To think primary transition days aren’t much help if you work?

[Transitiondays]

Arghh. Three primary transition days, two with pick ups at midday and one full day but obviously finishing around three. I’m guessing this is standard but very difficult to manage!

This is so naive. Not all jobs are the same. The OP has said she's a teacher so v difficult usually to get time off for this sort of thing. I wasn't at either of my kids' first days of school because I had to be at my own. Her husband has an overseas trip booked in. Not everyone has 4 grandparents locally, as another pp suggested. The OP may not have a community of mum friends with kids going to the same school. I get that all these are possible options for some but it's not a "surely you can..." situation.
Illness is a bit different, as unless you are v unlucky and there's something longer term, the odd couple of days here and there has to be tolerated by even the most inflexible boss, including a Head.

OP going forward I'd talk to colleagues and management about options for the next few years. I was lucky to work in a schools that allowed unofficial covers between willing volunteers for things like nativity plays, see the classroom mornings etc.

Looking at some of the replies it does seem we’re quite lucky, as to my knowledge we don’t have these staggered days to start with but then we get the information about September on one of the transition days (thankfully the one I can attend, although I’ll have to take my toddler with me which could prove interesting!) so it might be we do have do a couple of weeks of half days; I hope not.

Ironically, I think most of the people saying just to use AL would complain about their child having a cover teacher so their regular teacher could have a day off...

Sorry @Parker231 i meant to say staggered start not transition days. I’ve corrected it now.

We had to wait as they wouldn’t budge and take them earlier.

Do you have any friends who you do a swap with? You have their kids one day and they have yours the day you can't do? I helped a teacher friend out last year because being a teacher is a right pain in these situations.

Perfectly standard. I started teaching in 1988. We did it then. My children did visit days in July and then 2 weeks in September of either half days in the morning or half days every afternoon in the mid 90s. Parents complained then. School is all about the children. You are about to enter a world where they are front and centre. Brace yourself it can get very frustrating.

The sad thing about this thread is the contempt of "JUST do x, y z" as though the system makes perfect sense and questioning it makes you a bad parent. There is no inherent reason school, childcare and work are structured in the way they are. It's late capitalism extracting as much value out of us as it can, at the expense of our health and our families.

It is completely reasonable, in fact the most sane response, to point out how stressful and harmful it is to parents that society expects them literally to be in two places at once, or somehow miraculously have the resources and money to cover both work and child responsibilities.

It's not good for us. It's not right. Resist!!

They legally don’t have a choice. We sent DT’s full time from day one regardless of the staggered start schedule.

Op, have you asked the school for flexibility? Are there dates that you or your partner are available that you could do instead? Dc school claimed that they had this flexibility. They didn't want all children in at once, so they asked for parents who had other commitments to let them know before hand so they could, adjust the schedule and be inclusive.

Who looks after your child on these days? Could they not take to transition days instead? I often take minded children if it's on their days with me, you certainly wont be the only parent who isn't able to go. Most nurseries will also do this, they're likely to have more than 1 child to take.

I can't believe how many think YABU

I think YANBU. What's the point in getting a child used to half days at school and then all of a sudden they have to go full time?

Luckily the school DD is going to have done away with staggered starts, they all start full time in September, with a few opportunities over the summer to meet the teacher and the classroom etc

Honestly they aren’t the be all end all, DSs school didn’t have anything transition wise, apart from a Teddy bears picnic which he couldn’t go too as we had an inspection in at work.
DD we didn’t find out her primary school until July before she started in Sept, as we’d moved areas.
Both were absolutely fine. DD knew zero children and had no issues at all.

it’s the long transitions in Sept that are ridiculous, for DS it was TWO whole weeks or either AM or PM sessions…: thankfully for DD it was one day…..

@Bread121bread the school my DS is going to have certain days where next years reception come in, they are the days. I’m sure it isn’t the end of the world if he can’t go to all of them but it does make you feel bad.

Put toddler in the pram with snacks and a toy.
You will not be the first that has done it, and will not be the last - some mums don't have the child care, schools understand this more than most other setting.

@Bibbitybobbity70 no. He currently attends nursery when I work and they obviously can’t leave the children to transport my DS around. A childminder might be different of course.

DC will be attending a public nursery, and they are managed by our council. I called up and asked for a start date while I'm still on maternity leave. DC won't be quite a year, yet, so they kindly got permission to start her early (they don't usually take them before they are 12 months). However, they are closed during the summer holidays and I'm a teacher (and single parent...yay), so we couldn't have done the settling in before I return to work otherwise.

However, other people use grandparents or other family to help with that. Colleagues of mine just had to be covered and someone else taught their lessons in that time. We've got very family-friendly laws here and the employer should help sort it, if there's an issue. My (independent) school is also usually very family-friendly and if such things can't be helped, then they can't be helped.
Unlike the OP, it wouldn't be an issue for me to request leave and have it granted.

It was two weeks here. Including for a child who has done a year in the school nursery.

DH and I both work full time and our AL is for the school holidays and emergencies. It’s shit.

Send them full time from day one as is the legal position. I’m surprised at how many parents don’t realise that you don’t need to accept staggered starts unless you want to

Our school has completely stopped doing all these transition and half days as they say the kids settle in better without them. They said at the talk for parents that they’d found parents having a positive attitude much more important. They were seeing multiple adaptation phases each time the setup changed (now you stay the morning, now you stay for lunch, now you stay all day). So don’t feel bad if he can’t do them, I’m sure he’ll be fine.

My dc are 11 and 13 and I still remember the horror of accommodating the staggered start. For dd1, it was over THREE WEEKS. DH and I had no flexibility with work at the time and no help, so we took the whole 3 weeks as annual leave between us to cover it.

By the time, the staggered start was much reduced and only over a week, which is much more manageable.

Blimey. Ever heard of people who have different circumstances? By the time my eldest started primary 3 of her 4 grandparents were dead and the other lived 6 hours away and wouldn’t have been physically capable

Not to pile on when you're probably already stressed but we had a couple of transition mornings in July like you, and we were categorically not allowed to take siblings. Not sure if we'd have been kicked out or anything but it was made very clear they were not to be brought. Have you checked with his school you can bring your toddler?

It's half a day because of school lunches, not especially for the children. Primary school transition day is only half a day in my school because the current cohort are still in school and will be returning to their regular classes in order to facilitate lunch times. Some of the Y6 children will be at their new secondary schools that day, but not all as all schools don't have transition days on the same day- we coordinate it so that ours is when the biggest group of Y6 children will be out. If we did a full day of transition it would be unfair on the Y6s to to be out of their classroom for a whole day, it would mean we had to accommodate the new reception children for lunch which wouldn't be posssible as lunch times are tightly run as it is.

It’s quite usual for primary schools to have a staggered start for September for Reception children but I have never heard of multiple transition days in June/July. My DD school had 1 hour on a random Thursday in June when you dropped them off to play and meet their teacher. DS’s school had 1 hour after school where they could come over with parents and explore.

Tbh I wouldn’t worry about attending all the transistion days in June. If you could make one that would be great. I would say that September was much more important.

Yes. But it's still not childcare.