To think a 40 minute walk to school nursery is manageable?

[Heckythump1]

We are looking at pre-schools for September for an almost 4 year old. (We've just found out we have to move in a few weeks) we have a few choices but our favourite on paper is a school nursery 40 minutes walk away. Neither of us drive so we will have to walk whatever the weather, although there are buses for some of the journey.
We are visiting all options in the next week or so.
Am I being daft wanting to send them to a better place further away or should I send her to a closer one that I don't like as much?

And all this nonsense about the child being knackered. How bloody unfit are children these days! Sure, they'll find it tough at first but they'll build fitness and stamina and they'll end up walking faster than you .

I wonder how many of the people saying "it's fine, it's fine" would happily walk to and from work six times a week (there and back each time for the OP) regardless of the weather or any other extenuating circumstances.

What about when you have to carry around spare clothes for DC who may not yet be toilet trained? Plus another set of dry shoes and clothes because everything they wore to nursery in the morning is still damp from the rain? Carrying projects they've made or whatever?

I used to walk about a mile to work everyday and in summer it was great - nice fresh air, some sunshine before I started my day, I could stop in town on my way back for coffee or ice cream. In winter, however, it really was horrendous. The idea of getting up and walking to work in the dark and in horizontal rain and cold is pretty unappealing - I wouldn't have wanted to take a child with me, then walk back again, and then do the same trip all over again a few hours later.

1.5 miles in itself is not a great distance and nobody here is saying it is. They are saying that the monotony of doing it all the time regardless of bad weather or anything else soon wears you down!

@adaline A healthy four year old should be toilet trained and even able to use the lavatory unassisted. They’ll be in school shortly. An educated guess tells me that most parents who bother to walk further to a better nursery or school are usually going to have bothered training their child too. Less likely to have constipation too.

Yes I did the walk most days one rain, shine, snow and on Fridays we walked home after we’d walked from school to swimming lessons.
It’s perhaps different if you need to get to work at a set time.

You leave spare clothes and plimsoles at nursery or school and wear waterproof coats in winter. It’s good for children to understand the changing seasons and changing weather. It’s good to feel rain on your face and jump in puddles. It’s sad so many children are wrapped in cotton wool and travel by car from hermetically sealed building to hermetically sealed building.

I wonder how many of the people saying "it's fine, it's fine" would happily walk to and from work six times a week (there and back each time for the OP)

I did and I do (well, 5 days a week) . I think this thread shows the divide between people who either don't drive, or choose not to drive short distances, and those people who are wedded to their car. We (as a family) have made a constant decision to use the car as little as possible, and once you get used to walking (or cycling) it's really not a big deal.

As I said up-thread, there are many many people living near me who regularly walk/cycle their older child to junior school with their youngest in tow (1.5 miles away) and then walk their youngest most of the same way back to infants school (so a 3 mile round trip for an infants age child) (granted most people share with friends so their DC only do the round trip once a day). No one considers this weird or impossible. I think we've lost track of what is really quite normal.

I suppose it's all personal opinion isn't it?

If OP is genuinely happy to walk 160 minutes a day to and from pre-school that's her choice - personally I can think of better ways to spend my time!

Nonsense that a child will be knackered after a full day in preschool, especially while they're still getting used to it?! Mmmkay.

As someone who does more walking than that as part of my childcare run/commute, and would do even more of it on foot if I were less constrained for time, I take exception to to the posts that suggest people who think it’s doable and biologically normal are naive folk who’ve only made their child do that kind of walk as a leisure activity on a sunny day.

I’m in London and I appreciate this will vary geographically, but it honestly doesn’t rain that badly that often. Colleagues who walk or cycle say the same thing (because it often comes as a surprise when you commit to daily protracted exposure to the elements) - proper rain is not that frequent, even in winter.

I don’t think it’s healthy for children (or adults) to be so protected from inconvenience.

If somewhere for children’s waterproofs/boots to be hung to dry during the day is not available - and I can believe this - I would 100% be ‘that parent’ about it and help them find somewhere suitable.

All else held equal, of course it’s preferable that a school is more local. But in the real world all is not held equal and if that school was a noticeably better fit for my (very young, especially) child, I would not hesitate to do it. Side benefit would also be that hopefully they then grow up into the kind of person who just gets on with it, whatever the weather!

@Belenus Humans evolved to be able to walk and run over long distances. It's the thing that gave us an evolutionary advantage over other hunters. It's what our bodies are adapted for. A 40 minute walk isn't wasted time, it's time spent walking. And it's so sad that so few people want to do this

We did that in order to be able to hunt. Are you also super sad you’re not spearing buffalo on a daily basis now?

I’m in London and I appreciate this will vary geographically, but it honestly doesn’t rain that badly that often.

Come and live in Cumbria where more often than not, it's blowing a gale and/or pissing it down between about October and April!

I was one of those who said no way. Not because 40min walk is terrible for a child or that it's somehow impossible.
I have never owned a car and I cycle everywhere. Just the thought of walking 40 minutes 4 times a day bores the crap out of me. Especially if the route is the same. I walk 2miles to work occasionally and it's ok. Whenever the snow is at its worse I don't cycle so then I need to walk it twice a day for several weeks and I hate it. I have the right gear for wether, but would just rather cycle.

The kid will be fine and the adult will be fine. I just couldn't be bothered. Also I would dislike that walking is the only option.

Heaven forfend your child is miserable or tired.
It's not forty minutes each way, it might be forty minutes one way with a small child, but possibly half that the way back.
How on earth do people cope without cars?

Chuck sone hard-earned £££ at a car, give up the opportunity for some exercise, join the school traffic jams and pump out some pollution into the air OP, so long as you don't get tired legs or a bit bored.

We did that in order to be able to hunt. Are you also super sad you’re not spearing buffalo on a daily basis now?

Not really, but i recognise my anatomical and physiological adaptations and that I'm healthier if I live at least some of my life in accordance with them. So I like to get a fair bit of exercise, because it keeps me healthier mentally and physically. And I find the gym boring so I'd rather exercise served another purpose as well. Which means active travel is ideal because I'm exercising plus getting somewhere at the same time. And at the same time I'm lessening my impact on the environment.

It's not so much individual choices that I find depressing. It's that we're so stuck in a system in which those choices seem logical. We're so time poor that getting in a car and driving somewhere seems better than walking or cycling - which for short journeys often doesn't take much longer. And we're so afraid of being wet or cold for a bit that we feel the need to use cars, even though in the long term they will do considerable damage. Seems a mad way to live and I wish we could get to a stage where we facilitate better choices.

Its the monotony that gets me.School runs are hard enough without having to walk miles and miles.

It's not forty minutes each way, it might be forty minutes one way with a small child, but possibly half that the way back.

Even if OP can do it in twenty, that's still a minimum of two hours a day spent doing the school run.

Which I suppose is fine if that's how you want to spend your time, but you can't deny it's a large chunk of your day spent ferrying your child to/from school - worse on the half days where you won't have much time to do anything before turning back around to do the pick up.

Lots of people on here are also probably posting from the point of view of people who don't have that much spare time each day!

I wonder how crap people's coats must be too, for them to get cold and wet in winter. The weather in this country is never that extreme. No reason to be cold when walking unless you genuinely can't afford a proper coat.

It's definitely worth spending a couple of hours a day for a few days each week if you're getting your child into a setting that is more suited to them.
Going to an inferior school or group just because you can't be bothered to walk is a shame.
I'd probably get a bike - be able to pare it down to half an hour per trip eventually.

The weather in this country is never that extreme.

It depends where you live and what the conditions of your walk are like, doesn't it? Cumbria is far more prone to extreme weather than say, Suffolk or Norfolk, for example.

To be dry here in winter you need more than a waterproof coat - you need insulation, layers, waterproof trousers (decent ones, not just cheap £20 ones) and waterproof shoes - ideally boots for the better grip. I have all those things (I have dogs) and none of them were cheap, but it's still miserable to be out in that kind of weather day after day, especially when the wind picks up and you can't use an umbrella.

I’m in London and I appreciate this will vary geographically, but it honestly doesn’t rain that badly that often.

I'm in a really high average rain part of UK at bottom of some hills -often by time we get to city centre rain will have clearerd - it rains here a lot yet first few years even locals said they’d never had such wet winters.

I’ve also got summer born kids who were utterly exhausted by school in early years so despite being used to walking for miles they struggled.

Clearly this has shaped my perception that walking winter school runs are a pain in the arse. DH has as part of his commute last bit 45 minutes’ walk up hill to get home – even he says he’s glad we didn’t buy another ten minutes up the road because day in and out those minutes start to be felt.

Not enjoying it isn’t the same as not being able to do it and I'm sure the OP and her child will be able to.

She has to take her medication when she wakes up on an empty stomach, and should eat between 30 - 60 minutes later, which often means that she has to eat in form time. She has been told today, that she will have to leave the form room to eat alone, as her peers would wonder why they can't eat too!!!!!

Some people do better with taking the tablets at night too. I know it is scary at first but she will get used to it all. I've never bothered with the wait after taking them thing.

Or she can crunch them and have them absorbed sublingually rather than swallowing them. That's faster.

Oops I think that's all on the wrong thread.

40mins? Too long for such a little one to walk sorry.

It's the time not the tiredness (although I don't think my DS would have managed it) that I'd see as the biggest issue. 40 minutes is a very long journey twice a day for a 4yr old, they'd have to get up earlier, not get home until later etc. It's a hell of a lot of time of out your day going backwards and forwards twice a day.

40 minutes each morning and afternoon outside on a freezing cold chucking it down with rain in December. Every day all winter? Doesn't appeal to me!

Personally I think being close to where all the other children come from is important too. Ideally build a few relationships with children who'll be going to the same primary school.

Or at least have play dates with occasionally. That's very difficult if the other children are 15mins the other way - that'd be over an hours walk to get to their friends houses/ birthday parties etc.

I did a similar journey with three kids: two in a bike trailer, and baby on a front bike seat. I got an electric bike, and it was really good fun!

A couple of years later I took my youngest to nursery 6 miles away (non-electric bike, bike seat on the back). I got super fit! Far more efficient than walking.

You won't get in anyway if it's a good school as nowhere near it so I would even worry about it. You won't even be in the catchment area.