Can't believe how fast Year 7 has gone!

[christywhisty]

Seems like yesterday we were buying uniform and getting DS ready to start his first day.He has grown 4 inches and his voice has broken and matured in so many ways

There have been lots of highs and lows

The lows

Bullying from so called friends,and was put off making new friends.

Homework taking over our lives for the first term, then all the nagging to get homework done.

Losing things including a 2 pairs of trainers and a pe kit.

Nagging to get homework done

The highs
Winning the Year 7 breaststroke race

Hard work paid off with 2 awards at prize giving and an excellent report

DS will be a lower school House Captain in Year 8.

It's the homework issue that had bugged us all year. Got a good report - one of the brightest in the year...but says he doesn't want to be bright, wants to be cool!

He's coasting and I don't know how to motivate him. I don't want to resort to bribery, as he has to want to do this for himself, and if I go into 'teacher' as opposed to 'mum' mode he switches off.

Yes, year 7 has gone quickly - it'll be GCSEs before we know it!

Glad I found this thread. My daughter finishes Year Seven tomorrow, too, and yes, it does seem like two minutes since we were helping her pack that smart rucksack with her bright white PE top, etc. Now it's a big handbag (how does she fit everything in there?), black pumps that (say it quietly) didn't come from Clarks. Planner is in about three bits, the PE kit went missing months ago so now she takes her older brother's and he had to wear his rugby shirt every PE lesson until the new ones arrived.
How proud I was that first day. How I cringe now, I feel like I'm just slinging them out of the door as best I can before I can bin the whole lot tomorrow night and start again.

Wow, a broken voice in Y7! My DS's (just finishing Y8) voice is just beginning to break and he's only little and still very child-like, bless.

Agree about homework in Y8. DS seemed to get loads in Y7 but hardly anything this past year. I suspect Y9 will be different and I've told him not to get complacent!

Like Herbietea, I have a DD going to secondary in Sept - so I'm currently bracing myself for lots of tears at today's Leaver's Asembly.

Herbietea, my eldest has just finished Year 9 and it wasn't so bad. His secondary school seemed to take SATs in their stride (as they should do)and no big deal was made of them. Not like his sister's primary last year... ggrrrr!!!! He's started some GCSE work but nothing heavy, it just counts towards the overall work in two years' time. Year 10 next year though....eeek! He's happy - he gets to wear a different coloured jumper

Ds's voice only broke a few weeks ago, and I still don't recognise him on the phone. He was tall when he started Year 7 but now he towers over me and I have just bought him a new blazer 15 yr old size, thought it would be enormous on him and it isn't

I do hope Yr 8 is less homework. His report was all about you have worked very hard , now keep it up for year 8. He doesn't really care about being cool or uncool and is always really interested and enthusisatic in his classes, but I did start getting annoyed with him after telling me that he had no homework,then he would suddenly remember it just as he was going to bed .

DD will be Year 6 in September so I will have leaving service next summer and all the fun of applying for schools in September.
I know I will be in floods when she leaves.

Ds's voice only broke a few weeks ago, and I still don't recognise him on the phone. He was tall when he started Year 7 but now he towers over me and I have just bought him a new blazer 15 yr old size, thought it would be enormous on him and it isn't

I do hope Yr 8 is less homework. His report was all about you have worked very hard , now keep it up for year 8. He doesn't really care about being cool or uncool and is always really interested and enthusisatic in his classes, but I did start getting annoyed with him after telling me that he had no homework,then he would suddenly remember it just as he was going to bed .

DD will be Year 6 in September so I will have leaving service next summer and all the fun of applying for schools in September.
I know I will be in floods when she leaves.

My ds gets a hard time for being bright, and said to me after we'd read his report, that he'd rather be a 'cool' boy than a clever one. He doesn't normally care, but he's getting a hard time from one particular lad lately, which hasn't helped.

I hope the homework is maintained in year 8, as if they go off the boil it is hard to get them back on track for year 9 onwards. I'm hoping by then that homework will be so ingrained that we won't have any coursework issues. Having read the new RE spec for 2009 onwards for GCSE (to reflect the 14-19 curriculum), it now seems to be RE lite (less content, as it said in the blurb). GCSEs are getting easier. Bring back O-levels!

Thats such a shame Scaryteacher. Ds's problems have been with one of the superbright boys. Ds is dyslexic so had to have extra help in primary, but seems to have really flourished in secondary. Think this boy sees DS as a threat to him for some reason. He did the same to another very bright boy in primary.

LOL at the O'levels. I keep reminding DS how lucky he that he will be, to be able to prepare for things like Oral German and take the book into English Lit.