First Day of School

How it works.

The school hours are 8.15am to 3.15pm Monday, Tuesday and Thursday and 8.15am to 12.15am Wednesday and Friday. It's compulsory for the children to eat lunch at school - at the canteen. A phenomenon particular to schools in Singapore is that children are taken to and from school (door to door!) by bus. It's fantastic. Z's picked up at 7.33am at the gate each morning, and arrives home at 4.10pm or 1.10pm, depending on the day.

Z's first day of school was Wednesday 3rd September. C was in Geneva, so Z and I caught a taxi to school. We arrived in plenty of time, and checked out the bulletin board for her details.

There are 7 classes of CE1 this year and Z is in CE1B with 23 classmates, and her teachers name is Sylvie. Her class is on the top floor of a 3 floor building. It was clean and modern and we were warmly welcomed by Sylvie. Z chose her desk (in the front row), sat down behind her desk and said goodbye to me. I wasn't ready to cut the strings, so hung around for another 5 minutes before I realised I'd better go...

Z decided that morning, she wanted to catch the school bus home, rather than me coming to pick her up from school on the first day. I was really proud of her making this decision. Her logic was that on day 1, she'd be new just like all the other kids finding their way.

At 1.12pm, on Wednesday Z came home on the bus. She was very happy. She liked her teacher, made a friend in Malaka (another new girl who was seated beside her in class) and was happy that I'd bought all the right things for class!