Holidays are over… I know they are because I am now rushing around all the time. Rushing to do the shopping, get Siena dressed and fed, to get her lunch and my own ready for the day. There are thousands of notes in her bag from school… Sports fees, school fees, requirements for the year, gymnastics reminder, swimming lessons have begun and the list goes on.

All in all, this year I’m handling ‘back to school’ with a little more grace than I did last year. Siena is in 1^st grade and although she learned a lot last year at school, so did I.

Siena was reading 6 weeks into kindy last year. She also now is adding and subtracting, dividing and multiplying. She’s writing sentences and her vocabulary has grown immensely. Another much anticipated development is that more often than not Siena can be reasoned with. Tantrums are an anomaly rather than routine. Although when they do occur, they are fierce!

Siena loved kindy and learned discipline this year. How? Her teacher was great! I remember how I felt about my kindy teacher, many moons ago and I just adored her and Siena was the same. At the end of Term 1 last year I had a meeting with her and I asked “How do you get them all to listen and do what you say?” She responded “Don’t you know Cath, you’re just a parent. I’m their kindy teacher, I’m God to them!” And she’s right, that’s how she is viewed by those little children.

So, what did I learn through kindy last year?

• If I want Siena to do something, ask her teacher to ask her to do it.
• No matter what you put in your child’s lunchbox, they’ll never eat it.
• That you need to allocate at least 15 minutes for your child to get dressed for school, they don’t want your help getting ready, until the sock is on crooked and the whingeing begins.
• Teachers work hard. I assisted in class one morning a week in term 3 and I was amazed at how much patience I had to muster to survive 30 mins!
• Not all children are at the same level, at the same time…and there’s nothing wrong with that. Just persevere and make school life fun for them.
• Homework – the battle has begun!
• Before and after school care – life saver!
• Wonderful new friends. The network of people you meet when your child begins school is amazing. I’ve been so lucky with the great mums I’ve had the pleasure to get to know. They’ve saved me many a time and I try to do the same for them when I can.
• Public schools need more funding. It’s ridiculous that they have to fundraise for essentials like new home readers.
• It’s ok to cheat and give your child pizza once a week for dinner because you’re exhausted.
• You can use privileges (tv, computer time, DS) as leverage to get your child to eat vegetables.
• The school disco is great fun, although don’t try and dance there with your child, because no matter how cool you think you still are, your child just thinks you’re embarrassing and will tell you just that.

Here’s a to fun 2012… I can’t wait for the next school disco!

Speak soon, Cath