do children benefit from having at least one of their parents home

HappySad

If you can stay at home you can benefit from not being so trapped in having to keep up with everyone else with the stuff that they have. When at home don't get down to doing more house work remember to spend plenty of time with the kids.

Amanda65

As a mum of 3 (now much older) children who has been lucky(??) enough to be able to juggle my work patterns and have my parents on hand to do some drop offs / pick ups then I would say the main problem of not being at the school gate at all is that you tend to miss out on your child having friends round to tea etc. I know in some cases nannies / childminders can arrange this but not as reguarly. In the early days it's not unusual for your child to be friends with the children of those mums you chat to at the gate. Also for very little ones, they often aren't keen to go round someone's house if they don't know the mummy.

Also I do think you miss out, particularly in the early days, building a relationship up with the class teacher which can be very important to your LO settling in. However you know your child best and can only make decisions based on your circumstances. Whatever you do, I'm sure it will be with your daughter's best interests in mind