I’m sitting here and from the junior school next door I can hear the sounds of the end of term disco, lots of music, lots of karaoke and excited singing, lots of sounds of kids having a wonderful time. I guess these are the children who will be leaving and going onto secondary; they will be going from being top of the school to the youngest and probably smallest in school, going from several hundred kids in the place to a thousand, from being in one classroom with one teacher to swapping rooms and teachers every lesson. They won’t all go to the same secondary, in our town there are five secondary schools, but there are others in neighbouring villages which parents might want their children to go to, so friends might go to different places. A challenging time and although now they are very excited, in six weeks time they may have different feelings too!
Meanwhile, in the secondary schools, the youngest classes, the year 7 children, will no doubt be thinking with relief that they will no longer be the bottom of the school, they will have edge up a year and will have some little kids below them. The children who are going up in other years will feel the difference too as they have to choose different subjects and hope they ave specialised in things which will help them in the future; some will be going into the exam year, and that will be quite nerve-racking too!
It’s 8 p.m. and the disco is over; no doubt there are lots of hugs and lots of tears, but for these youngsters a new experience lies ahead. Good luck to them!
My featured picture, by the way is the old school, not the present one!
Lois Elsden 