Gradual introduction to primary school and all the different times they go in the first few weeks - how on earth do you organise/achieve it especially if you work???

[TheGoddessBlossom]

My DS1 is 4 on Thursday so does not actualy start till next year. But I am amazed at the toing and froing involved in these first few weeks of all his friends starting school. ie, first week of 1.30 to 3.30, second week of 9 to 11, third week of 9 to 11 etc...how on earth do mothers who work actually manage to organise this? One mother I have just spoken to said her parents have had to move in with them for 5 weeks so that her and her husband can still go to work!

How is everyone else coping with this?

It is a bloody nightmare and i'm sure all the swapping and changing can't be good for the kids. When my DS started he did mornings till CHRISTMAS!! Luckily worked evenings then so not too much of a problem, but DD did mornings up until end of October, finishing at 11.50, i now work until 1.30, so for 2 whole months i had to beg my boss to let me leave early. Am very lucky as he had a lo starting at the same time so understood the situation, but i felt awful having to do it, and DD would much rather have been there all day as they barely had time to do anything.

Both my DC'S are summer babies, but am sure that a couple of mornings would have got them settled, rather than months of me running around like a mad woman!

It does seem particularly ridiculous for children (like mine) who have done full days at nursery since they were a few months old. The full school day is short in comparison.

dd goes to a nursery where dh works, so he has been a star and dropped her off at 9, picked her up at 12 every morning this week and taken her to nursery in the afternoons - I am still off thurs and fri and I did the drop off tuesday morning so I didn't feel left out!

It is a bit of a complicated arrangement and initially one we wanted to avoid, but ultimately decided that it was in some ways continuing her 'normal' routine and she gets to see old friends as well as new while she makes the transition to school.

yes but fennel a full day at school is really full on.

It's nothing like daycare IME. I recall helping in a class of summer babies last year and at the end of the first full week of mornings only, several of them wanted to do nothing else than sit by me and watch by middday. One or two were nearly asleep! (bless)

I agree it's a pain though and can be a logistical nightmare.

DS is spring born and is doing mornings only until xmas (nobody suggested this was optional) like yours Fennel he was doing nursery at the school 4 days 9-330 last year. Frankly I would much rather he did full days. All the activities eg swimming and so on are after 4 and all his freinds are at school full time. I am not quite sure what will do with ourselves 5 long afternoons a week. Also DD sleeps 1-230 so 1pmpick up complte PITA from that point of view too. I thinking he will probrably end up watching cbeebies 130-230 whilst his sister sleeps and I do house work surely school would be better than that?

What a load ot rubbish - what do the schools think it will achieve?

DD went straight in to reception 8.50 to 3.30 on the first day in Sept. having spent a year and a term at nursery. She had been in childcare as well - private nursery attached to school so it was no great change for her.

It just reinforces my opinio that schools have no consideration for those who work - we have special assemblies at 10am - why not do it at 9.15am then you could hang around and then go to it, rather than waste half a days holiday!

I would complain loudly to the school governors about it - they nmay change it for the next intake if enough people complain!

I do wonder if it has ever been suggested to schools to start with full days bit actually structure the day for the reception year in a way, that the learning is in the morning, but the afternoons are similar to a nursery setting. The kids could be offered a quiet corner where they could rest and of course should have access to play facilities outside. Learning in the afternoon can then gradually be introduced when the teachers feel that the kids are ready. Would that be asking too much. Could teachers or classroom assistants be asked to do a similar job to a nursery carer? I somehow think that this would be such a more workable solution for everyone (the kids included).

Our school starts children on full days straight away - they have a staggered start though, with 5 kids on the first day, 5 more on the second, etc, until all 30 are in. It works well.

DS' school sell this p/t start as a real benefit but I'm not sure for whom. DS doesn't know if he's coming or going and has cried and asked to go back to nursery . But the head has already said I'm 'unusual' because I wont be at the school gate every day and because I enquired about before and after school care (there isn't any). DS would be more settled if, after the first week, he went full time rather than it dragging on for half a term.

Thank goodness all children started back on same day and all Reception children are 8.30 until 3.15 right from the off at our school.

Enough trouble working out cover for holidays/half terms without that sort of nonsense to contend with as well.

Can't help being really jealous of everyone with a school that started all of the kids full time. Who decides how the reception kids are starting school? They don't employ the reception teachers only half days for the first few weeks or do they? I mean there must be staff to be able to look after the little ones.
I asked at one of the local primarys for 'before and after school care' as I was still checking the choices in the area. The head looked at me in digust saying that school isn't supposed to be a 'wrap-around care'. With this attitude to working parents that school went right down to the bottom of my list.

I think Clary has a point. My neighbour's LO cries all the way home from exhaustion, (Feb baby, school 8.30 to 3.15 and he was at nursery for two years before this) whereas dd is tired but happy on just mornings.

That said, I can see it must be a total PITA - or worse - for f/t working parents; its a shame there isn't a system for providing after-school care for little ones (with naps available if necessary, or at least down-time).

i'd say my dc's school is generally pants at remembering that there isn't one parent at home in all households - but at least they limit the stupid half-day malarky to only one week.

my dd only turned 4 at the end of july and yes she is tired but more than capable of doing the full day!

you think that is bad..my ds has gone 1.30 -3pm this week ..next week its only 15 minutes longer..1.30-3.15pm and the week after that is 8.50 till 12.10 when i have to go to school and go to lunch with him and then take him home. Then he starts full time the week after that . It isn't great when you can't take little ones in with you either as my dd is only 9 weeks old and the only person available to have her is Dh's dad.. and im not too sure I want him to have her :0( !

up in Scotland my kids started full time school straight away (bar a long lunch on day 1)

saves messing them and mums about

ilkainnorthnats, lots of school structure the whole FS2 year like that anyway - the learning is all through play at our school anyway, and there's a lot of "choosing" (= free play) amid short bursts of phonics etc.

If you've not been into an FS2 classroom you maybe would be surprised. (pleasantly so)

Can I just say there were several children in tears at our infant school on friday morning - not just in FS2 actually - exhausted after the first full week, which for the 4yos was still just mornings.

Yes I know what the learning is like. DS's school and teachers are brilliant and have a fantastic setting for learning and play. Doesn't though take the preasure for working parents away if it's only available in the morning. And if 4 year olds really can't cope with school yet that raises the question if school should be started later. However looking at the cost of pre-school childcare any parent is glad to have a child in school. But that's a completely different subject.

Our school starts with a few (three? can't remember now) half days and then full days. The start dates are staggered, with a few children joining every couple of days, so that the last to join the class may not actually start until close to half term. Some other local schools are even more working parent-unfriendly, because the children do even less than half days (9 to 11.30 or some such) for several weeks.

Does the school have a Parents and Friends group? What do they think? Another local school changed its starting arrangements because so many parents found them impossible to manage. (I think this is something to raise with the school, rather than the governors, as its about day to day management).

We had half-days for the first three weeks, and it was a pain. They did 9-12 first, then started extending it to include lunch. To be honest we only managed it because I worked flexibly at home full-time then.

By the time DS started last year we were at a different school where it was done more sensibly. But even then, the "orientation day" was only an afternoon, and the teacher kept referring to "the mums" despite the fact that there were three of us dads there.

It's a mahoosive pita and no mistake. I've had to use two weeks of my precious 5 weeks annual leave to cover dd doing mornings for her first two weeks at school. I work too far away to get back at lunchtime and drop dd off somewhere else for the afternoon as most of her peers' parents have done.

I have heard some weird and wonderful starting regimes for schools in this area. I consider myself fortunate that we have had one of the easier ones.

It's dd's first full day at school today and I'm back in the office [sigh]

Funny thing really is, that it looks like many children do actually go to nursery after their half day at school. So the whole issue of the kids not being able to last all day at school seems a bit odd. They obviously can, even with being driven around at lunch and brought to yet another setting. And that's basically what I meant earlier, leave the learning out in the afternoon to start with, but keep them at school for a rest and a play.

Well DD doesn't start until January. However most of her friends were leaving nursery so I decided to put her into the school nursery this term and with my (well-established as DS is in now in Y3) childminder with the hours of 8.50-11.50. Only 2 weeks in my childminder has decided to retire. So now I need to decide what to do next.

Well ilk as far as "last the day" goes, obviously they can manage to get through the day as in not collapse in a heap on the floor.

But I'd be surprised if my CM (or any nursery) expected DS2 to do a great deal after a morning at school this time last year.

Yes, if you want to complain, don't ask the governors, it's certainly a matter decided by the head and senior management team, so you should go to them.