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Anyone NOT ALLOWED to escort there recpetion children (aged 4) who have been there less than 3 weeks to the class room then?

150 replies

NannyL · 20/09/2007 19:31

OMG I am seething....

my 4 year old charge has recently started reception in a TINY private school. (It 'is' a house, not even a particularly big house, just a 4 bed detached house on a street with loads of other hosues that are similar)

Anyway the children hang the coats in the 'hallway'. Given that it was a house the hallway is not that massive, but that is where ALL the children in the school hang their coats / sort out their book bags, and remove snack box and reading folder, and then take off hat and put in their bag before hanging coat / balzer and book bag on peg and carrying snack box and reading folder into class room.

My 4 year old has been there for 3 weeks now.... Today i went in as usual (with the phil and teds buggy with my 2 year old strapped-in in). I made my 4 year old take off his coat HIMSELF, (and find the hook and hang it up on the peg) and take off his hat himself, and pass his hat to me to hold while he took his snack box and reading folder out of his bag himself , and then passed him back his hat so he could put it in his bag and hang the bag on the peg

(he was going on a play date today so also had another bag of home clothes)

The miserable old bag teacher then said to me "Now he's in reception dont you think he should be doing it himself" I said yes, he HAS done it himself (He is only just learning to undo his stiff blazer buttons and cause its a new blazer sometimes genuinely CANT do it, though i always make him try)

She said "No, i dont think YOU need to come IN here now, i think next week you should wait at the door and watch him do it"

I couldnt belive my ears.... he has only been there 3 weeks, he NEEDS me at the moment...

also he is the only boy on his class (7 children 6 girls and a boy) so mb wants me to have close contact with the teacher at the moment, because tbh he may wellbe changing schools (anoterh issue altogether)

Anyway i ALWAYS then walk through with him to the class room and say hi to the teacher, see what they are doing today, then we have a hug and kiss good bye etc and i go back out and collect the buggy from the hall and off i go.

Are any other schools expecting the 4 year olds who have been there just 2.5 weeks to go in by themselves, completely sort them selves out and then go in?

(In the other schools that my old charges have gone to it has been completely normal for mums etc to help hang up the coats / bags etc them settle the child into the classroom for the WHOLE of reception, with it being discourged in years 1, and then not allowed after the 1st half term of year 1 (when mums were still allowed in cloakroom, just not actually IN the classrom)

I told my mb who said that on Monday the same teacher had said the same to her.
She also said please ignore her and take him in as usual!

(I will)

This is the same teacher who last year when my charge was in the nursary (a 'building' in the 'back garden') and i left my then one year old in the cloackroom asked me "if i would mind leaving him alone in the buggy in the 'new shelter type thing'?" built for leaving buggies and bikes and car seats in duting the day! (The i told her actually i DID mind as i refused to leave my 1 year old in a 'bus stop with a door completely unsupervised, and that also he would cry his eyes out and hate it... and I continued 'parking' him in the buggy in the hall way as usual)

Woudl love to know if anyother recption chidlren are supposed to be going in COMPLETELY alone yet!

OP posts:
Are your children’s vaccines up to date?
Twiglett · 20/09/2007 20:16

at TuM

TellusMater · 20/09/2007 20:16

Ooh - pressed post before I said - no worries.

And now DH is talking to me and delaying my post even more and I shall be in a feud...

TellusMater · 20/09/2007 20:16
Blandmum · 20/09/2007 20:17

I've never met a teacher yet who isn't busy in the morning. Sorting resources, checking lists, enless bloody photocopying, andswering e-mails. I'll be in at about 7.40 tomorrow, and I'll still be running round like a blue arsed fly at 9.00

MaloryTowersJudgyJudgyJudgy · 20/09/2007 20:17

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

DumbledoresGirl · 20/09/2007 20:17

I am not.

In fact, I was discouraged from escorting him into the playgroup when he attended that last year, but I went anyway as I thought it was daft that he should not be allowed to go in with his mother aged 3/4.

But the school was most insistent. The teacher stands at the door and physically blocks access to all parents so the children go in alone.

I think it is ridiculous. My three older children all started school at another school where parents were welcomed in for at least half a term and even after half term, we could accompany our child into the cloakroom and wave through the window to them in class. It was about Christmas before staff told us we should only come in if we needed to speak to the teacher.

NannyL · 20/09/2007 20:18

most of the children is not an appropriate turn in MY experiance

I have ALWAYS taken my other reception aged children to their classrooms.... as did ALL the other parents in those schools

I THOUGHT it was normal as it is all i have ever known in my life experiance... (2 other local independant schhols)

SORRY if it offends anyone

I only asked....

OP posts:
Blandmum · 20/09/2007 20:18

snaf, and obviously barefoot as well

which does make life quicker in the morning.

If a little prone to chilblains

Alambil · 20/09/2007 20:18

same as twiglett

from day 1 the kids line up in the playground and teacher / TA come out to escort them into class

scattyspice · 20/09/2007 20:18

If the teacher is not busy, she can probably help him herself.

morningpaper · 20/09/2007 20:19

What kind of hippy school of 12 is this, that has a posh blazer policy? Eton-Montessori?

Shove something suitably shaped into the blazer hole to make it bigger

stop being a poof

deepinlaundry · 20/09/2007 20:19

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

NannyL · 20/09/2007 20:19

By the way all the other teachers dont have a problem.... only 1 teacher who is at the door on monday and thursday

she is the same teacher who 'told me off' for letting my then 3 year old swap his school cap for his WARM winter cap on a FREEZING cold day (literally freezing

OP posts:
morningpaper · 20/09/2007 20:20

BTW am PMSL @ "Of course, since he goes to a state school, he is sewed into his only set of clothes in September and doesn't remove them until the end of the following June."

soooo funny snaf

MaryBleedinPoppins · 20/09/2007 20:20

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

MaloryTowersJudgyJudgyJudgy · 20/09/2007 20:20

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Hulababy · 20/09/2007 20:21

NannyL - DD is at an independent prep school and it is the norm there to go in the classroom to sort books, etc. out before leaving in the playground afterwards.

NannyL · 20/09/2007 20:21

scattyspice.... that would be so.... if the class room was anywhere near where they hang their coats!

as it is the teacher wouldnt even know he was there!

OP posts:
3andnomore · 20/09/2007 20:21

NannyL...well...I think there is a very good reason why a lot of schools don't have Blazers etc...in their Uniform code...

I truely can not understand the problem, it is pretty normal that after settling in time the Kids do it themselfs....the school my ms jsut started has 2 weeks of halfdays, where we mums are allowed to take our children, and I think that after that time, they go in alone....but not entirely sure...

NannyL · 20/09/2007 20:23

thanks hulababy

im not the only person to ahve been to a school where mums help the tiny children sort through 4 / 5 lots of things then!

Is the norm in all the other indepandant schools around here!

OP posts:
DumbledoresGirl · 20/09/2007 20:24

I didn't see it as being about fussing over my children. I liked going into the class to see the work laid out for the morning, maybe have a quick peek at the displays, and it was always nice to have an informal comment from the teacher about my child if appropriate.

But then, the school my older ones started at was better all round than the school they go to now (apart from the music provision). It was a large village school that scored very highly on community involvement whereas the current school is shunned by most locally (hence there were places for my children when we moved!)

I hate the way we expect 4 years olds to grow up so quickly these days. If you want the truth, my 4 yo can't wipe his bottom yet (arms not long enough!)

morningpaper · 20/09/2007 20:25

I have that trouble too DG

DumbledoresGirl · 20/09/2007 20:26

Your arms aren't long enough?

Twiglett · 20/09/2007 20:26

Look the crux is you don't like this teacher

she probably doesn't like you

so it would make sense to drop and run wouldn't it

and it would do the kid a world of good not to be the one who is babied when he's already the only boy there

personally if he was mine I'd move him to a school that had a better mix of genders

morningpaper · 20/09/2007 20:26
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