Only twelve more years of cajoling to go

Today marked the start of the last term of the school year. Personally, I was pretty excited about it. It's the summer term. Sports days, school plays, fetes and leavers ceremonies to look forward too, not to mention walking to school in sunshine, rather than blizzards. And only one more term before son 2 goes to big school and I can stop paying
for childcare. Hooray!

But the enthusiasm was not shared by son 1. He reluctantly ate breakfast and even more reluctantly read his school book that he should have read over half term but didn't. (Note for parents of boys: according to child psychologist Nigel Latta, boys don't leave things till the last minute because they are lazy. They do it because, well, you never know. They could get stabbed to death by a pirate or kidnapped by aliens before the due date of whatever the task is. So why bother wasting valuable time doing something that might end up being pointless?)

Anyway, after an excrutiatingly slow rendition of Chip and Biff's latest adventure, it was time to get dressed. It was round about this time that he started complaining of 'not feeling very well'. When I enquired after the nature of his illness, he indicated a general malaise - sore head, sore tummy, cough and possible cold. He definitely felt that he had a temperature.

He looked fine to me, other than a slightly red eye but that was probably due to excess swimming over the weekend.

I made him a deal. I said that if he had a temperature over 39C, he could stay home. If not, he had to go to school. His temperature was 36.5C.

This didn't go down well.

So emphatic were his protestations that I felt that perhaps he really did feel unwell, and how would I feel if someone forced me off somewhere when I genuinely felt rubbish. So I called the childminder and asked her how she'd feel about having him, and she said that there was something going around that caused this general malaise. Feeling like a bad mother, I said that he could go to the childminder for the day. Instantly he seemed to be on the mend.

When I picked him up I asked the childminder how he had been. Fit as a fiddle apparently. She feels he is suffering from stress about going to school.

So I googled 'child not wanting to go to school' and instantly (God bless the internet) found a very useful article that said children who don't want to go to school usually fall into one of three problems:
1. They have social issues (no friends, being picked on, thinking they're not liked etc)
2. They have issues with the schoolwork (find it too hard, feel like they're stupid, can't keep up etc)
3. They have ants in their pants issues (can't sit still and find school a bore)

Now I know that my child is good academically. I'm not saying he's going to be one of the world's top brainiacs, but he can read, and write, and spell (mostly) and is good with maths. In fact I've been told that he's very good at maths. But this seems to be slipping of late. So is it a work related thing?

I know he has had friends issues, but he hasn't mentioned this for some time. And he's definitely not the ants in pants variety.

I attempted to talk to him about this. Gently, calmly, hopefully being caring and understanding. He simply said that he doesn't want to talk about it, but he hates school and doesn't want to go anymore. Apparently, the reason he hates school is he hates 'doing work'. Hmm, could the prognosis be that he's bone idle? But it seems that he falls into category 2.

But once I managed to dig slightly deeper, I discovered that the teachers don't read out the questions to them, they have to read them themselves and then answer them. And because he says he doesn't understand the questions, he doesn't know how to answer them. And if there's one thing my son cannot stand, it's being wrong. Is it wrong for 6 year olds to be expected to read through the questions and answer them on their own? I don't know. They don't teach you this stuff when you give birth do they?

The other issue is that they have to write in linked up writing. His print writing looks fine. His linked up writing looks like a drunk spider has vomited across a page. And because of this, he hates doing any work that requires him to write, not because he doesn't have the ideas, but because he finds the job of putting pen to paper way too hard.

But I still feel that these are surface issues. And that there is more to discover, but he won't (or possibly can't) express what it is. I'm going to have to chat to the teacher about it. I recall at the parent teacher evening, they said that it was a fine line to push children who could do more and not push them too much that they feel overwhelmed by it all. Perhaps there's been too much of the latter.

Sigh. I wish I'd studied child psychology so I could figure out what is going on in his small boy head. But if anyone has any top tips on how to get a reluctant school goer to go to school, please share. Because I'm not sure I can manage another 12-odd years of this.

Damn your eyes Dino Cards!

Sigh.

Why are children so fickle and mean? Here's my situation:

My five year old son is a sensitive soul. He gets easily upset, he doesn't have terrific social skills, it takes him a while to join in, yet once he's comfortable, he can turn quite bossy and aggressive. So not terrifically helpful in the making friends department. Yet underneath it all he can be a sweet little boy who just wants to fit in.

When he started school, his best friend was the little boy across the road. They'd only just gotten to know each other but they stuck to each other as they faced the newness of school together. They have very similar temperaments. Both sensitive, both clingy.

Over the past few months the arguments between them seem to have escalated. There've been plenty of 'Well I'm not your friend anymore' type moments, but they've been swiftly replaced with statements like 'I'm going to marry J when I'm older.' It's a love hate thing.

However, enter the ominous prescence of DINO KING TRADING CARDS. Last year, Go Gos were all the rage. The must have craze, without which my son might surely die. So we stocked up on sodding Go Gos. That was like sooo last year dude. Now Dino King Trading Cards are the MUST HAVE item for every cool kid in the school.

So friend across the road (J) and a boy in year 1 (I) both had some cards. My son didn't. Both he and I were blissfully unaware of the uber-coolness dino cards inferred on their bearers. However, within a day of these boys having the cards, the nagging started. I ignored it as I was still admiring my array of Go Gos yet to be doled out for good behaviour. But as the nagging escalated I began to see why.

Every morning in the playground I&J (which incidentally is a name of a frozen fish company in South Africa, but that's probably not relevant) would huddle together looking at each other's cards, physically blocking my son out. It was heartbreaking to see. What was more heartbreaking was having my son come home every day and cry that he had no friends because he didn't have any trading cards.

My heart strings were well and truly plucked so I ordered a batch off the internet and got a pack for immediate gratification while we waited for the internet order to arrive. The next day my son got to school, proudly carrying his cards and he rushed up to his friends so that he could at last fit in. But he still wasn't cool. Because they both had DINO CARD HOLDERS! Let me explain. These things are large, chunky pieces of plastic crap that cost £18. All they do is make a couple of sounds and can hold one card. Whoopdedoo.

But without a Dino Card Holder, my son might as well have dyed his hair ginger, worn thick specs and covered his face with spots - such was his uncoolness. After much arguing and lamenting and ranting and raging we agreed that he could use his birthday money to buy a dino card holder, even though I strongly advised against it. This ended in an almighty meltdown when he realised that he was going to actually have to part with his own money, but he got over it.

So equipped with cards (including the pack off the internet by this stage) and the dino card holder, he headed off to school, at long last worthy enough to be spoken to by his friends. The joy lasted for a few days.

But for the last week, he has come home and cried saying that both I&J refused to trade cards with him. They tell him his cards are rubbish and not 'strong enough' (which I assume means something in dino-ease but I'm not sure what) and just won't let him into the inner circle of two. I can see it at the school gate in the morning, where J speaks to my son until I arrives, and then he's frozen out.

Now part of me makes me want to ram their little sodding heads together and say: STOP BEING SO MEAN! But part of me also wonders whether my son has done something to prompt this behaviour from them. As I explained at the beginning, he can get bossy and aggressive, so maybe he's been that way with the cards. Who knows. I'm not in the school. I can't see what goes on.

I'd laugh it all off but it is so heartbreaking to hear my son saying: "I&J are having a sleepover this weekend. I is J's new best friend. I don't really have any friends anymore."

I'd like to blame it all on the dino cards, but I fear if it wasn't that, it would be something else. The only advice I can give my son is to treat people the way you want to be treated and hopefully they'll be nice back to you. But somehow I don't think five year olds operate that way.

A snowfall of guilt

It's snowing. Really snowing. The pre-school rang and said it wasn't opening today. I called the childminder who said she could have son 2 instead. The school is open (although we don't know how long it will stay open). The boys had a ball walking to school, making snowballs and snow angels. They liked the ice cold hands a little less.

We passed a friend whose little boy I normally take to pre-school and I said that the pre-school was shut. His reply was: 'Oh, well he wasn't going anyway.' 'Why, is he ill?' I asked. He looked at me as though I was mad and said 'No, it's snowing. We're staying at home and playing in it.'

Cue the guilt. It hadn't entered my head that we could spend the day that way. I just knew how long my to do list was for work and sent them on their merry way. Now I feel awful. Like I'm the world's worst mother.

That's all I'm going to say for today so that I can plough through my work and go fetch my little boys early so that we can build a snowman.