Mummies and Daddies, if your child starts school in September, you NEED to read this. Life as you know it is about to change. In ways you never thought of. And you need to be prepared.

As the summer holidays inch nearer, hundreds of thousands of parents of new starters are getting ready for when their child starts school. School shoes are being bought, over-sized school uniforms are being tried on and labelled. But do they really know what to expect?

Probably not.

So, with two school-kids under my belt now, I am ready to give my ‘expert’ advice…

1. Enjoy your child’s accent before they start school

I know we’re in the first paragraph and you’re already looking at me askance. Like, why would their accent change just because they’re about to start school?

Seriously, it will.

It’s one of the first things you need to expect when your child starts school.

Look, I know you probably live just around the corner from your chosen primary school.

It’s a 7 minute walk.

It’s not terribly geographically different from their own lounge or back garden.

But, trust me, school will change their accent.

And change it a lot.

In a way you probably wouldn’t expect.

Because, wherever the school is, your child will develop an American accent.

Even if they have never been to America

…and couldn’t even point it out on a map.

And there’s nothing you can do to stop it.

2. Your child starts school. Moana comes home.

Littlest Angel started school in September.

She didn’t know who or what Moana was.

Moana could have been animal, mineral or vegetable to her.

Then, suddenly, on the way home, we have

One day I’ll kno-o-ow

how far I’ll go-o-o

And it’s not just the lyrics. It’s the staring into the distance, the tossing of the mane.

Over the course of the school day, Littlest Angel has been transformed into….

…Moana.

Now she just needs to watch the film!

3. The Street Urchin Look

Close your eyes and think of your little child.

Now add a cute, slightly over-sized, school uniform on that child.

A darling image, n’est pas?

A beautiful, rosy-cheeked cherub, all scrubbed clean and looking a perfect picture in their clean, neatly pressed and carefully labelled uniform.

And that’s surely how they will be.

On Day 1.

So enjoy that image.

Hell, take a picture of them looking just like that on the day your kid starts school.

…. because it will be the first and last time you ever see it.

Because the post-school look will not be what you expect.

That beautiful, carefully scrubbed cherub will come flying out of school looking like a street urchin.

They’ll look like they’ve been wrestling roosters in a mud pen all day. Even though they have been doing ’nuffin’.

4. The many and varied joys of Nuffin’

And when the school day is finished, do you know what to expect?

I imagine your thoughts are of long-to-be-cherished chats about what your darling did, saw, drew and learnt.

Heck, I don’t want to rain on your parade.

But you do need to know what to expect when your child starts school.

…and it won’t be that.

Because your child will have done nuffin‘. All day.

All day and every day.

So now you need to spend your summer thinking up unique and wonderful ways to get your child to talk about their day at school.

5. You’ll never hear a t in the middle of a word again

When your child starts school, you lose control.

All the time you carefully and patiently corrected their words was wasted.

Because, as soon as they’re away from you, their perfect diction goes out of the window.

Yes, mummies and daddies, you will never hear a t in the middle of a word again.

So, enjoy your Ts while you can. Because, very shortly, they’ll become extinct.

And you’ll have whole sen’ences without them.

It happens to the best of them.

I bet it even happened to the Royal Prince when he started school.

6. Clothes & Hair Clips

It doesn’t matter how well prepared you are. How many items of clothing you bought. And carefully labelled.

Or how many hair clips you have amassed from Clare’s Accessories.

When your child starts school, items of clothing and hair clips simply disappear.

We bought yet another replacement sunhat yesterday morning. It had disappeared by pick-up that same afternoon.

And where does it all go?

It all gets sucked up into a weird vortex, never to be seen again.

7. What to expect when your child starts school

Your child will, bar some weeping and wailing, love school.

Some love it straight away, some take a while.

But what you can expect is that they will change.

Your child has been used to your accent, your way of doing things, the songs you play.

But the big change is that they’ll be away from you.

Your child will be open to outside influences.

Like a little sponge, they’ll absorb other people’s accents and learn other people’s songs.

…. your child is about to have their first taste of the outside world.

But don’t stress about it. Sit back and enjoy watching your little treasure start to turn into a Big Person.

(Did your child start school this year? What changes did you notice? Let us know in the Reply to Comments at the bottom of the page)