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Secondary education

Connect with other parents whose children are starting secondary school on this forum.

Original poster

pfb -in fact only child - off to secondary on Thursday...

788 replies

MaryAnnSingleton · 02/09/2008 08:07

am being calm but every so often panic strikes me - ds is fine about it, it's just me fretting about roads to cross/ money for the canteen - will it get lost/stolen, what about the lockers, arghhh ! Plus,as with the beginning of every term,I'll miss him - I love having him here in the holidays !
It also means that I have no excuses not to sit at my desk and work on the job I'm meant to finish by the end of Seot...

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bellavita · 12/09/2008 14:48

erm drums , makes the ds's electric guitars that they play more appealing now!

DS seemed quite keen on having extra guitar lessons at school (done on a rolling lesson so that the same lessons are not missed every week), but up to DS to check the timetables, however he has not as yet mentioned it. Perhaps it is the thought of lugging his guitar to school along with everything else?

At the moment he has only got one pair of astro turf trainers that he takes to school for both pe lessons, I think Monday's is inside and Tuesday outside. When he came home on Tuesday I had to put the trainers through the washing machine. Am a bit loathe to buy another pair so he has a pair for Monday and a pair for Tuesday as he does not know yet if he will be doing rugby or football and then I will have to buy boots aswell.

I had to send £2 to school today for the art book he was given and I need to send in a further £6 for D&T materials. (Tis worse than the primary school asking for money every 5 mins).

Soren - we have not gone down the coat route yet. He at the moment is insisting on wearing a zip up hoodie, and leaves his raincoat in his bag. Not sure what is going to happen when the weather gets really cold. I have usually bought winter coats from Next/Gap but he seems to have grown out of these shops and likes VANS, Quicksilver, Element and the like, so I can see I am going to have a battle on my hands finding something that he likes (at a reasonable cost to me)

Original poster
MaryAnnSingleton · 12/09/2008 16:15

oh dear, coats ! I've put ds' rain mac on him when it's been pouring (ie every day,almost) but haven't thought of coat.
He has signed himself up for Reading Club on a Thursday lunchtime so I'll definitely make him sandwiches to take that day, canteen lunch would be impossible. I just wish he'd go for the grab bags which sound really good - drink,sandwich,cake and fruit. Today he bought bread roll and blueberry muffin - sigh !
Glad things ok with dd polgara - fingers crossed for next week

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bellavita · 12/09/2008 16:29

Ds has come in - he has received an ST for forgetting his literacy book (even though he packed his bag last night!)

On the plus side he has received another two merits today (one from the same literacy teacher who gave the ST) so all in all he has received 6 merits this week.

Parent Consultation evening has already been planned for the 1st October . DH will have to go as I work on a Wednesday eve. Why can't anything be on a Monday or a Thursday? Grrrr.

MAS the grab bags sound great, but I do like a blueberry muffin now and again too ...

Original poster
MaryAnnSingleton · 12/09/2008 16:46

I told him that there's cake in the grab bag !!
What is an ST or am I being dense ? well done for all those merits though

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bellavita · 12/09/2008 16:53

Not sure what it stands for but in his planner teacher writes ST, reason why and her initials, suppose in a way it is like a "black mark"

Think if you get so many of these in a week, then you get detention and then onto report.

WendyWeber · 12/09/2008 20:31

bella, try TKMaxx for coats - they have quite good stock for 11-13.

SorenLorensen · 12/09/2008 20:39

Oh, this is just a thin raincoat from Millet's - don't know if he'll take a proper coat, they don't have lockers, so he'd have to cart it round with him all day.

I don't know what an ST is either - but ds1 has 9 housepoints now

Polgara2 · 12/09/2008 21:00

Hah as predicted dd1 has come home with several pieces of homework None of it too hard though thank goodness. She has walked home with her old friend (cue much nail biting from me) who stayed for tea so she is a happy bunny at the moment. Will have to check how many merits she has so I can keep up with the rest of you!

Original poster
MaryAnnSingleton · 12/09/2008 21:25

no merits here yet !

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magentadreamer · 12/09/2008 23:32

At DD's school they're clled Win Draw Tickets - they have a termly prize draw plus the top 50 per year get to go on the annual praise trip.

Ashantai · 13/09/2008 00:21

No merits here yet either Mary! Clearly i have to crack the whip a bit

About the coat thing, we bought one for 20 quid from the school shop and she has worn it once! Even when its chucking it down she just has her umbrella. I asked her why and she said its cos there is nowhere to put it and she'd have to lug it everywhere she goes!

She does have a lot of layers, cropped vest, shirt, jumper and blazer and the one time she wore the coat she sweated like a pig

bellavita · 13/09/2008 00:31

wendy - will try TKMax next week, we have one not far from here. It is difficult though isn't, you don't want them to stand out from the crowd but don't really need the added expense of buying something "designer".

I am sure the merits for your lo's will come thick and fast - at least yours have not got a "black mark" in their planner!

Magenta - I might try the playing out until 5 thing next week and see how that goes.

I have just been into his bedroom (as I always do when I come home from work) to make sure that he is covered up, blinds drawn etc and he is layed flat out asleep with his earphones still in his ears with music playing

roisin · 13/09/2008 10:08

I'm pleased everyone seems to be getting on OK. There's so much to learn isn't there?

ds1's school has a uniform light weight jacket and about half the students wear it most days. At interview day the senior teacher told ds1 that the brighter half of the school wear coats, and ds1 has to stand and wait for buses, so he doesn't need any persuading to wear a coat

magentadreamer · 13/09/2008 14:15

DD is one of those children who's thermostat is set to high all the time so I don't actually have any worries about her freezing in her sweat shirt on route to school so I bought her a plain black raincoat to stop her getting wet which is also small enough to be put in her bag or locker. We were told that any coats/jackets etc weren't to have logo's all over them

She informs me today that the PE teacher on wednesday is a bit mean as she gave out detentions for 5 girls ( might have been more) that weren't wearing the regulation socks - 2 of the girls had track suit bottoms on so how she checked to see if they didn't have thm on I'm not too sure - I have visions of her getting all track suit clad girls to roll their trousers up! DD was very vocal about these socks and detentions I have visions of the PE sock 1 protest!

She's a bit worried about English due to the fact she writes really slowly I think it's a left handed thing as I did too at that age. When she's got time to write stuff she is ok but give her 15 mins to write a page and she panics. It's not the actual composing of what she writes she's got a great vocab it's the physical getting it onto paper bit, that showed up in her SATS last year. Hopefully she'll learn to speed up. I think she's also worried her teacher will think she's lazy and can't be bothered. I've bought her a special pen for lefties and hopefully that will help her.

Polgara2 · 13/09/2008 15:21

Magenta - what is 'plain black raincoat' like? I am struggling to think of what to get for dd1 that will keep her dry and is not too bulky as she will have to carry it round all the time (including lunch)! Heaven knows what she will do when its snowing.

magentadreamer · 13/09/2008 16:42

It's jacket length with a waxy finish zip up the front and was a bargain in the school shop. Whether Madam wears it further then the end of the street is another matter as my school coat never reached the top of our street when I went to school!

Ashantai · 13/09/2008 17:02

I didnt like wearing my coat either but at least i had somewhere to put it! I can definately understand why she wouldnt want to lug it around

I'll have to get her a locker cos her schoolbag is getting heavier by the day!

Polgara2 · 14/09/2008 13:48

Hmm well she has got a school raincoat (supposedly for pe in the rain?) but apparently NO-ONE wears those!!!

Polgara2 · 14/09/2008 13:49

Oops pressed too soon! I just wish they could have a locker it would be so much easier.

magentadreamer · 14/09/2008 17:18

We got told that any school coat had to be black and no logo's on it and hoodies were banned. DD is very much a hoodie girl hence me buying the cheapest thing I could as I had my doubts as to how much wear it would have! I'm thinking a brollie might have been a better option as school is literally a 5 min walk so her chances of hyperthermia are lessened!

Hope everyone's DC has a good 3rd week!

Original poster
MaryAnnSingleton · 14/09/2008 21:35

yes, here's to a good third week ! ds has cooking tomorrow and a singing lesson,which I hope he'll remember to go to

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magentadreamer · 14/09/2008 22:39

ARGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGH! At 7.15pm DD rang me to ask if I'd bring her favourite book round to her dad's. She's got a presentation for English to do tomorrow and decided at 7pm that she wasn't going to do what she'd been working on in class. I spent ages scouring the house looking for said book and eventually found it so hot footed it over to her dad's. DD was really getting into the presentation and it was great to see her actualy enjoying doing something school work wise.

I just happened to flick throw her planner to see if she'd done all the homework and realised that her ICT homework had been written down in next weeks section! The homework was to compare Microsoft word with openoffice. I asked DD if she had got her ICT excersise book or work sheets on the two systems DD replied that they did all ICT work on the computers at school and hadn't been given anything to take home. Now I have internet connection and good old google told me what exactly open office was her Dad doesn't. I'm also wondering how many of her class mates have it I'd suspect not all of them. I asked DD if they'd looked at both of these software packages in class and she said they had but she only knew how to do things on Word and had only seen openoffice once in the lesson. And promptly burst into tears! The waterworks don't normally work on me I'll add. I told her Dad to put a note in her planner saying that DD was unable to do the homework as she had only come across the once in the lesson and wasn't too sure what she needed to do. I don't think DD has written it down wrong and I know it would only be a question of writting a couple of things down on each of the software packages but surely they also need to have been given something to actually be able to compare it at home. If she'd say been given an English assignment that asked her to compare two set poems I'd expect her to at least come home with the poems so surely the teacher should have given her something wich perhaps listed something about the two different software packages?? Rant over!

magentadreamer · 15/09/2008 06:37

I think perhaps well no perhaps I was reading more into the IT homework then it was.It's more than likely a question of listing features etc It was just a shock to see DD going from a manic happy enthusiastic child adding stuff to the presentation at a rate of knots and generally being very excited at doing it - she even said she was getting butterflies about doing it to bursting into tears. *I wanna go back to spellings,sums and reading for homework

bellavita · 15/09/2008 08:25

aww magenta for your DD, hope everything is ok with homework.

Yet again, DS1 was sooooo slow with all of his homework, he kept moving from room to room (switching tv's on) in the hope that I would not realise what he was doing and everytime I herded him back to the dining room. If only (and I hope he will learn this pretty quickly) he got down to doing the blasted stuff he would have more "him time".

His problem at the moment is he does not read back through what he has written or typed out on the computer. He had some music homework to do on his favourite band, did it, printed it off and put it in his file. When I looked at it he had repeated both paragraphs

He is having one of his old Yr6 class friends over for tea tonight so am hoping he does not get much homework otherwise he is going to spend all tomorrow evening catching up.

Heres to hopefully a good third week.

Original poster
MaryAnnSingleton · 15/09/2008 08:43

for dd magentadreamer - hope all is ok..

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