Back to school: Shelter Island moms weigh in
Some kids are eager, some worried, and most a little of both for school to start. Keeping the last of summer alive last week, from left, Riley Renault, Elijah Davidson, Nathan Cronin, Hayden Davidson, Cooper Renault and Pacey Cronin on the slide. Seated in back, from left, Abby Kotula, Susan Cronin and Kate Davidson.
Katie Springer was asked if she was busy this time of year getting her children ready to go back to school. “I’d like to talk,” she said. “But I’m too busy getting the kids ready to go back to school.”
It’s a given that this is a busy time for parents and children. Busy, and at times stressful, on the emotions and on a family’s pocketbook.
Susan Cronin has three children entering school next week. Makayla, 5, is moving up from pre-school to kindergarten. Nathan, 8, enters 3rd grade and Pacey, 11, will go into 6th grade this year, which is designated as middle school. Ms. Cronin asked Pacey if he was excited about going back to school.
His response was kid-like in its logic as well as contradiction, since he said he was excited to be going into middle school but not really too thrilled to be going back to school overall.
Makayla is “excited and nervous,” Ms. Cronin said about her youngest. “Here on Shelter Island she knows lots of kids” from two years of pre-school and so is eager to be with them again.
“But she’s nervous because she knows it’s the ‘big school,’” Ms. Cronin said. “She won’t have the same teacher and she’s afraid she’ll get into trouble if she’s late.”
Makayla’s not alone when it comes to children being worried about what’s ahead of them when the calendar changes to September.
According to Nemours, a nonprofit children’s health system that cares for 250,000 children annually, about a third of children worry about the schoolwork expected of them and another third are concerned about social issues, or how they’ll get along with their peers. How they’ll look and how they’re dressed is a concern for anther 25 percent of kids going back to school.
Some older students get so stressed their health is affected. Teenagers report more headaches in the early fall, according to research from Nationwide Children’s Hospital, one of America’s largest pediatric healthcare and research centers. Although kids faking headaches to miss school may skew the data, there’s enough information that points to stress as one reason those heads are hurting.
An essential remedy to worries includes listening to the children and preparing them for the opening of school, said Martha Tuthill, Shelter Island School’s guidance counselor, and the mother of two teenagers herself.
One method used to soothe Makayla’s concerns, Ms. Cronin said, was taking her to the school building recently and showing her the classroom.
There are plans for another visit before school starts. “I tell her she’ll see her friends and she’s going to love it,” Ms. Cronin said. “She’s ready.”
Ms. Tuthill said nervousness is typical for older children, as well. “They’re worried about class work, the teacher and how they’ll connect with him or her,” she said.
Students going into middle school, such as Pacey Cronin, have had an orientation session to get them ready for some changes. “They’re going to have to open a locker, change classes and walk the halls with the older kids,” Ms. Tuthill said. “It’s a change.”
Her advice to parents is to tell their children they’re open to their concerns and will listen. The school is also a resource. “They should know they can talk to guidance counselors and teachers,” Ms. Tuthill said. “We can’t help if we don’t know.”
Katherine Garrison said her children, Lily, 14, who will be a freshman this year, and Will, 16, who will be a junior, are ready and eager for school to start. It’s not a matter of just preparing them now, Ms. Garrison said, but it started when they were much younger.
“By the time the kids got to 6th grade, they were self-starters,” Ms. Garrison said, “So we had to be less hands-on.”
There are certain things that “are not negotiable,” she added. “This is what we expect. It’s been remarkably easy.”
Expense is another worry in preparing children for school. “It gets more expensive every year,” Ms. Cronin said. This year she spent more than $200 on school supplies suggested by the school. That figure doesn’t include new sneakers and clothes.
“Pacey went from 5th to 6th and I didn’t have three-ring binders, and the school asks you to buy tissues and boxes of crayons,” she added. “It gets ridiculous.”
As for clothes, “We do a lot of hand-me-downs,” Ms. Cronin said.
Retailers rack up big numbers in late August and early September with parents filling out school lists for supplies and buying clothes. Total expenditure for a family with a child in grades K-12 was more than $600 last year on supplies, apparel and shoes, according to the National Retail Federation, a trade association.
Total numbers for all back to school purchases last year, including college, was $26.5 billion.
The older the child, the less expense, Ms. Garrison said. There are hand-me-downs that take a burden off the clothing budget, but also, “when they’re younger you’re getting them new shoes every year,” she said.
Ms. Springer did find some time to speak and said that her budget for clothes is not bad. Her children — Henry, 6, and Maeve, 5 — attend Our Lady of the Hamptons School in Southampton so the clothes budget is basically buying uniforms. “It’s easier for me,” Ms. Springer said. “No fighting over what you’re wearing.”
Like the other mothers, Ms. Springer said back to school is also a change for them. “Routine is good,” Ms. Springer said. “September comes and it’s little bit of a chore, but I don’t mind it.”
The first week is a hard one, Ms. Cronin said. “We get organized, with clothes picked out the night before, so the less to do in the morning, the better,” she said. “We get it down to a science.”
