David Hill: First day of school proves more of an ordeal for parents

COMMENT

We have this photo of our son and daughter on the back path. Our son is 9, and patently bored. Our daughter's face glows with excitement. She wears a blue dress, brown sandals, white knee-socks. On her back is a brown bag. She's 5, and about to start school. She can't wait.

There's a second photo, still in our camera. A small boy this time. He wears blue shorts, a red T-shirt proclaiming "ZOIDS RULE". The bag on his back is orange and green. He's 5, too. He's our grandson Patrick, off to start school, just a couple of weeks after term began.

We can't believe Patrick is old enough to be a schoolboy. Or that our daughter is old enough to have a 5-year-old - and a 2-year-old. But our grandson was ready. His best mate, Lewis, started school four months back, and Patrick was bursting to try out this cool playground Lewis had told him about.

He was ready in other ways, too. He can write his name, though the 'C' veers through 180 degrees. He can count to 10, though seven and eight still negotiate for position.

A lot of the credit for his being prepared goes to his parents. They took him to kindergarten, and to playgroup before that. They made sure he stayed overnight with grandparents, went out to friends, had swimming lessons and Mainly Music lessons with other adults as teachers.

They taught him to dress himself and use the loo (we hope he's allowed to sing in the school ones); to hold a pencil and look at books.

They talked about the first school-day to him, walked the route to school with him and named his clothes and bag.

They took him to the school for an orientation visit. He met his teacher and his room, learned where the toilets and lunch area are, got shown how they share pencils.

After the orientation visit, our daughter told us how impressed she was by the new entrant teacher. The teacher was in her late 20s - our daughter's own age. My wife and I were appalled. A mere child in charge of our grandson. Someone only ... only his mother's age.

We must have been rotten parents, because we don't remember much about our daughter's own first days at school. That's probably because she fitted in from the start. A friend who taught at the school said they called her "the little smiley one". I had to mention that to embarrass her.

Like any rite of passage, the first day at school can be an ordeal. Teachers are friendly and reassuring, but for both parent and child it's an amputation, a moment of irreversible moving away. Plus parents fret that they've done everything for their kid, but suddenly it may all come to nothing.

Patrick wasn't worried. He was too full of the fact that he'd be staying there for lunch. Could anything be more sophisticated?

The first school day came. Our daughter and our younger grandson arrived about 9.30 for coffee after taking Patrick to class. Owen bustled in, taking over as usual. "Patrick gone cool," he announced.

So how did it go? we asked our daughter. Was he all right? "Oh yes," she said. "He's fine." It took us a second to register the emphasis, to realise that behind the smile, her eyes were red.

So we brought out that photo of her and her brother.