On Monday P went in and did another teaching day at school, teaching science to year 5. Again he really enjoyed it. On Tuesday while J was getting wonderfully muddy in the woods with the scouts P & I went to the 'new parents evening' at his new school. It was quite reassuring as the staff all seemed so friendly & helpful. Of course there might be some of the teachers they don't put on display. It's like when we went looking round the schools, I got the feeling there were some children that were kept hidden from view.
This happy feeling about senior school lasted until last night when I went to a 'managing transition' course for parents whose children are starting senior school. They came up with this long list of potential worries for parents, most of which we hadn't thought of. They gave us some 'coping strategies' which we can 'role-play' with our children.
Actually it was quite traumatic for me because at one point they were talking about bullying & how a danger point can be if the child walks into the toilets & there's a whole gang in there standing around. I said 'What would they do then?' & the leader replied 'what do you think?' & I said 'I don't know' because at that moment all these memories came flooding back of being badly bullied when I had only just started school and I felt like a helpless little four year old.
'What would you do?' she asked.
'I'd walk out.'
'Right.'
'What would you do if you walked into the toilets at school and there was a threatening looking gang in there?' I asked J when I got home. 'Walk out,' he said without looking up from his book.
It took me a while to get to sleep, all these horrible thoughts were coming into my mind about my school days. Still as they said, we mustn't project our bad experiences onto our children & we mustn't show them we're anxious & I'm sure J is going to be alright. And right now I need to go & pick him up.