"Private" means, you pay more to get in and maintaining, compared to public ones.
I was a product of public kindergarten and personally, I'm not doing too bad with my life ...
But that's beside the point ...
So, tomorrow, I can see that we, as parent, need to muster our courage to do things differently.
The biggest one, I can immediately tell, is to start very, very early morning.
Frankly, I'm not a morning person. I can say the same about my wife. But tomorrow, that has to change.
Do you know how to successfully change biological clock?
Do you have personal tips to share?
Please, share them below ...
What else need to change?
Aaa ... We need to control her time spent on her iPad, on games. That probably not a hard one. Not as hard as the "morning" challenge, I can say ...
What else?
Financial change.
Need to come up with budget for her food and drinks, and other "conveniences" while she's at school.
Owh! The transport. That need to be included in the budget too ...
Imagine if I had daughters, or sons, or daughters and sons ...
My hat off to parents who have slaved their years with this. Pardon my pun, for everything just too new for me :-)
Lend me your courage. Share with me how you pull this off. I'd love to hear what you have to say, who ever, where ever you are ...
For my daughter, and her beloved parents ;-)
Update January 2nd 2013:
Arrive at school on time.
Experienced delay due to backlog of cars going the same way.
Well, what do I expect ... It's their first day also ...
Asked mother and daughter to go in first. Had to make a long "U turn" and finally got a lucky squeeze parking in front of secondary school.
Walked more than 500 meters to my kid school ...
And it was drizzling.
Looked like she did fit in well in her class. Saw parents were as busy as their children on this first day.
Minimal case of crying non-stop in classroom ...
We excused ourselves after the morning dua recital.
And it rain heavily ... Just as we're about to make way to our car! Arghhh ...
We and few parents stood waiting for the rain to stop, or at least slow down.
And it did, about an hour later ...
We make way to the car and off for breakfast. We're back at the school just before recess.
It was hectic ... Chaotic ...
The whole standard one classes marched to the school canteen. And most seats were filled by parents!
Another chaos during lining up to buy food and drink ...
No wonder parents were there. Some did bully their way through. Cheap shot ...
I just guide my daughter through the line up and buying. It went well. That's cool.
And I found sitting spot where my daughter got to sit on the floor. Just like ole days back home, at the village ...
I think some parents just don't get for who the seats at the canteen were meant for.
Obviously not for them ...
After we fished the meal, we went straight back to the class. I taught my daughter to remember where her class is.
I showed her all the big clue - the pond.
And parents were lining up there, and wait for the class teacher. She didn't came, and the class was dim. Someone switched off the light.
Wonder why they did not turn them back on ...
A few minutes later, a teacher from another class came.
"Please go back to the canteen everybody," he announced. "Line up like how you go to the canteen just now, according to class ya," he added.
Everyone slowly make way back to the canteen. There, a few rows of pupils already formed.
"Let's say our pray first," and he lead the recital.
"Tomorrow, we'll do the same like what we did today. Line up to the canteen. And line up back to the classroom. Walk in single file. Don't run. Many mishaps had happened in the past because some people try to go too fast," he ended what I thought will take all day long :-)
And back they marched ...
Once my daughter back at her seat, I looked at her and signaled, that Mummy and Daddy were going home.
She nodded. My brave one ...
May Allah bless and protect you, always my child ...
And here's the 1220, school bell update:
Thank Allah it went well.
From class to the place where the van waits, it went well. And more reason for gratitude - the van driver is someone who we know ...
He used to work where my wife used to work six years back. He still remember us (the perk of being popular, I guess).
And with a short intro, filling registration form, and payment, we're done.
But not for my wife, apparently ...
She's concerned about the safety of the children.
The van could not enter the school yard, which mean, they need to cross the road to get to the other side where the van will be waiting.
The meeting point, if you will ...
And the children do almost everything on their own, which is a bit concerning because cars are going back and forth to fetch other children as well.
She compared that to the urban school ...
Well, I guess, the only comfort I can offer her is, some of these children have been doing it for years.
I mean, some of them did that from standard one to three ...
Allah will, everything will be just fine.
That's for now. First day for courageous parents and children to school ...
Update January 3rd, 2013:
So far so good ...
We managed to wake up at just the right time, for two consecutive days. Hooray!!! Who would've thought that we could go this far.
I thought we're going to have a problem ...
Actually, we do. But we don't own the problem. Our daughter do.
She finds it difficult to get up. Two parts of her anatomy rise first before her whole body, namely, her "back side" and her knee ...
And that's due to her hitting the sack at late hours. 1000 PM is her new late. If she go in after ten, she's gone ...
I mean, her morning spirit to school, gone. But we manage to keep it under control for now. No persuasion. Just outright authority ("I'm dad - you're daughter stuff").
Today, the flow is similar to yesterday. The main difference is, we look from afar, and try to get our hands off her "business" as far as we can.
It scares the hell out of my wife ...
Especially after school session is over. She can't imagine her sweet petit daughter crosses the road of flowing traffic to get to the van.
And I, use my authority to straighten thing up ("I'm husband - you're wife" stuff) once again ...
So, we wait at the meeting point. I tried to hide my "slim" figure behind one of the poles, and watched how my daughter went through the flow.
We saw her walking with my friend's daughter who's one year older than her. She passed us by and she just smiled.
I nodded in approval of her action. I smiled back ...
And we watched them walk confidently towards the van. They paused for a second before crossing the road, and the van driver already waited for them on the other side.
Phew! Thanks Allah. Everything went smooth according to His will ...
This event just put to bed my wife (and my hidden) worries about getting from school gate to the van, across the road.
For tomorrow, we've planned another test, but I won't be able to see how the result turns out.
I have a meeting ... Sigh ...
UPDATE: FEBRUARY 6th, 2019
Time really flies.
Since my last note here (6 years ago!), my daughter has now entered her Secondary School. She's entering that stage popularly known as 'teenager'. I'm excited and anxious at the same time.
But anyway...
The consolation I got right now is that, the school, is just a few hundreds meters away from home. She travels on foot to get there. When school time over, she walks back and enjoy her 'de-stress' time at home. Usually helping herself to the dose of Korean TV show (Running Man).
For my wife and I...
As parents, my wife's actually expect our daughter to go into boarding school. There's a specific 'brand' of school that my wife aim for; MRSM, or Maktab Rendah Sains Mara in full but this year, under the new Governing party (PH), the admission privilege was given to the B40 - the income group that fits certain criteria.
Clearly, we don't belong to that group because MRSM just had their 5th intake...
...and I was not a fan of that particular brand because of 'past experience'.
And things are working out just fine, or rather very awesomely at the moment. If the premise that the child own competencies and motivation take them to success, not so much of the school, then I'm looking forward, eagerly, for my daughter's success.
Lets just ease into it...
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