Tag Archives: Northampton

October 14, 2010 · 9:00 am

The relief of not being caught up in the agony of school applications

THIS is the first time since 2007 we haven’t been wrapped up in the autumn stress-fest that is secondary school admission applications.

I can’t say I’m missing it.

If you have a child in Year Six, the final year of primary school, then you have to apply by November 1, at 5pm to get a place at school for next September.

Don’t imagine for a second that you will automatically get the school you want. That’s not how it works these days. I’m sure I’ve bored you enough over the years with my grumbles about catchment areas (and how ALL schools should give priority to families who live within three miles). I didn’t get first choice with son 1, appealed, lost, sent him to school that then closed and reopened as academy. A year later, son 2 applied and got a place at school that previously rejected us, under alleged ‘random selection.’ *sighs.

Son 2 was asked to turn up at his over-subscribed school to play rugby from 6pm-8.30pm (under floodlights). They don’t usually train at this time but I guess it looks good to prospective parents. I watched lines and lines of would-be pupils and their hopeful folks trudge around the playing fields in the dark, feeling utter sympathy, knowing that most of them will be disappointed next March when the places are allocated.

Don’t only visit the school you really want. You have to put down three choices, so visit at least three schools. Imagine how difficult it would be for your child, if they’ve been allocated a school they’ve never seen. Not many appeals are successful.

Be open-minded. Talk to other parents, make notes, and get a ‘gut-feeling’ about each place. Don’t look for faults at your ‘second-choice’ schools, and don’t ignore them at the one you’ve already decided you want.

Open days are running for a few weeks, and if you really can’t make their date, ring and ask if it’s possible to make an appointment before November 1.

Above all, take your child with you to the school. And listen when they tell you what they think. You may not agree, but it’s your child who will be spending the next seven years there.

n All open days are detailed in the admissions booklet you will have received with your application, or you can check online via the county council website.

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October 13, 2010 · 12:31 pm

Devious ways to distract your children

I have discovered a marvellous way of keeping two-year-old Bonnie occupied while I attempt to catch up with some gardening chores.

One of the tasks for the autumn gardener is to collect up and wash out all the pots and seed trays that have been used throughout the year. It’s a mucky job, and far too much like housework for my liking.

Bonnie makes brother wash-up pots. Wise girl

Bonnie doesn’t like to be indoors when I’m outdoors. Even when it’s cold and rainy. But that doesn’t stop her moaning and whining while she follows you around, putting bulbs in upside-down and tipping soil everywhere.

To stop her stomping about on my freshly-re-seeded, patchy lawn, I set up a washing station with a trug of soapy water and an old dishcloth. She happily scrubbed two dozen pots and then wiped-down the watering cans. It took her a good hour, and she even had the sense to enlist one of her brothers to come and help. I think those pots may need a wash again next weekend. . .

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October 7, 2010 · 8:30 am

Having a lollypop head and stupid eyelashes is not a talent and not alright

 THE TV watershed is all very well for younger kids – as are strict bedtimes – but what do you do about your older children watching things you don’t want them to?

I’m not necessarily talking about rude stuff – although sitting in the same room as your pre-and-teen sons watching rumpy is as excruciating as it was watching with my own parents. The slightest hint of an impending snog still sends my mother diving for the remote.

Anyone who was a kid when there were only three/four channels will remember how much easier it must have been for our parents. Many people I know weren’t allowed to watch ITV. The whole channel. There was a terrible snobbery about watching anything but the BBC.

We weren’t subjected to a complete commercial television ban, mainly because my parents have a Coronation Street addiction stretching back decades. #

So we got to see Saturday morning wrestling hosted by Dicky Davies, while many of our posher friends were left out of the loop.

Having a television in your bedroom wasn’t an issue. There was one telly in the house in the 1970s and 80s, and it was rented. My brother got the use of a portable black and white set when he was about 16, which we were only allowed to watch when ill.

Now we’re the parents, there are trillions of channels. We have three tellies, but none in the kids’ rooms. It’s hard enough to spend any time with them as it is. If they had TVs in their rooms they’d only see us at feeding time. Routine bedtimes would be impossible. If children have TVs in their rooms they will attempt to watch it, even/especially if you tell them not to.

In our house there are restrictions on children’s telly. Yes, even children’s telly.

Then there’s the X-Factor. Damn you ITV, you’re proving those 1970s parents right with your ‘reality’ programmes.

We watched one of the earlier series of the X-Factor together, I think it was the one where Leona Lewis won. But it is what it is: a load of sadistically entertaining guff.

Bloke opts out completely, he just thinks it’s exploitative rubbish. I usually avoid it until the final couple of live shows.

But the boys will set their watches by it, from the earliest audition to the tear-sodden final. Much like adults around the proverbial water-cooler, they know that the following day’s school conversations will involve why Cheryl should have chosen Gamu over stupid fame-hungry Katie, and how daft Storm looks/sounds/is.

I haven’t banned the X-Factor because I think the boys are at an age where they should be able to make up their own minds on whether someone is an idiot or not. I despair that they think the frighteningly thin, lollypop-headed Cher with her ridiculous false eyelashes is “alright.”

I take every opportunity to remind them not to give the show any emotional investment. I point out the dodgy showbiz connections and explaining the way they make their money is to con poor sap members of the public into actually giving enough of a toss to vote.

The X-Factor might be classic Saturday night entertainment, but don’t for a second think that it’s reality.

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October 2, 2010 · 1:05 pm

There’s a teen in the house: Y’get me?

MY little boy became a teenager this week. Scary, huh? Everyone tells you, when you have kids, how quickly time will pass. And how right they are.

That 13th birthday is a milestone. It may not really mean anything much legally – I think you can take on a paper-round and Facebook is no longer a no-go – but it’s the first tangible step out of childhood.

As well as having an embarrassing mother who puts embarrassing photos of you in the paper, Jed’s become unlucky by virtue of birth dates. His youngest brother, Billy, was born six days before his sixth birthday. He went from being the subject of unadulterated September celebrations to having to share the same week with someone younger.

Billy is still able to have a knees-up in the traditional manner, with the chaotic pass the parcel, cake and ten friends party, because he’s seven.

Jed gave up the ball-pit, bouncy castle and party-bag fun at the age of ten. It must be hard. What fuss is made when a boy turns 13? Nothing much. He’s chosen his present. He gets to choose where we go for a family meal to celebrate. He’s altogether underwhelmed with the whole birthday thing and has perfected that teenage ‘not-bothered’ shrug already.

There’s a famous parenting book from the 1970s which says you have to view teenage boys a little like babies rather than adults. For example, a 13-year old will forget all means of communication and you’ll need to do everything for them. A 14-year old will be frustrated at everything and everyone and throws tantrums, much like a toddler during the terrible twos. A 15-year old will try to push the boundaries and will argue with inanimate objects if there’s no adult around to appreciate their wisdom.

I’m pretty sure he’d hate me saying so, and God knows I don’t want to tempt fate, but so far, Jed’s been a pretty great, easy-going kid.

He’s had the pressure of being the eldest, with his next sibling very close in age, and the expectation that he should help out with everyone else. He’s good company, but has the advantage of a brother close in age so doesn’t feel he has to go knocking on doors to see friends. He cooks, he cleans (when nagged), but still leaves underpants and damp towels where they fall and argues about how unfair bedtime is every, single night.

He’s suddenly had a much-longed-for growth-spurt, and is now taller than his brother and both grandmothers, and almost as tall as me. He’s now enduring the hilarious voice-breaking stage, and can waver from sounding quite manly to literally squeaking the next. He’s cynical, exasperated with life and if he wasn’t disturbed, could sleep until noon. I know I’m biased, but he’s delightful. I wish I could give him everything he ever wants. I’m grateful that he still talks to me, and will even deign to give his old Ma a hug. How long this will last, well, only time will tell.

It seems an impossibly long time ago that I became a mum, and was handed that tiny, scrunched-up, red-faced baby boy, who is now on the cusp of becoming a man.

Happy 13th birthday Jed, oh, and don’t forget to pick up your laundry from the bedroom floor. . .

Jed and Doug, some years ago. Aww.

Sorry, poor quality pic but they hide when they see a camera now

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October 1, 2010 · 8:30 am

They broke my house

I once got hate mail from a reader who was incensed that I recommended not giving out party bags, on the grounds they are full of plastic junk and the kids just want sweets.

She took the time to write and tell me she thought I was a slobby mother who obviously didn’t care for her kids. She said this was evident by the home-made cake and drinks cartons in a picture of one of my boys’ celebrations.

She was glad her daughter wasn’t acquainted with my offspring as she would be devastated not to get a party bag. I was sorely tempted to fill a party bag with something from the park bin and pop it through her door. I resisted. For once.

However, when it was party time for Billy this weekend, as he reached the grand-old age of seven, I did do party bags: they were Lidl freezer bags with two tiny bags of Haribo, a collectible Bean and some cake. Job done.

Some of the other mums and I were discussing how our attitudes to parties changed the more children we produced.

I’ve always been disorganised (and tight), so I never managed to stage the truly spectacular children’s party, with entertainers and bouncy castles, matching tablecloths, paper plates, treat bags and wrapping paper.

We agreed these were only ever staged once, usually early on with your first-born. We quickly realised the kids wouldn’t even notice the Bob The Builder theme and were most happy to be stuffing down cake and running around bonkers with their friends.

As I’d left it too late to book a party at an-oh-so-easy-no-clearing-up-venue like the Wacky Warehouse or Berzerk, Billy asked to have some friends over to the house. I groaned, silently. OK, but none of this North London nonsense about inviting the entire class.

To make one party: Ten friends, invites hastily printed out on the home computer. Two hours on a Saturday lunchtime, balloons, a load of cakes, sandwiches, pizza and crisps, two older brothers to marshal party games, some confectionery bribes and a DVD set up to calm them all down before handing them back. It’s never as bad as you first fear.

Everyone behaved well, even if the noise levels were ear-splitting. No one cried and all seemed to go home happy.

However, I’ve just noticed a new crack across the living room ceiling, which must have been made when Dougie had 11 under-sevens hopping and jumping up and down in the bedroom above.

Perhaps I’ll diary in an early booking for next year’s party to be held somewhere else. I’m not sure the house can take them getting any bigger.

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September 27, 2010 · 8:58 am

Simple pleasures are easily ignored

Six-year-old Billy and I decided spontaneously to stop at Abington Park and introduce Bonnie to the joys of the horse chestnut harvest. 

I know it’s a cliche, all this running about being at one with your kids, but it’s memory of my childhood that’s still vivid. 

It was an annual treat for my brothers and I, skiving off on a Sunday morning to the conker trees with Dad, fighting over the best ones. 

They might not be allowed in the playground any more, what with the paranoia of Health&Safety, but there’s still plenty of pleasure in finding conkers. 

From the anticipation of carefully breaking open a fat prickly windfall, to scouring out that perfect, polished brown ball, it was a satisfying and absorbing hour’s play for all three of us. 

Bill and Bonnie with their haul of conkers

 

Bonnie ran back and forth, utterly engaged with the task in hand, filling her pockets. She now insists on carrying around a handbag stuffed with them. 

Still, this means I avoid stabbing myself with a skewer trying to get a piece of string through them.

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September 23, 2010 · 9:05 am

I’m NoHo, fly me. (Or welcome to Northampton and please stay a while)

IF 2,000 new people moved into Northampton this week, you’d think we’d notice, yes? Well, they have.

OK, quite a lot of them may already live here, but nonetheless there will be over 2,000 new faces arriving at the University of Northampton to start their higher education.

Meanwhile, many of our native offspring will be leaving, flying the proverbial nest, to start their studies at universities elsewhere.

It’s a week that would give the most seasoned population statistician a headache. And parents a weird mixture of pride, relief and heartache.

Bizarrely, despite hundreds of new Northamptonians arriving, we hardly seem to notice. Parking spaces become even rarer. Estate cars loaded with anxious parents bearing pot plants and boxes of baked beans might ask for directions.

But are we aware of more people in town? The doctors surgeries? The nightclubs? (If you’re a parent reading this you probably haven’t been near a nightclub for years).

Yet there are three times the students starting some Northampton courses compared to two years ago.

I was a newbie myself at the university last year, but unfortunately it wasn’t to start a three-year pub-crawl and get myself into yet more debt. I am a part-time lecturer.

And it’s been an eye-opener.

Student life has changed drastically over the last couple of decades. No doubt many of you will be feeling the extraordinary pain of financing your child/childrens’ three-year rite of passage. This will be at least £3,000 a year, for three years, for tuition and possibly the same for living expenses.

However, if you cough up for everything, you may not be doing them the massive favour you think you are.

From personal experience, both as a student and someone who teaches them today, it’s the ones who feel personal financial commitment who appear to get the most from their university life.

It’s not a universal truth, nor is it a gross generalisation. But most of the students I know who work part-time seem to be the most attentive. They know that every second costs.

Sometimes those students whose parents pick up the tab are easy to spot: they have the shortest attention spans, the worst attendance records, and hand in the poorest work.

In short, they are enjoying the cliched uni-experince without putting any knowledge in the bank. They have iPhones and MacBooks, they drive new cars and have sat-nav and therefore never actually have to explore the town they live in. It’s sad to how little they grow.

There have always been students who were helped out by their parents, from every background. None of us wants to imagine our kids living in a slum with nothing to eat.

It’s all very well for us, whose education was grant-funded by the Government. No guilt about missing lectures due to a chronic hangover, living on cornflakes for every meal until the grant cheque arrived.

Today’s undergraduates have to remember what it costs. I reckon, roughly, that every lecture missed by a student will have cost the parent about £24. It will probably be their only lecture that day.

We want our children to go to university. We’re proud of their exam results and the fact they got a place. But these days, its no longer enough that they got in. There are thousands of students and over 150 UK universities. It’s how you use your three years that matters.

The students I teach actually taught me a lot last year. I now have a far better understanding of the multitude ways anyone under 25 communicates. They might not be tub-thumping radical thinkers, but they can email, text, Twitter, Facebook, Bebo, Myspace and publish your startled expression on YouTube faster than you can say “a cider and blackcurrant please.” And the less said about chatroulette the better.

If you are new to Northampton this week, welcome. Don’t feel nervous, we’re really quite nice if you venture off campus and get to know us. . .

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September 21, 2010 · 8:04 am

Time to tuck up toms?

HOME-GROWN outdoor tomatoes have been fab this year, and just as we’re getting a last blast of sunshine, it’s probably time to think about bring them indoors.
A couple of beginner gardener mates have been stressing about their toms, having read that they won’t ripen further.
Actually, they might, given the sunny day, and you should remove any faded leaves or those that are shading the fruit.But it’s the night temperatures which could get them. Clear cloudless nights mean cold, and it dipped to just 3 degrees at the end of last week.

green tomatoes may still ripen

To save them from the compost heap, you can cut a whole truss of green tomatoes off the plant and bring them indoors. Put them in your fruit bowl, or in a bag with a ripening banana, and they will, eventually, turn red.

Don’t put them in the fridge as that’s just the same as leaving them outside in the cold – it just stops them in their tracks.

You can still use green tomatoes for chutney (cooking and adding sugar and some riper red ‘uns is the trick) or just chop them up as part of a tray of roasted vegetables with a sprinkle of chilli. Yum.

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September 17, 2010 · 9:05 am

Does smarter mean smarter?

I CAN’T help but smile while doing the extended school run of a morning, since Malcolm Arnold Academy-nee-Unity-nee-Trinity changed their uniform.

Where once there was a purple fog of sweatshirt-clad teens dragging themselves across Northampton’s Racecourse, now there’s a sea of public-schoolesque blazers and cravats.

New boy Dougie in new uniform and yr 8 Jed, right, in his (and he had a haircut after seeing this photo)

I’m not sure if it’s just because I’m getting old, but I really like their new look. Whereas before they seemed to look, well, like primary school kids, now they look far more grown-up. They seem to stand up straighter (now I’m worried I’m turning into my mother).

Apparently the girls have mixed feelings about it. Some appreciate that it’s actually ‘on-trend’ this season to have the preppy look. Others are taking every opportunity to use it as a tool of rebellion: cravats around heads, shirts undone, skirts rolled up at the waist to indecent lengths (yes yes, we all did it. . .)

Whether the smarter look actually makes them pay better attention to their schooling remains to be seen.

It seems to be considered an instant fix to a down-at-heel school to give everyone very public-school-style uniforms in the first instance. Whether this is so they are seen to be doing something, or genuinely because they believe it makes pupils take more pride in themselves, well, I guess it would be hard to prove. Uniform change comes with regime change. Which parts of that new regime actually work is often hard to quantify.

With one son at MAA and another at NSB (Northampton School for Boys), we’ve already see how two big secondaries operate in the first week of term.

Last year's secondary school uniform for Jed, er, just like primary but purple

MA has smart uniforms. NSB has smartish uniforms.

NSB has already held after-school trials for Year 7 cross-country, rugby, football, basketball and other activities in lunchtimes. MA hasn’t organised any afterschool clubs yet.

Nor does it actually have a Head of Music in place (despite being a music and maths specialist school?)

MA has lockers for pupils to store belongings.

NSB does not (for Yr 7s, at least).

This means small new boy is carting around a rucksack weighing half his bodyweight, sometimes with two sets of sports kit, for the entire day. Goodness only knows what happens when they start having to take a winter coat too. I understand this is supposed to make them responsible for their belongings. I suspect it may be responsible for giving them back injuries.

This may all seem superficial if both schools are delivering quality teaching in the classroom, and I guess its fair enough to give the new powers at MAA a chance to get things moving, seeing as they only legally took over a fortnight ago.

It’s a relief though, that my elder two boys seem happy and have settled quickly. I’m not happy, however, to be having to iron shirts for the first time in 20 years. I think a homework session for the boys in how to use an iron is due. . .

And while I’m not planning a blow-by-blow account of the term in these columns, it will certainly be interesting for all involved to see how things have gone by next summer. I’m keen to hear your views too.

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September 16, 2010 · 12:00 pm

By ‘eck grommets (Part II)

BILLY finally had his ear operation. And he seems absolutely fine. It was a huge relief to get it done.

Billy after his ear operation, not happy to be interrupted eating after eight hours nil-by-mouth

I feel a little embarrassed now, by how worried I was about my six-year-old going into hospital to get grommets fitted in his ears. After all, there are parents who have had to endure far worse with far, far poorlier kids.

And people were really lovely, very reassuring, very understanding. It wasn’t the actual operation I was too worried about, it was watching him be put under. I was worried I would blub in front of him.

It’s ridiculous. I used to be tough. I had some grim jobs as a junior reporter, having to do the dreaded ‘death knock,’ when someone has died and the paper send you to knock on the door of the bereaved. After I had children I couldn’t do them. I’d be on the doorstep in tears before they even answered. I became a snivelling wreck, crying at just about everything. TV shows. Sports events. Christmas. *Sniffs. Pathetic.

Bloke had taken the day off for Friday’s op, and we’d tried to be as nonchalant as possible with Billy, reassuring him without raising his suspicions that something scary was going to happen.

I thought Bloke would volunteer to go down to be with Bill in the anaesthesia room. Nope. He made me do it. He told me that Billy would want me there, and that I would be able to hold back the tears for his sake.

He was right, of course. I chatted incessantly until he was out-for-the-count. It was horrible to watch, I felt I had a weight on my heart, but I didn’t cry. Not until I was in the ladies loo anyway, and it was over in a nose-blow.

Everyone at Northampton General Hospital was great (although predictably understaffed). Everything from getting him settled and into his robe (“but it shows my pants!”) to having him come round and recover. He had a little cry in the recovery room, disorientated and a little tender. But with the help of smiley nurses and porters, a dose of paracetamol, some warm toast and a Penguin biscuit, and he was back to his usual self and complaining about how loud everyone was being.

We were in at 12noon, and out just before 6pm. I’m very grateful to all involved. He’s not complained once and is only grumpy about the fact he can’t go swimming for six weeks.

As I put him to bed last night, he said: “Mum, I ever don’t want to have any operations again, OK?” I told him I couldn’t promise, but hopefully that would be it. I didn’t tell him the little boy in the next bed was in for his second grommet op in two years.

Fingers crossed, he’s fixed. . .

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