Year 7 Starters

[pippistrelle]

The new uniform is all ready, pens and pencils bought, as many of the practicalities that I can deal with now have been dealt with. So, just a few days to go. Daughter is getting nervous and, to be completely frank, I am a bit too. Not because I don't think she'll be fine but because, well, change can be daunting.

Anyone else at that stage too? Or, if you're already past this phase, how long did it take until you all settled in to a new routine?

(Couldn't spot any other general Year 7 threads, but apologies if there are any others already.)

I think they took it easy on tgem today
No homework set
Games in the afternoon where they did fun stuff instead of the normal rugby/ football
Ds is exhausted but we're all glad it's the weekend

That sounds good, allwornout.

Sorry to hear of your difficult morning , moose.

Hope your daughter had a better day, BlackHills, and that it's just a perspective thing.

I think we're doing okay here at the moment. She's managing the train journey fine (and has even found herself someone to travel with - a Y8 girl she actually knew two years ago from a primary school club - at a different school one stop further down the line), made some friends, joined some clubs, and I haven't even had to nag about homework yet.

I'm now relaxed enough that I have the brain space to start worrying about contingency arrangements for days when the train might not be running properly.

DD has got a lunchtime detention Poor thing, she's very worried about it - not sure where the room is, whether it's on Monday, whether it's just for Yr 7 etc. I'm being very evenhanded about it but actually I'm quite pissed off - they're supposed to get tutor slips for minor misbehaviour which escalate to a 15 minute detention at break then 30 minutes at lunch - not straight to lunchtime detention for kicking a chair! From her head of house as well, which is hardly going to encourage her to seek help from this person in future.

Oh no. Why did she kick the chair?

Ha - because her friend was doing it. And possibly because the boy occupying the chair (who subsequently told on her) told them to. So, DD, you've learned not to just do what Friend does - remember Friend once randomly licked you, she's lovely but she's also a loon. And you've learned that Boy is possibly a troublemaker and definitely a telltale.

Oh dear, does sound like she was tripped up by others and that led to the detention. Poor dd.

Fwiw, ds was getting so stressed about the possibility of getting a detention for something/anything I told him no to worry about it. All that happens is you have to go to a designated room, at a certain time, where you will either have to wait in silence or do some homework until it's time to leave. Hardly the scariest thing in the world. I also told him that if they are giving out that many detentions for minor infractions then they are undermining the whole idea of detentions as a punishment anyway.

When I was at secondary school, detention was a really big thing and was supervised by the terrifying deputy head, but you only ever had one if you'd done something really bad. It seems a bit ridiculous to me for them to be giving them out for anything and everything and surely after you've had a couple they are no longer much of a deterrent anyway.

Low level misbehaviour is a massive issue and if they are tackling it then I would be pleased. If left then it can mean your child's education is really disrupted.

I agree it's good that they are addressing it, but if the consequence for absolutely everything is a detention, it's going to lose it's power pretty quickly, as soon as the kids cotton on that it's nothing to be scared of.

As far as I can tell all it's doing causing constant anxiety amongst the genuinely well behaved children, like ds2, who are petrified that they'll get one for an oversight or something accidental, whereas to the persistent trouble makers it's no deterrent at all.

Oh dear. At least your dd will know next time not to join in, so won't get into trouble again. I'm sure the school will soon get the measure of the boy and whether he's the sort to have tried to get someone into trouble or to have been minding his own business when they started kicking his chair.

Lunchtime detentions are very different to after school detentions. I would have expected that kicking a chair is more than a minor misdemeanour to be honest (& I too have an easily led child)

I suppose it depends how the chair was kicked? If they were violently kicking chairs around the room, then no, definitely not a minor misdemeanour, but nudging a chair that someone was sitting on, who actually told you to do it isn't exactly hooliganistic. Also depends when, of course, if it was during a lesson then all three should have been paying attention, so much worse than if it was, say, in the dining room or library. I think it's so hard to know sometimes, once it's been through the dc-filter.

When I mentioned minor infractions I was referring to some of the instant detentions that have been handed out to pupils at ds2's school. Some teachers gave out detentions to pupils that got lost during their first week, when they weren't even issued with maps and their Senior Pupil 'buddies' failed to turn up to show them to the next lesson. I think that's ott and unnecessary. Ds ended up petrified he was going to get lost, be late and end up with a detention on top, when he was genuinely trying his best to be on time and organised. Fortunately he's been ok, but there are some poor pupils that are really struggling and instead of this being noted they are just racking up more and more detentions for things that really indicate they could do with a bit more support settling in. Ds1 would have been in constant detention from day 1 if he'd gone there.

That sounds appalling moosemamma. Both my children need support with organisation/concentration & I would not have been happy with what you are describing. I would have had to complain by now if it had happened to my child.

I know balletgirlmum it does doesn't it. Ds2 is very worried about one particular lad in his form that seems to get a detention in almost every registration group and lesson, plus a few more for being lost in various corridors when he should be in lessons. He just seems completely unable to organise himself. (Ds tends to worry about and want to look after pupils that struggle or may have SEN, I think from being used to having a brother who has ASD.)

The problem is, everyone in our town wants their dcs to go to this school (for us it just happens to be the school that my dcs' primary feeds into). The school has form for turning down pupils that have SEN, so many parents choose not to get their dcs assessed/diagnosed/supported in primary so that they're not flagged up during admissions, without realising what this will mean on a daily basis for them, in real terms, when they are actually there.

My ds1 is statemented. We visited this school when he was in Y5 and again in Y6 on the advice of our ASD outreach team and LA Officer and were told he would be fine there and they looked forward to receiving his application. Then a couple of weeks after the applications went in we got a letter, sent directly to our home (contravening SEN admissions policy) flatly refusing to take him (and coincidentally, all other statemented applicants that applied that year) claiming they couldn't meet need.

This is how he ended up at an out of area independent, because all the schools in our area are now academies of a similar size and set up, so if this school couldn't meet need, then neither could any of the others, so effectively this school gave all the other schools an easy get-out clause. That said, knowing what I know now, he'd never have coped there and I'm glad he didn't go. He needs constant ad-hoc support with organisation and anxiety management and there's no way he could manage to be organised to the standard they expect, even with lots of additional support.

I am currently aware of several pupils who have SEN in my ds' old primary school, whose parents have chosen not to push for support, so they can get into this school more easily and it breaks my heart to think what their dcs are going to go through when they get there.

It is a very good school, but very academic, with very high expectations of their pupils in terms of both behaviour and achievement. Ds2 and dd will be fine there, but I would never recommend it to parents of dcs that struggle with organisation or concentration.

How the hell do they get away with turning down children with SEN?

Ds's school is an academically selective independent & I did worry about the pressure but it seems to be going fine so far (better than juniors).

It was around the time everything was messed up with new academies springing up all over the place. The only way to overturn a refusal by an Academy to meet needs of a statemented pupil the LA wanted to place there, was to appeal directly to the Education Secretary. Our LA was hoping some of the parents that were turned down might do this, but having just fought long and hard for his diagnosis, then statement, then to actually enforce the statement provision we had no fight left in us. Plus, if they didn't want him, we felt they wouldn't be going out of there way to support him and make sure the placement was successful. It was very sad though, as all but a handful of his year from primary went there, including his best friend and ds ended up in a school where he knew no-one and went from living across the road from school to an hour each way commute in a taxi. Y7 was absolute hell.

The school ds1 went to used to be awesome for pupils with his type of needs, but the old HT left the summer before he started and it's not been great since. Things picked up last year, as they had a really good SENCO, but they left and we're on our third SENCO in as many years now. Every new school year we spend around a term and a half fighting to get things back where they were before they broke up for the Summer, it's exhausting and soul destroying. It's also an academically selective independent, but has a lot of statemented pupils from it's own and other LAs, although I believe ours is no longer placing pupils there, as they are trying to save costs by shoe-horning pupils into in county provision.

Glad your ds' placement seems to be working out for him. Long may it last.

Wow, just wow. They shouldn't be able to get away with that.

Some headteachers are utterly immoral. Some are actually amoral I think.

moosemama it was the end of assembly, fwiw; she's definitely not the kind to kick chairs round the classroom. I love the dc-filter - in the context of all this she volunteered the fact that I don't know that she's telling the truth about it all.

IguanaTail I know, really, and I recognise the tactic of coming in hard so kids know you mean business (my mum was a secondary teacher, plus I had a rather candid science teacher who told us a few interesting snippets), plus as a fan of any real-life programme set in a school I can appreciate how bad that kind of disruption can be!

I wouldn't think that a lunchtime detention is a massive deal. Well, perhaps it's because it's suddenly called "detention". I've kept several of my Year 6s in already this year...and it's week 3. They are familiar with the concept, but not with the terminology.

I'm a real softie with year 7 at the start. My older classes can't believe it. I can't bear to give them warnings when they're desperate to make such a great start. I toughen up after that.

minispringroll I think you're right about the terminology - but it's also a room she's never been to, she doesn't know who is in charge, who else will be there, what she will be doing, etc. Plus I'm not sure was ever kept in at primary, she's really very good!

Iguana Is that why mine come back once they've started secondary and tell me that their teachers are much less strict than I used to be? My new Y6s think I'm really nice. It's odd. I've only made one cry so far...(didn't even mean to,...didn't shout, didn't threaten with anything, wasn't cross...) I might actually be getting soft,...

Don'tCallMeBaby I guess the lack of familiarity of the surroundings makes it worse. Can't she find out from someone in a higher year?

Mini- probably!

I think at primary because you have to get them into really clear regular routines, that you "sweat the small stuff" a lot more. I want a date and title down, but I'm not interested in whether or not it's underlined with a pencil. And I don't mind colours in books. Etc etc. and at lunchtime they can pretty much go wherever they like on site. There's more freedom. But I totally get why at primary there needs to be a lot more guidance.

And Year 7 are cute and adorable to us, with their carefully brushed hair and make-up-free wide eyes. Some of them are right out of my line of vision when I stand up. While to you, Year 6 are top of the shop.

Some year 6s from a nearby school came to visit us with their teacher and we were quite shocked by how harsh she was with them all!