The Year Four Journey begins

Just like that the summer is over, it’s hard to believe.  We’ve had a very different summer this year, I’ve worked through part of it for the first time and we haven’t had a family holiday at all.  My son and I have had a couple of staycations with friends and days out of course, but it’s been the most chilled out summer we’ve ever had.  I think it’s worked quite well for both of us.  But I saw a change in my son the closer we’ve got to today.  He’s been aggressive and very stroppy one minute and then with the flick of a switch he’s been back to the loving boy I know is there.  I guessed it was his way of letting me know he was a bit worried about today, as the Year Four journey begins.

You all know that he never finds this transition easy at school.  I like to think that I cope with it all better these days, externally at least.  But inside I’m just as wound up as he is.  It’s all different this year and as the Year Four journey begins there are a few unknowns to face along the way.

The biggest in some ways is the way that my son will go into school and come out at the end of the day.  In year Four he has to go into the school building by himself and come out to find me in the playground at the end of the day.  Until now we’ve had to drop him off at the classroom door to his teacher and then she’s released him back to me at the door at the end of the day.

We’ve always been able to see his classroom from the playground.  That all changes from today.  We can’t see his classroom and I will be leaving him at the double doors that take him into the area for Year Four and Upper Key Stage Two.

This particular morning I did actually walk through those doors as other parents did too.  We walk to school with his best friend who was feeling a little anxious so I wanted to make sure he got to class ok.  My son was a different child from the one I know and sorted out where they both needed to leave their coats and bags, where his friend needed to leave his lunchbox and we walked through to the lobby for the classroom. My son walked straight into class and sat down with another friend, without even a goodbye.  What a refreshing change. In all the emotions of the morning I’ve totally forgotten to agree a meeting place for after school so hopefully that will all pan out ok later.

The second big change as the Year Four journey begins is his teacher.  He’s got a male teacher for the first time and a teacher I know nothing about.  In fact I’d not even seen who he was properly until this morning.  A sign of the years to come I guess as parents become more and more remote from the classroom.  I have absolutely no idea who this relationship will work, if it will work in fact.  My son spends so little time with his own father, and with his Gramps being in Spain, he doesn’t really have a man in his life very much at all.

I’m hoping this new teacher dynamic might do him some good, I’m hoping that my son lets him in and we don’t have a whole lost term where he just shuts down.  I’m keeping everything crossed, that we don’t end up slipping  further behind his peers.  Time will tell, whatever happens I hope he can try to enjoy it.

Maybe this will be the year he picks up a reading book willingly, decides that learning his times tables would actually makes maths much easier and that writing more than two words is not a sign of torture.  Probably not, but I live in hope.

As the Year Four journey begins I hope that I’m coping with it all better too. I’ve definitely not made a ‘thing’ about going back to school and we’ve chatted about always being there for each other at the end of every day.  This morning as we were getting ready my son disappeared with a pair of scissors, a glue stick and some paper and came back with a paper heart for me.  That nearly had me in tears.  It was his way of telling me that he loved me and that today would be ok.  Let’s hope that the rest of the Year Four journey goes as smoothly!

How has back to school gone for you?