Meeting Harry's New Teacher - Moving Onto Reception

This week has seen very mixed emotions for me, I guess it is now official that I no longer have a baby any more – of course that is ridiculous to say out loud especially as Harry will be 5 years old in October but being my youngest and last child he will always be ‘my baby’ no matter how old he is.

He has thrived in Nursery and although we had a few rough weeks where he didn’t want to go in, we rode that out and he is back to skipping up the path into class happily to hug his teachers and go into class.

He has a few very good friends in his Nursery class, ones he talks about often at home and ones he always waves at and runs to play with in the playground and after school. It’s lovely to watch him playing with these friends because being the second child I didn’t have as much time to take him to clubs as I did with Emmy and I have always felt guilty about this – he spends all of his time with me, when not in school we are together and often that means doing chores together – the weekly shop, cleaning etc. He never seems to mind but I still worry he is bored and it’s not much fun, although we do always manage to squeeze in a park trip or fun and games while together.

This week Harry got to spend an hour in his new Reception classroom, meeting his new teacher and seeing which friends from Nursery were to join him. This happened after school on Monday.

It was hot and he was tired, but once inside his new classroom he was so excited – especially when he saw his best friend was joining him in the class along with a few of his other good friends.

There are 3 Reception classes so it was great to see him placed with good friends, this was something which didn’t happen for Emmy when she moved onto Reception – she had a good circle of friends and they were all split up when it came to moving up, she makes friends easily but it did make the initial settling in period a little harder than it would have been had she a friend by her side.

We spent and hour looking around the classroom, well I looked around it while Harry dashed from activity to activity happily playing and chattering with his friends.

I got to speak with his new teacher and I really think having a male teacher will be great for Harry, who can be boisterous and very easily led at times. He responses well to men and it should be a great year for him.

We spoke of the changes which have been implemented recently in the Reception classes, it certainly has changed since Emmy was there. They have introduced a peg system for free play outside, the children grab a peg when heading out into the play areas (now open plan between the 3 classes) and they are allowed to freely roam the 3 different playground areas (each class has a play area outside, these were all separate when Emmy attended). This means they can mix with their friends from Nursery who are now in different classes and enjoy the different activities happily.

Harry is now really excited to start Reception and attend school every day just like his sister, well that is until September comes and he realises that every day actually means EVERY DAY.

I, on the other hand will miss my little side kick dearly.

I love having him around, we have a great time giggling, playing with his trains/cars, action figures or even just snuggling on the sofa and on many occasions having an afternoon nap together.

It will mean I am able to get my work done during the daytime and I shouldn’t really need to be on the laptop at 10pm, that’s the theory anyway, but if I could have just a little more time with my baby I would happily take it.

They aren’t small for very long and I am regretting the time we haven’t spent together but all isn’t lost, he isn’t lost to the school system full time until September so I WILL make the most of the time we actually have left together.