me with a sandwich, years of children looking at me like ensued until I finally managed to convince her that it was just a snack, not a piece.

Though to be fair, fruit didn't help as I distinctly remember being asked several times why I had a chicken drumstick for my playpiece as clearly Scottish schoolchildren in the eighties didn't recognise a pear, rofl.

Our school systems are completely different Hairy, in lots of ways.

We generally start at 4.5 or 5 here not 4 as in England. We don't have a reception year. Children do 7 years of primary and then 4-6 years of secondary depending.

You can defer a child that will be young for their year(and here that's a January/February baby not a summer one) but unlike in the rest of the UK it's a true deferral so you don't skip a year and then join back up with your cohort, you are held back a year and stay with them.

If your children aren't at school yet then you might wan

Forgot to say we also don't follow the 'National' Curriculum, we have our own so we haven't been subject to Mr Gove.