Childcare at 7.45am

thegirlintheattic

At 9 I was walking to school on my own, although mum was in the house.

I would say let them walk. Give older one mobile phone and say if anything happens ring you or the school. Parents today are too scared of what ifs to let their children become independent.

Abductions etc. are very rare, and could happen if they are playing out or going to the shops. More likely problems don't pose that much risk e.g. one of them gets sick (hopefully you'd know before you dropped off) but school is near by), school closed when they get there - they'll be staff to look after them until you collect.

Spendless

FBaby wrote: »

I've read the 5 pages, but don't think I've seen anything about whether the breakfast club would allow the children to arrive alone. I mention it because my kids have gone to three different ones, and each required the parent to drop them off. They wouldn't even agree for the child to walk alone from the car park, they had to see the parent, which I failed to understand, but the rules were the rules..

yeah, I did.

Spendless wrote: »

Re- letting them walk to the breakfast club. First have you checked that the breakfast club will allow this? Mine doesn't, all children have to be taken into and picked up by an adult.

I don't think I was the first or only one either, but easily missed in a thread that ocassionally mentions likely things about it being dark, inclement weather, objections of school/club and what to do in case of a fall against posts about the more unlikely event of them being kidnapped!

Having had a bit more of a think for you. Do they still have childminder co-ordinators for areas (even if they've been re-named)? I know they used to have them. Some years ago when wrap around care started at my kids Primary, the local childminders called a meeting to complain that 'all their business was being taken away'. I'd been invited as a parent using childcare (wrap around) to say my view and there was someone there who was a childminder co-ordinator and another person who might have been from Early years(?). They pointed out that they had mums in the area desperate for childcare (nurses, who worked shifts) and they were in a position to be able to offer more flexible care than the breakfast/asc was! Worth a try, they might just have someone just on the brink of registering and hey presto she has her first client, because she can offer a service no-one else is doing.

silvermist05

bylromarha wrote: »

Figured the age old "THEY'RE TOO YOUNG TO EVER BE ALONE" would come up.

OH and I are very confident in our kids and their abilities. We wouldn't let them out on their walks alone around the area if we didn't.

Thanks for the idea of asking the school office - forgot what a fountain of local knowledge some secretaries can be.

And to repeat, our job times are just not bendable. There is no 15 minutes to make up at the end. It starts when it starts or you don't have a job.

I have a 8 year old and a 9 year old and I am also very confident in their abilities but I'm sorry I would never leave them walk to school it is the rest of the community that I fear. And no matter how capable we think are children are accidents do happen.

silvermist05

As others have said my at my children's school parents are required to go into the school to sign them in for breakfast club.

Have you looked at nursery/crèches my local crèche opens at 7:45 and does school drop off's they take children up to 11 years.

zippybungle

Problem with leaving kids to walk alone at that time in the morning is that in the winter it will be dark. I don't think it's the same as Kids walking to school at say 8.30am when it is lighter and there would be more parents with kids doing the school run, plus a lollypop man/lady around too.

mrcow

I'm a teacher and have this problem. My solution was to sort it out with other parents that could get them to school. I get that you're saying you don't really know anyone at the moment, but long term, it's probably the way to go.

The pay off is that you're around at half terms etc to do your share of the looking after.

cte1111

My parents are both teachers and worked a fairly long drive away from where we lived, so they had this problem. We used to go to a neighbour's house before school. When we were a bit older, another neighbour's teenage daughter would keep an eye on us before we walked to school, this turned into her maybe popping in for 5 minutes then leaving us on our own. TBH having to go to someone else's house before dawn was something I hated. When we were effectively on our own at ages 8-9, we did all sorts of minor naughtiness (bringing our rabbits into the house) but also on one occasion an argument between my sister and I whilst emptying the dishwasher ended up with us throwing plates at each other, I still have a scar on my knee from this.

I'm a parent now, my children are 11 and 7. Since having my children, we've tried to organise our life so that we didn't have to spend ages commuting and could both spend time instead with our children. We moved so that were we live is 30 minutes drive from my husband's work. The local primary school is a 15 minute walk or 5 minute drive away.

I wouldn't let my children be out on the streets at 7.45 in the morning. I'm happy for them to walk part of the way to school (I cross them over the main road), as they are walking past friend's houses with lots of other people also walking to school. I know if they had a problem, there would be other parents around to help them and make sure they got to school or were looked after. I've helped to pick up another girl who fell over a while ago. She tripped over and her shoe fell off. She was grazed and crying. Myself and another Mum stopped and helped her put her shoe back on and took her into school so she could be looked after by staff in school. If this had happened an hour earlier, I would worry that the children would be left in a state without anyone to help.

Sorry this is so lengthy, just trying to give a possible glimpse into your children's POV.

itsanne

I think children today are often over-protected. In a safe area, such as the OP's, there is no problem with children of 7 and 9 walking 10 minutes to school. However, I don't think it would be acceptable in the situation where neither parent was available in case of trouble. By trouble, I don't mean the extremely unlikely risk of abduction but the more "normal" problems, such as a nasty fall, which can arise. Because the children would be dropped off so early this would be an even bigger problem.

As well as the suggestions which have already been made, perhaps you could ask your new neighbours for ideas. If one of the club workers takes responsibility for the children it might be possible to drop the children off at his/her house so he/she could take them to the club, even if only when it is dark or the weather is particularly bad.

Even if you are comfortable with dropping your children off with a ten minute walk to school, it's clear from the reactions on here that many people disagree with you, some of them quite strongly. If anyone in your neighbourhood feels the same and complains it will cause you big problems, especially because of your own job. I don't think there would be a problem in that respect if you were at home and simply allowing the children to walk to school from there, but that's not the situation you would be defending. There is something qualitatively different between the children setting off from home and being dropped off some distance away.

an9i77

onlyroz wrote: »

I haven't read all replies but...

As a parent you have the right to request a flexible working arrangement from your employer and they have to give a sound business reason for refusing. How about you put in a formal request to arrive at work 15 minutes later and either take a shorter lunch break or leave work 15 minutes later to make up the time.

It is incredibly easy for employers to come up with a 'sound business reason' for refusing these requests. I know because I used to work in a job where managers would approach me saying someone had put in a flexi working request and how could they refuse it? Of course, I tried to encourage them to consider these request properly and sometimes they did, but if they really wanted to refuse them it was not hard to find a reason that would accord with the guidelines for refusal. The law appears to be on the employees side in this area at first glance, but is really on the employers side.

an9i77

Re the walking alone thing, the world must have changed a lot since the 80s. I walked to school (a good mile at least) since I was 7, I then changed schools at 8 and got a bus from my home to the school, about a half hour bus ride.

Then at 10 my family moved further away but I stayed at that school which meant a 40 minute train ride into Manchester, a train across the city centre and a bus out - total journey about 90 minutes. I do remember getting flashed at once, when I was around 12, but don't think it did any lasting damage.