So Eton, everything I expected and more

[JoanBias]

My DS is at a private school, so I have experience of private schooling, but my word Eton was like another world.

Not just the school, but the people there.

There was one prep school being shown around, all in tweed jackets, and to a boy the spitting image of Draco Malfoy (well there was one Chinese boy, but otherwise....).

One of the mothers doing the tour was not quite right in some respect, I'm not sure how but something wasn't wired up correctly or something. She was immacuately dressed, 6-inch heels (pretty daft considering the confirmation letter warns about having a long walk), but she was just bizarre. The admissions tutor said 'we have a waiting list of 80 boys and typically 35% of these will make it through', and she asked afterwards 'so 80% of the boys from the waiting list make it through?', and it was then explained again, but you could kind of hear the cogs going round and she clearly didn't get it. She had asked several other similar questions; e.g., it was explained that some Houses are catering and others go to a central cafeteria, so she then asked 'so they all eat in the cafeteria'? She pointed at the Fives Court and asked me 'what do they play here?' I said 'Fives' 'Is it squash?', she said. 'No, Eton Fives.' 'So is it squash?' It seemed as if this woman had had the benefit of the 'Finishing School for the Terminally Dim', because she was otherwise every inch the presentable upper middle-class wife.

Another family had a son who looked the prototypical pre-Etonian, and sure enough Daddy spent the tour braying on about his House when he had been there.

The facilities were extremely impressive, although they didn't bother to show us any of the academic parts, and basically the impression was 'if your son is incredibly pushy and self-motivated, send him here and we will teach him to be entitled'. They said 'every year we reject about a third of the highest performers on the test', essentially because they aren't pushy enough. (The House Mistresses seemed quite nice though.)

Fantastic training for future managing directors and whatever, but not for us.....

Well worth it to sign up for a tour, very illuminating. They take about 100 a day from what I can see, so obligation at all....

A level even.

Oops: so very ( not so vey).

We used to Home-ed so it is habit. DS2 is very interested in rocks, caves and fossils, so last year we planned our holiday around this. DS1 is interested in steam and history so we spent another week visiting Abbeys, battle grounds, old churches & cathedrals. These things make them happy but as part of the deal they are expected to engage in some form of learning. I don't expect them to just trail along, they ask questions, take photographs and they usually put together a project book. I try to keep them busy, we don't have television and neither child plays with toys. Both outgrew toys around five years of age! so what would you do with them?

Of more importance to me than indulging every whim in childhood is whether they have the skills and ability later to generate a life that gives them happiness as an adult. My parents were very social, very political and although I was indulged and had every material thing you could ask for, what I never had was any encouragement to achieve. My mother thought ladies should marry well and the only real effort that was made was to ensure I had RP and good manners. I neither married or married well and I swear like a trooper.

Your children don't have any toys? What do they play with?

I would hate to have no television. My Dc love rubbishy stuff but they've still achieved, objectively.

And no toys?! Sounds awful.

No toys, plenty of games though, books, puzzles and we have (shhh computers) I work from home so they have space in the office. If I'm here talking to you, they are often in here, they read, they play chess, have maths games, a couple of maths programmes online and they have recently started scouring youtube for these quirky 5 minute physics lectures. I'm learning loads! One is playing violin, the other goes riding, we live on the edge of a wood which they love and they both like making things. Boring for some maybe but we are happy.

But what do they do for imaginative play? I don't understand the need for everything to be so productive. Can't they just be?

They don't. DS1 wouldn't even wear fancy dress aged 4 to go to a party. Said he felt stupid. They do drama, does that count?

Yes, it would have been very boring for mine. X factor, Strictly, The Big Bang Theory, Made in Chelsea. No chance mine would have substituted playing chess and You Tube physics lectures for that.

Drama would count if they made up their performances. My ds wouldn't wear fancy dress to a party aged 4 either that has nothing to do with imagination. However he would and does do imaginative play. He also sits and does nothing.

It sounds as if your dcs are given no time to be bored or to organise themselves. What do they do when they go to visit friends who no doubt have toys?

Not really - it isn't the same as playing and using your imagination- it is directed.

I think they need benign neglect- time alone with friends- time to be bored and forced to rely on their imaginations.

MinitheMinx - Why are games different from toys? I thought board games were a type of toy? They are certainly something to play with... And computers are most peoples' main toy these days.
Did your children even give up on soft toys to go to bed with by the time they were 5? What about lego? What about watching films??? What about pretending something is a wand, or a telescope, or a sword to fight with? Wouldn't that be a toy? Do space hoppers, or climbing frames count as toys???? What about jigsaws?

Sounds far too earnest and twee. What's wrong with a bit of telly? I'm an avid reader myself and never watch tv but totally get that others want to and I'm not going to be all smugly wooden toys and creative play about it shudder

They are left alone, they watch physics lectures they are entertaining bite sized clips. DS1 has taken the pc apart because he wanted to, took the hub to pieces to see if he could fix it when we set up a new one. Both have made things, one likes painting, the other likes drawing ,they also have magazines. The eldest will even pick up a newspaper.They both like collecting things, one is collecting rocks, gems, fossils and shells, the other collects old coins and if we had the money and we let him he is interested in antique armoury and weapons.

Children do not need toys, children learn more and are actually more creative when they have access to ordinary everyday things.

Just as well we are all different Your son sounds as though he has done very well.

My two were playing with ds2's socks this morning. Socks apparently make an excellent toy if you heap them all into a pile and dive into the middle of them, then bury your head under them and try to find the lone grey sock with your eyes closed.

"Children do not need toys" just sounds silly to me - betrays a lack of imagination as to what constitutes a toy.

I can't imagine how you manage without toys- I still have some of mine up in the loft and the best of the DCs. I also think there are times they just want to chill out with TV. How old are they?

Your DS1 clearly thinks the PC is a toy, even if you think it is something far more worthy.

I think Mini is the first openly tiger mother I've ever seen on MN. I'm rather in awe and thinking that my parenting puts me fairly and squarely in the lazy fuckers' corner. Although I did encourage ds this evening to write down his music composition, which he eventually did after playing the theme from Mission Impossible and Chopsticks (as heard in the latest mini iPad tv commercial).

Well no hang on if you can get the lone grey sock with your eyes closed you are humungously gifted and must get a bursary, immediately, even if you are completely happy and thriving in a state.

I'm with you bisjo.

Worthy is the perfect word.

My DC's are watching Mission Impossible with their dad and I'm standing in the kitchen on MN. Everyone's happy.

Yellowtip - you think so? I shall fill out the forms forthwith. I realise now that the local school is not up to the mark for my little gems.

Mine got very resistant to me doing anything they thought had an educational angle.

The sock game sounds fun.

They play games and they also like to pretend they are in the army hiding behind trees in the woods. They just won't play with toys. We have lego, that comes out sometimes but not often now. Neither play with plastic toys, or sets of toys. DS1 even at a year would work out what a toy did then put it to one side, never showed any further interest in it. I bought a set of toy soldiers, tanks, helicopters and planes which sit in boxes untouched.