Fully Prep(ared)

On Tuesday 28th January 2020, Abel started Prep. Which is just Aussie for 'Reception' to all my friends in the UK. It may well have stood for something longer in the past, but no one now knows because the aim of the Aussie language seems to be to shorten a word and then forget the second half existed altogether.

Had he been heading to 'Reception' like his British based peers, he'd have been at school since September by now, so by virtue of the fact he's Australian he got an extra 4.5 months at home before becoming a 'schoolie'. Something I'd say was a blessing or a curse depending on the day you asked me and the mood he was in. Overall though, I think the extra time was actually of real value, because he was ready, so ready, to go to school. He played 'school'. He pretended to 'read' books. He wrote his name and had me transcribe stories onto his pictures. And if I forgot to set up the morning's activity (the pre breakfast ritual we have so that I can get stuff prepared for Abe and Betts without 'assistance' which results in broken bowls/cups or having to hear 'I'm staaaarving' 47 times while I dole out Weetbix) Abe was most unimpressed. He believes, it seems, the day should start with art/craft/writing/making before anything else. One of many factors that I think will make him an excellent student.

In many ways, school has been a long time coming. If I look back over the last five years at the things he has learnt and the challenges he has brought me, well, it's been epic. More epic than I could have imagined in my pre-child days. Pre-kids, I was someone who didn't really consider that each and every skill - from not shitting your pants to using a fork to the simple act of rolling over - all needed to be learnt and thus, by default, somehow taught or facilitated by a more capable human. One who has already mastered rolling, wielding cutlery and not pooing in places other than on a loo.

In other ways, time has passed as quickly as if I were sleeping the last five years (and I assure you I was definitely not - hardly at all in fact). It seems impossible that my baby can be heading to prep. Heading off to be shaped into the human he needs to be by someone else 5 days a week, 37 weeks of the year and not me. My BAAAAAAABY! How do I let him & all that responsibility I've shouldered since he arrived go for large(ish) chunks of the day?

Now, I know that school won't tie his right hand behind his back to stave off the devil's influence that made him a 'leftie' or sit him for an hour in a corner with a dunce's cap on for making a mistake on his times tables like they did in Victorian England. Or that they'll use any swear words when they talk to him (like, AT ALL) or make him eat peas like I do. And actually, if my own school days were anything to go by (it was awesome), it's likely to be an amazing experience for him for the next 13 years. He'll get to meet new people and play with new stuff and learn new skills...

But no one will tuck his label in when it's sticking out and ruffle his hair at the same time. Or slip him a chocolate covered raisin to accompany the eye roll as we watch the other kid have a full blown tantrum about the pink pen running out. No one knows that he likes it when you call him 'sir' but can't stand it when you add Mr. to the front of his name.

They haven't necessarily 'got his back' or even time, with 25 kids in a class, to 'hear his side'. And what if, just what if, there's a mean kid who laughs at him or calls him names or wont let him sit with them at fruit snack time?

It's these kind of concerns that had me wondering that first morning if I'd bawl like a baby myself when I dropped him off and walked out through the gameshow esq gold streamers they have on the classroom door towards my first ever day while 'Abe was at school'. I wondered if I may have to head directly for the staffroom for the 'tissues and Tim Tams' provided for all the prep parents. After all, I had spent half the evening before lamenting the fact that, like with so many milestones, one of the people I most wanted to share it with, or at least be able to send the requisite pictures of him in his (still oversized size 4) uniform wasn't around to witness it.

Though as usual, Mum did her bit from up in the cloud - and I hear that's where all my pictures go anyway...

As I'd fallen asleep the night before school began, I commented to her (via the weird thought dialogues we have) that there was no way dad would know it was Abe's first day and call like she'd have done. No way.

To be fair to dad, he's in the US where the time difference is even more problematic than the UK/Oz one and he's also just as likely to have not remembered it was another of his grandchildren's birthdays on that Tuesday either because for the best part of 40 years that kind of shit wasn't on his allocated list of jobs (which I think Mum found best to keep simple and outdoors - like 'bins' and 'gardening'). And it didn't worry me at all really. It was simply more of an observation so Mum would know the kind of thing I missed her for and to guilt her into making sure she popped in to see both Abe and Eden on Tuesday...

That morning though, she not only (I'm sure) accompanied me to school with Abe and Sean, but she manipulated dad into calling us as well. For something else entirely - because she no doubt didn't want to terrify me by her ability to control things from beyond the grave - but he called and saw Abe before he set off for school in his brand new blue and yellow shirt and shorts just before we left nonetheless. And that made both my, and Abel's day. Because he got to see Grandad and I got to really sense mum around before I set off towards my new life norm as the parent of a student.

School also did their bit this year to make it easy on us Prep mums. We had to get our kids there with only: a bag; a hat; a water bottle and some food - a significant contrast to the Year 1 and beyond's requirements which seemed to be, judging from the boxes they were all carrying, 4000 glue sticks, 111 packets of pens and a pencil in every shade of the colour wheel. All of which I hear on the grapevine (from my next door neighbour whose daughter is a year ahead of Abe) needed to be labelled with the child's name. For the completion of which arduous task, you can buy teeny tiny pencil stickers that are as hard to apply to the stationary as they are to peel from the backing. I may need those Tim Tams next year...

But this time, in the end, there was no chocolate required for this school mum. Instead, I was at a GRIT class doing burpees by 9am, the clear eyed owner of one prep child. As a teacher, and having spent the last seven weeks with Abe, I was also fully aware that the year's only free non-shit-biscuits the staffroom would see were far, far more necessary for those working with the preppies than those of us dropping and running for a day without them.

Yep, it seems like Abe and I were both fully prepared for this.

#Prep #Kids #Beginnings #School #Anxiety #Change #Students