School's Out

So, I was successful in meeting the kids off the bus in the afternoon, and they had lots of good stories to tell. Emma is in P7 which is the oldest class in the school, and therefore she gets to be a “prefect.” It sounds quite honorable in its Harry Potterishness, but it sounds like it actually means that she gets to do some of the things around the school that the teachers don’t really want to do, like monitor the little kids during recess and collect money for the tuck shop. She drew the latter for her daily duty, so she and a girl named Maddy got to collect all the pence today in exchange for a “biscuit” apiece. (So much for a healthy tuck…biscuits are cookies!). I asked her how she was able to count up all the money when it’s unfamiliar to all of us (and it’s not just English notes…the Bank of Scotland has its own money, so there’s twice as much to learn), but she just shrugged. I guess that Greyfriars isn’t too concerned about balancing the till at the end of the day!

Emma said that overall school was pretty good, and she made several friends (this was demonstrated when she came home and promptly began to email all of them!) She said her class is reading a book about Mount Everest which, thankfully, wasn’t “gruesome.” She said she was able to understand most of the kids pretty well, though one boy apparently asked her a question while bending over his paper and kind of muttering, so she just answered “Yeah…I guess so” without having any idea about what he was saying. Another boy, named Micah, was easier to understand, and apparently they became friends when they discovered that they were both vegetarians. Emma said he told her he became “a prop –ah vegetarian after havin’ a look at a docu-ment-ry abou’ sloh-er-houses.”

However, it does seem like she is going to have a bit of a problem with “maths” at Greyfriars. P7 is the equivalent of sixth grade, and at home Emma is only in fifth, which means they have only started long division this year. In Scotland, it seems like they have been doing it for a while, and they are now doing division with decimals and fractions. The Scottish kids have apparently had lots of practice at it, and are therefore much quicker at it than Emma. The teacher noticed this, and assured Emma that she would either give her some extra help to make sure she catches up, or find some less-intense “American-style” (yes, that’s a real quote!) maths for her to do. Ouch…

Predictably, John didn’t have as much to say about what happened in the class, other than the fact that he made seven friends and played football (and this he said with air quotes. He mostly talked about the lunch, or the “two course school dinner,” as they call it. Sounds fancy, but it’s actually just the same as what most American cafeterias serve: cheese pizza and ice cream. John thoroughly approved of the ice cream, which he said was served with a “kind of a cake crust.” Shortbread, maybe? He did say that one of the boys in the class asked him if he “carried American football,” and though John didn’t know what the little boy meant, he said “yes” anyway. I don’t think John appreciated his query, because it didn’t seem as if this lad was counted among the seven friends! I did gather that the class is divided into different groups according to reading level, and John was put in the second highest level, which is nice because he will be bringing home some challenging books. The downside, though, is that he brought home a killer list of spelling words as a result (including things like “September” and “October” and “hairbrush” (?)) that he has to memorize by Friday. That should make for some pleasant post-dinner homework sessions around the kitchen table in the days to come!

So, the kids might have enjoyed their day at school, but overall I feel like the real winner for one reason: uniforms! Not only do they eliminate the before-school argument about what to wear, what not to wear, what’s too dirty to wear, etc…, but they also cut down greatly on the laundry. Once the kids got home, I had them take off their uniforms right away and hang them up, and they will be ready to go again in the morning!