Tick. Started high school. This week my firstborn crossed off another rite of passage on childhood's checklist. A little like a dinghy, usually my precious son just bobs about, sticking to the inner harbour, but increasingly, when the wind gets up, he is inclined to sail full steam ahead, filled with joyously reckless purpose. And while, for the most part, I am like a gull, circling helplessly above him, squawking fruitlessly of impending danger, on a good day I am a lighthouse, wise and unwavering, guiding him staunchly to safety.
The next five years stretch before us, as unknown as the open sea, and I am as terrified as the day my husband dragged me away from the door to the new entrants' class. This, though, is what his eight years of primary and intermediate schooling have taught me:
Do not worry if how they learn and what they learn is not how or what you were taught. Theirs is a new world, even more unrecognisable to you than perhaps the one you inherited from your parents was to them. Our children will work in different ways and face different perils; they will need these new strategies to prosper and survive.
Those lucky enough to attend schools enlightened to our changing world are being taught that gender is fluid, that diversity in all things is awesome. Do not poison their open minds and generous hearts with your old prejudices.
While school is key, it's not everything. By and large, what they are and who they will become is down to you, to what you discuss at the dinner table, and how you behave towards, and talk about, others.
Sometimes your child will get saddled with a dud teacher. Don't panic. Think of it as a good lesson in life, preparing them for how to manage that dud boss they will inevitably strike later on.
