1st Day @ Nursery

This is first day for tots born in 2010, so they could be as young as 25 months to 3 years old. Some of them have never attended school so you can imagine it’s nerve breaking for both the parents and tots.

The school tried to get organised with its first day activities by having staggered hours for smaller groups of students with more teachers. To help kids settle down, they will be attending 1 hour 15 mins of class unless the teachers feel they are adapted for 3 hours of class. Only one parent is allowed to accompany the tot into the classroom and so my mum decides to hang around the cafeteria area since she’s in charge of fetching Samuel later.

Imagine the scene. Screaming tots and struggling parents in the limited assembly area of ACS transport centre with family cars parallel parked temporary to drop off the crying kids. Parents were trying to get in a queue with their tots at arms while teachers were trying to keep the order and process the tots with the usual temperature check. I can hear tots screaming at the top of their voices, chanting non stop ‘I want to go home!’ and one parent repeatedly told his boy, “We can talk after you stop crying”. Cries are always contagious. (I actually remember I feel like crying on my first day to primary school when I saw everyone crying around me.) In my heart I was hoping Samuel does not get too affected and decide to join the crying crowd. I held his hands even tighter to make sure we don’t lost ourselves in the crowds. And I think we are trying to brave it all by giving each other occasional eye contact and a weak smile.

In a queue holding a string, we finally arrived at the classroom. Samuel couldn’t wait to check out his class. He jumped ahead and the teacher tried to stop him as she was making sure all kids have their hands sanitised before entering the classroom. He scanned the room and immediately noticed the small basin for washing hands with the Ikea steps. He patted it delightfully and then went on to check out the bookshelves, the glass door leading to the garden/playground outside and then proceed to the table to grab his seat. It was as if he’s at home. I’m not even sure if he still remember his mum is around. He sat down and started playing with the blocks on the table. But one look across the other table, he noticed the wooden trains. He carefully jumped off his seat and proceed to scoop the wooden trains from the other tables and then went back to his seat.

At this point, I decided it’s a sign that I shall just quietly sneak out to leave. Just when I was about to close the door, Samuel dashed out hugging me. The teacher pulled him back as I go and he started crying. I knew he was just putting the cry act out for me and usually it wouldn’t last that long anyway. So I went off to work.

An hour and a half later, I checked in with my mum. She had no problem getting Samuel and he was all happy to see her. And Samuel is approved to go straight into the 3 hours class the next day. Yay we survived!

First day drama?

Sometimes I wondered if we over thinked on our kid’s first day at school. Maybe we decided subconsiously that it’s going to be drama and our kid sensing our sentiment is just responding to what he feel from his parents?

Looking back at one of my older blogs about his first few weeks at Playgroup, I thought he did well for first day but only because he wasn’t expecting it. And then it became drama for the subsequent weeks to follow. Could it have been me?

However last week, I dropped him off at an enrichment class without thinking. Haha! I didn’t realise it was a dropoff program. And then when the teacher said to come back 2 hours later to pick him up, I just thought it’s near home so I can come back easily. I turned and waved to Samuel, he look like he has intentions to follow us out of the classroom and so we hurried off.

2 hours later, I came back and was eager to get an update from the teacher. But the classroom door remained closed. I started thinking if I’m too mean about just dropping off Samuel without even prepping him for this. There were many parents pacing up and down the waiting area. Some kids came out crying and some parents dashed in to receive their kids. The children were being released class by class.

While I continued to reflect on my behaviour as a mum, the door opened. Samuel came out hopping happily into my arms, all smiles. The teacher told me about how he was looking for his ‘safety blanket’ only when it came falling out of his bag during snack break. Otherwise he was participating and in general attentive.

So the ‘nonchalent’ feeling from me works? Let’s see again this Thursday for his first day at Nursery. I will keep in mind to adopt the same mannerism.