Top tips needed - starting Y7

[JiltedJohnsJulie]

DS starts in two weeks and I feel a bit clueless. I left school a long, long time ago which doesn't help.

So can you give me your top tips please?

Is Y6 in secondary school where you are?

No, I am a complete ditz. I must have put Y6 through wishful thinking!

It's Y7 tips I'm after

My third & fourth children are about to start Y7. These are some of the things I am / will be doing:

• making a copy of their timetable, so whenif they lose it, it's not the end of the world

• making a space for them to keep and organise their books, so they can put them somewhere sensible when they unpack their bags

• freeing up a box or drawer for school sports kit so it stays together and everyone knows where it is

• practising the bus journey with the one going by bus and making sure the other one knows which route to walk

• making sure they have folders and subfolders set up on the computer to save their documents somewhere where they can find them again

• getting them into the habit of packing their bag the night before

Ideas on how to set up systems for organisation here

Tips on how to prepare children for the transition here

Thank you so much, this is just the kind of thing I'm after.

Anymore tips will be gratefully received

I will be watching this thread! My son starts Y7 next month! First child at secondary so I am a little lost.

Country, it's my PFB too, can you tell

Buy the Casio fx83 calculator - best price at the moment is £4.50 at Tescos.

Set up somewhere for homework- dd through primary does hers on the coffee table whilst multi tasking. And while she does do academic stuff by choice and concentrates, I'm under no illusions she'll do that by choice for less interesting homework. In our house that means a desk area in her room.
She's quite organised by nature anyway, so not too bothered by that. Otherwise we're just planning to muddle through!

Thanks both .

Anymore wise MNers about?

Find out whether the school has lockers (you may not find out until the first day). If she needs to provide a padlock for the locker, get one with a KEY, not a combination (as other students can change the combinations). They are usually sold with 3 copies of the key. Your daughter should keep one on her and one at home. As she's in Year 7, her tutor may agree to keep a spare locker key for her too (she should Tippex her initials onto it or distinguish it in some other way as hers).

Does her school have a blazer? If so, the blazer inside pocket is probably the best place to keep important stuff like locker key, bus pass, emergency money. (On own clothes days, remember to take these out of the blazer and take them to school!)

Good luck and enjoy!

Yes, they do have lockers but gather they are a bit out of the way and it's seen as rather uncool to use them unfortunately.

When you wash the blazer, remember to empty the pockets first. Otherwise you might accidentally destroy the only copy of the preparation for an English GCSE controlled assessment. If this does happen, do not get the giggles when shown the resulting mulch by a furious teenager.

Watching this thread with interest. Our only DS is starting year 7 in September. This will entail him having to get on and off the school bus at the right stops. He's blasé about the whole thing. DH & I are complete nervous wrecks! DH has booked DS's first day off work. I'm half expecting him to follow the bus in case there's any problems!

Also watching with interest. I have just ordered school bags, and rugby boots, so think I just have stationery to do now. DS has gone from being excited, to laid back, to slightly fidgety.

(Must remember the padlock......can someone please remind me next week :))

If they let themselves in after school attach the key to a long piece of elastic and sew the damn thing into their school bag, that way they won't lose it.

Unpack their entire book load for the day, and put them into some form of container marked with the days (we have wooden magazine files from Ikea) then they repack the bag with the next day's books.

We use a notice board marked with days, whatever homework Ds1 has he writes on a small piece of paper ie "English book report" and pins it up next to the day it is due. That way he can see what he needs to prioritise. He bins them when the homework is complete.

Organise where and when they will do homework. Ds1 comes in, I make it back 10 minutes later as I collect Ds2 from school. In that time he gets changed and does music practise. I feed him a snack while we chat about his day then he cracks on with homework.

We walked his route a few times a week and so he was aware of being at a specific point at a specific time.

Label clothing, mark their pens/pencils with a sharpie/tippex and have 2 pencil cases, one for the day to day stuff and one for the coloured pencils &maths equipment (compass, protractor.) They will need a pritt stick and leave those pencil cases in the bag so they do not use them at home. That way they will never forget them.

Expect them to have a new best mate who you have never met or even seen!

Secondary teacher here. Make sure they have pens. Lots of pens.

My DS school suggests they have plastic A4 envelope wallets for each subject so they can keep the textbook / homework and exercise book together. Its worked a treat and means just one thing to grab per subject.

They also suggest not getting a smartphone for yr 7, but if you feel you have to then taking it off them e.g. at 8pm as otherwise silly social media stuff tends to happen late at night and spill over into school (more true for girls than boys)

If you do buy a smartphone be prepared for them to lose it in the first term (i mean lose and not stolen - have yet to meet a Yr 7 boy who hasn't lost a phone) and make sure know school rules on phones

If they have a locker having a sturdy magazine file inside it (if room) to put books etc

Warn them about teasing / tricks on newbies. Some older children 'hid' clothes while swimming so my DS had no trousers to change back into - luckily he had made a friend who went and got his tracksuit bottoms but it happened to a few children. He was very good about it and told me he managed not to cry but I felt bad as though I should have prepared him for the possibility of pranks. Putting padlocks on other children's lockers so they can't open them is another one.

Bag packed night before is essential

Check their planner and bag for letters etc Its always your fault when they turn up in uniform on non uniform day

Plastic bag within gym bag for muddy boots / swim stuff / wet towel etc. DS would happily leave his muddy wet stuff in amongst his dry stuff all week.

Possibly time to think about introducing them to deodorant :)

ds is just going in to Y8 so I remember it well!

-copy of their timetable on the fridge, make sure it is stuck into his planner.

• check the planner regularly (we are supposed to sign ds every week)
• ds took a snack for the first term, as he was up very early and lunch wasn't till 1:15
• make a time for homework, and then enforce it every single day until it becomes habit.

-pack bag the night before, uniform out the night before, check planner for pe kit/food tech etc night before.

• check kit list for pens/calculator/dictionary etc. Ds school suggest a particular calculator, get the one the school suggests.
• make a rule about phones - ours is that after dinner phones go on charge in kitchen and stay there till morning. This pre-empts any social media bullying. On the same note, make a decision for yourself about how you will check/regulate/oversee the social media use. (eg ds doesn't have fb, he does have whatsap and instagram.
• give loads of behind the scenes support, but don't interfere!

-get away with not buying new stuff eg phone until after they have started, so they can find out what everyone else has.

• but take it with a huge pinch of salt when they say 'everyone else has....'

The biggest thing to note is that ds was exhausted by about November. Totally and utterly wrecked. He is pretty independent and a coper, and I didn't realise just how bad it was at first. He really needed a lot of support through that last few weeks of term, in fact his birthday is December and he didn't want any social event for it as he was too tired, we had Granny and Grandpa round for a meal and that was it, and he ended up missing last week of school ill (he is never ill)
Then in January he was fine, and he has never been so tired again.

So watch out for that, and be aware that they need a lot more support even when they appear to be coping.

ds is really good, he has lost very few things, but he did loose a brand new coat on the train second time he used it, and his food tech muffins on the way home.

Steppe - Agree with your list! My DS is going into Yr 8 too and we had exactly the same here last year in terms of him being totally wiped out by the end of the first term. He is September born, quite mature for his age, takes everything in his stride, but the tiredness and mood swings were debilitating for him and us around him. He was like that towards the end of year 6 too so probably more to do with pre-teen hormones etc than the change of school tbh. The move to Y7 was positive because, although he loved his teacher and his primary, he was clearly getting bored amongst quite a small Y6 cohort. The larger cohort and overall challenge of Y7 came at the right time .
He did not manage to break, lose or wear out anything all year apart from the final week of term in July when he lost one of his jumpers . My final piece of advice is to expect less direct communication from the secondary than you may have had from the primary e.g. all sports fixtures and team lists are posted on the school's Twitter account.
HTH

YY to communication. The boys are expected to organise themselves, so if ds comes home and says he needs x there is no back up letter/text from school, I have to trust that he has got the message right!

ds has blossomed at secondary and grown up enormously over the last year.

These are are great, thank you

It's just over a week to go and I think ds is being very calm, much more calm than me