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!

I honestly don't see how they're helpful to anyone - parent or child. The child is just shocked when they have to do a full day! Most kids have also been to nursery with at least school hours, so the whole business is just confusing and stressful!

I thank my lucky stars our eminently sensible primary doesn't take this approach. Instead they have small intakes of children according to age order, throughout the first two weeks of September, so not everyone is starting at the same time, but they all start off on a FT basis. The older ones are in the routine and help and newbies. Seems to work very well.

Our schools don't do that any more. It's full days from day one.

Correct - it’s the legal position and we used it to send DT’s full time from day one and avoided the staggered start.

You will find that a decent amount of annual leave is now taken over by primary school stuff. I think DH and I both set aside 1 week, not always needed but precaution wise it was worth it.

DH and I split these transistion days, similar to splitting most of primary school events.

It's part of the way it works. DD was at full time nursery for 4 days/week but a new envrionment, lots of new children and adults is a lot for some children who aren't even 4 yet.

I had to take annual leave when my first went to primary school as I wouldn't have been able to do it myself. I know not everyone can but I specifically saved a week for it that year as there was no way I'd could work and do 9am drop off and 12pm pick ups and my job wasn't a wfh job.

DS' school wasn't too bad he did a Monday morning with half the class in non uniform then Tuesday off (couldn't go to nursery his place there was gone), Wednesday afternoon with the whole class in uniform, then straight into full days. We had to book leave which I know is not possible for you.
A colleague had 3 weeks of a couple of hours, then half days it was ridiculous. Lots of children do full days at nursery these days. Those who don't, have the option to with the government funding. It's unusual to find a child who hasn't been in childcare provision by reception age.

You can’t take a few days annual leave? You have no one at all to help? I’m struggling to believe you can’t make it work unless you’re choosing not to. To ask the obvious if they aren’t there where will they be?

How many times?The OP works in a school - she can’t take annual leave, parental leave won’t be granted. Do you really think that hasn’t occurred to her !

Sorry I edited because I missed that it was from summer term but for everyone else I said school have to legally provide full time education from September and so you can ask them to start full time rather than transition.

I always wondered how these were even legal. Kids have to be in school full time from the September after the turn 4. But the school then decides that for the first few days/weeks (dependent on the school) they are only in part time. And it’s for the benefit of the kids despite the fact that all schools do it differently. Right-o.

Are you able to keep them in nursery? DS' nursery ended contract for anyone going to school in September, at the end of August so if he hadn't started until the second or third week of September that would've been a huge issue!

Am amazed at the number of parents who aren’t aware of the legal position of being able to start full time from day one and ignore a staggered start. For many children (and parents), a staggered start is not in anyone’s best interests.

A school can propose a staggered start but it’s not legally enforceable.

They’re about to start school full-time, some of them have only just turned 4. It’s a massive transition and from here on in, they’ll be at school / college / uni / job for the rest of their lives… you can juggle for a few weeks to help them settle in ffs. It should be a special time where they really need parental support and seen us such, not an inconvenience.

And how would you cope if your child's teacher or teaching staff just took off what they needed during term time meaning your kids don't get their education or support they should- you should note OP works in a school. They don't get AL and will probably be working to support the children in their school!

Some people need to remember some jobs are not flexible and those jobs are important to society.

Way to try and make the Op feel bad too.

It’s bad luck that you don’t have flexible annual leave, your DH is away and you don’t have any family or friends that can help out. I think if you can do one or two of the days that will be absolutely fine. My DS missed his step-up day because we had a long-booked holiday at that time. I don’t think it made much difference at all as he’s a reasonably confident child. It’s good to have the option though, it wouldn’t be fair on the other children to stop them just because a few can’t make it.

Looking to the future, it may be worth lining up a back-up babysitter/childminder because once he’s at school these unexpected days are going to happen from time to time.

It’s an absolute pain and ironically, the parents that struggle because they have work to think about are the ones whose dc have been in childcare from a very young age, often.

And to add to the chorus, if you’re a teacher you cannot take annual leave. It doesn’t matter if you give a full year of notice, it ain’t going to happen.

OP, get your dc to what you can and don’t worry about the rest. It will make zero difference. Especially as it’s before summer!

No, I can’t take a few days annual leave. I’m a teacher.

No, I don’t have anyone who could help with this particular issue. Funnily enough my friends aren’t sat at home, keen to take and collect my child to school, and my parents died many years before I had children and DHs live many miles away and will only help with things like this ‘if they can’ and to be honest they usually can’t; they are lovely people but they do have lives of their own and it isn’t for me to say that this is right or wrong. It’s just how it is.

It’s the term after they turn 5 and it’s that they have a right to an education, it’s doesn’t need to be at school. So it’s absolutely fine to stagger it.

Very rarely and it is at the discretion of management.
You can request unpaid parental leave but this isn’t always granted.

Some schools are great and will work round letting parents take time for sports days, plays, and these kind of first day at school events but not all will.

We used to allow it more when we could cover one another using TAs and staff willing to swap PPa time, but the budgets are now so constrained it’s harder as there is less staff available and far less money to pay for additional cover.

Probably in the day care nursery that the OP has arranged up until the child starts school in September so she can work at a school with other peoples children 🙄

Not every job has Al, some are just term time only jobs.

Our school is just difficult to be honest. I will ask, as my teaching timetable will be very light as I primarily teach exam classes who have gone, but they’ll probably still say no.

Looking at it from the other viewpoint, back in the day my kids’s school lengthened the day from Y1 to accommodate working parents. I worked p/t so was really annoyed my kids had to have a longer day. The key thing is what’s best for the kids, with reasonable accommodations.

One of the ironies is that every day would have been manageable with the exception of Thursday, so of course that’s when most of the confounded days are!

You can’t plan for every eventuality and we can only do our best. I’ll just have to plead with school.

Ok I’m going to butt in here on op’s behalf, having worked in a school myself.
First of all, she is a teacher, I’m sure you would all be up in arms if your child’s teacher wasn’t there every time something was happening in school.
Secondly, this is for June/july, I’m sure the op has things sorted for September with a childminder or wrap around care, things that aren’t available as easily in July when the child hasn’t started school.
Having worked in a school myself, you just accept the crappiness that you are unlikely to be able to attend sports day or assemblies or nativities (although I was lucky as there was always an evening performance), so things that ‘come up’ are either covered by dad, or no one. Obviously there is the benefit of school holidays, but let’s stop assuming covering as hoc things is going to happen for everyone.
Op, don’t beat yourself up, I worked full time in a primary so my kids missed the odd thing or I wasnt there (luckily dad often was). I also calmed down a lot of parents guilt when they expressed this to me when dropping their kids off, we can’t all do everything and showing your kids that working hard is a good thing is something not all kids get. My kids are way past all of that now and are unscathed!