Year 7 Spring Term ....

[MaryAnnSingleton]

our thread, part two - all ready for the new term !! ds goes back on Tuesday...

DD is back on Monday. Hope everyone had a good Christmas.

ds fretting about friends or lack of still..but seems ok.
Christmas was very good but goes so quickly ! New Year away was more relaxing - I love going to MILs

Morning all, hope everyone has had a good christmas and new year.

DS back to school on Tuesday, not sure how is he is going to cope getting up at 7.00am again (has been 9.00ish every day eek).

MAS - how about DS makes a new years resolution - to talk to one child he has not spoken to much before every day for a week - even if it is just to say "what have you done over the holidays?"

Is this the Y7 support thread I saw mentioned somewhere recently?

DD is also back on Tuesday. I don't know how we are going to cope with the early mornings - I struggled to rouse myself this morning having set the alarm for 7.45am,8am yesterday (breaking myself in gently!). Neither of us has been up much before 9am during the hols.

Welcome SueW - yes this is the support thread - MAS started a new one for the spring term.

We all woke up at just gone 9.00 this morning and DS is still in his pj's (sorting out last minute homework which he should have done on the weekend before xmas).

Funnily enough DD discovered some Maths homework last night!

ds still hasn't done his Geography homework !
Welcome SueW !
and that is a very good idea bellavita - will speak to ds about it

Hello again everybody!
HAPPY NEW YEAR
Welcome SueW.

I go back tomorrow but ds1 isn't back until Wednesday. He is moping around and saying he isn't looking forward to going back, but he'll be fine once he's back and gets into the swing of things. (He's been in bed til c.10am most mornings and has to catch the bus at 8am, but he usually adapts back quickly to school routines.)

He just had one homework (Science), which I insisted he got on and completed before Christmas so it was out of the way.

MAS does ds talk about lack of friends a lot? ds1 hasn't met up with any mates over the hols, or phoned them, or texted them. Occasionally I mention it, but he genuinely doesn't seem particularly interested, and I don't want my frustrations to cause him to start worrying about it.

When I was at secondary I didn't meet up with mates outside of school/school activities until I was at least 14 or 15.

Ah yes, homework. DD just got home from a double sleepover (two nights) and announced she had a book project to do.

This is the book project she threw a wobbly over the weekend before hols as not having had time to do because she'd been off ill.

She stays to do homework at school 3-4 nights a week so it's extremely rare to have any to do at home. She'll have to ifnish it tomorrow because we're going out this afternoon.

OTOH, I must double check uniform. And I didn't get the photos printed that I'd planned to for my 6th formers.

We thought that DS had done his homework the weekend before xmas, apart from his science which needed graph paper - DH popped out on the Tue lunchtime from work to get it.

It is driving me up the wall now. He had a leaflet to do on picnics for Food Tech - taken him about 4 days because of dilly dallying about.

Had loads of art stuff to complete - he hates art and rather then get on and do it, sits there saying he is no good at it. He has this colour thing to do, he bodged the first one so it meant another trip to B&Q this morning to get some more colour paint strips.

If he did his homework with as much enthusiasm as playing on the guitar hero (and I must admit he is pretty damn good) then it would be done in a flash.

He wanted someone to sleep over last night and we said yes, but homework had to be finished, you would have thought that would be the incentive he needed but no...

DD back on Tuesday (I'm back tomorrow without even a teacher day to ease me in - grrr!). Poor dd has been ill for most of the holiday and it's only in the last 2 or 3 days that she's seemed herself again: I really wish we had another week off so that she could actually enjoy the break for a bit, as secondary school seems to exhaust her.

roisin - he mentions it from time to time, but doesn't seem interested in seeing anyone outside school, though he is always happy to go to tea with his friend E or have him here..I think it's just the thought of returning to school and feeling he wants to be part of the friendship groups in school but doesn't know how to or feel able to join in - I've tried to encourage chatting to others/asking questions/taking an interest but he is quite reticent - all I can do is encourage as much as I can. I can't explain any further about how you make friends- it just happens doesn't it - but you do have to be open to friendship and that's where he doesn't know how to react... that's not to say that he is ever rude or offhand -he is unfailingly sweet and polite.

Oh bless your ds MAS, he sounds adorable.

janeite - that was DS in the October half term, really poorly all week.

thank you bellavita - he is and I do think that people like him, he just doesn't feel he knows how to do friendships !

DD is back on Thursday. I am still trying to get her to do her holiday homework.

Bellavita - was he okay after the holiday? I'm just a bit worried that she will be rather over-tired and therefore moody next week, as, although she's had plenty of rest, she hasn't had a lot of relaxation, if that makes sense.

She was ill for the last couple of days of term too, so at least she hasn't had any homework that we need to persaude her to do today!

janeite - first couple of days back to school really took it out of him and he was over tired, but we made sure he went to bed a little earlier to compensate - even if he did not go to sleep but perhaps listened to his music or read.

Although in a way, I am glad that it was the holiday he was poorly in because missing a week of school would not have been good - he would have never caught up with the work.

Thanks.

Janeite - that's been me this holiday too! I was struggling with a cough/cold in the last week of term, but battled bravely on. I then spent the 3 days of the holiday basically just in bed, then did very little. I don't "feel ill" (no temperature or anything) but am still coughing up gunk and sneezing.

We are back tomorrow, but with a teacher day to ease us in gently. By Wednesday or Thursday I will be very clear whether I am "better" or "ill"!

Returning to the friendship discussion, it appears at ds1's school they do seem to have helped this a bit. Most of the children (say 75%) come from the feeder primaries. I believe what they have done is to put most of the non-feeder-primary students together in two formgroups. (They have almost all lessons together as a mixed ability formgroup - like primary.)

So everyone in that class may know 1 or 2 or 3 others at the start, but not more. I think probably most of them are still at the position of forming friendships. As I said, ds1 certainly hasn't contacted anyone from school during the hols. He has had the security of 3 other boys from his primary school in his class, and usually chooses to work with them during group work or projects, but at break times sometimes hangs around with others from his form.

Did your ds know many students before he started MAS?

there are several children from his primary school yr group in his tutor group, one of whom he is friendly with anyway - I think he underestimates the amount of people he does know - I think he equates friendship with going around in a big bunch rather than getting along with one or two people.

DD's (independent) school has an entry which is roughly 50:50 own prepther schools (both state and independent).

They have spread the 'own prep' kids across the whole year group although there is one class that has stunned all parents with its mix due to keeping quite a tight-knit 'in-crowd' of girls together. There are only about 8 girls in each class and 14-16 boys but by Y9 they will be split into tutor groups of about 12 pupils sothings may yet change.

DD was devestated at the induction evening to find she wasn't with her friends but that evening made a new friend and has gone on to become firm friends with her and a girl from the prep she wasn't friends with before.

Sorry - you all prob did all this last term! I'm just catching up - hope you don't mind.

So how big is the school SueW? How many students per year?

Annual intake varies - I think 116 pupils in DD's year, in 5 forms. Previous year was 96 in 4 forms. I think, I know it was smaller. The prep school expanded last year though, going from two classes of 21/22 in Y6 to 3 classes of 17/18. There are about 1100 pupils on site, aged 3-18.