Induction for twins to start school

Having older children I’m sure I have done this before, but if I’m honest I can’t remember what it was like and what happened. 

The morning was very well organised and refreshments in the form of tea and biscuits was offered which was lovely. 

First to speak was the head teacher and she spoke about what was expected of us as parents and how the children will be settled in to primary school, which I might add, is a very gentle process making sure the wellbeing and happiness is first and foremost in their minds. 

The school has a very hands on ‘play as you learn’ curriculum and also an outdoor learning curriculum which is fantastic and I actually didn’t know they had. 

The next person to speak was the attendance officer and this was interesting. She said if your child has a headache or a bad tummy send them to school, which staggered me! I’m sure we can decide how well our child is and if they’re well enough to attend school. The funny thing is as soon as she had gone the head teacher said if they have a bad tummy keep them home, we don’t want to spread it all around the school! Apparently a statistic that I never knew is if you achieve 90% attendance throughout your school life you will have missed one year of your education which actually is quite a lot!

After all the talking we had a tour of the reception classes and where the children are dropped off and picked up.

I was very impressed by the classes. Both classrooms have no doors and a huge communal play area in the middle and certain activities take place in different classrooms which is great because even though some of the girls friends from nursery are not in the same class they will still get to see them on a regular basis.

Finally we were showed where the girls will enter school in the morning which is from the infants playground and if I’m honest it’s where I felt a little emotional! I know they haven’t even started yet so I will explain. 

I tried to put myself in the mind of a four year old, or in our case two four year olds on their first morning. It will be very overwhelming for them. They will be on a playground with approximately 250 other children and feeling nervous and most likely intimated by the sheer size of the area. Yes we will be with them, but when the bell goes and all the children will line up and walk into school without us down some steps and into the school until 3.30pm, the nursery on their first few days will probably feel huge and frightening, but this is ten times the size. 

The girls have had two induction days which should be a great help for them to settle in. The first one was last Friday where the nursery teachers took them over to big school. The second is tomorrow and this will be a long day for them as they will attend nursery in the morning, then their mummy will take them home for lunch before returning to the school for an afternoon session. My wife has taken a day off work so she doesn’t miss a thing or she doesn’t trust me to take them! Ha, ha! 

It’s going to be strange that now during the week the biggest part of their lives is going to be spent in school and not with us, their parents Life really does go quickly. I for one actually don’t mind how long September takes to come. I will savor the last few weeks where I get to be with R and M on my own every Monday and Tuesdays It’ll be strange when they do start full time, and OMG, I have to work again on those days!

Of course I know they will be fine and yes they will have eft two blubbering adults on the playground! All this emotion is too hard to bear at times!