Parents !

I'm out of the door before the rest of the house is up but Mrs N seems to have this (mostly)sorted.

No TV or devices
Dressed before breakfast
Hair done, shoes on & bag packed before any reading/colouring/fart-arsing about
Don't shout, encourage
Give them specific things to do, and not too many e.g. 'brush your teeth and then bring your hairbrush downstairs' as opposed to just 'get ready'
 
I must be pretty lucky with my two (Boy 9 & Girl 6) then!

I get them up, washed, teeth brushed, dressed and hairs done, packed lunches sorted and dropped off for breakfast with granddad by 7:30am.

I don't know why some people fanny about so much and pander to their kids so much...YOU are the adult, YOU are the parent. Take the situation in hand and make it work! its not rocket science.
 
Stolly said:
I've got school age kids...two of them....

I get them out of bed at 7 and have to literally whip them like dogs (not literally)to get them out of the door at 8:40.

Am i alone in finding this a pretty bloody stressful start to the day. We are always on time. but its at a high cost in stress levels all around. Having the kids upset before they've even got to school just doesn't sit well with me there has to be a better way....it can take 20 mins to brush hair...10 mins to put on a pair of bloody socks...

What do other people do ? TV on or off ? Breakfast in the living room or around the table ? Any strategies to positively incentivise the process rather than turning in a nagging machine....
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TV off phone off ipods OFF

No distractions.

Have you tried organising things better the night before.

Kit already in bags lunch packs made?

Clothes to wear already out and waiting.

So less 'where's my...' questions in the morning.
 
zootfloot said:
I must be pretty lucky with my two (Boy 9 & Girl 6) then!

I get them up, washed, teeth brushed, dressed and hairs done, packed lunches sorted and dropped off for breakfast with granddad by 7:30am.

I don't know why some people fanny about so much and pander to their kids so much...YOU are the adult, YOU are the parent. Take the situation in hand and make it work! its not rocket science.
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Some people are just lucky with their kids.

Yes it is luck.
:o
 
Update...

No TV today...eldest cracked on with things for the most part and was ready.

Youngest got ready quicker apart from the hair brushing...30 mins to brush hair....we may brush hair before bedtime next time i have them !
 
My son started senior school last September and he would be so upset if he was late for school.

You see the headmaster said at the beginning of term. If you are 1 minute late you get a 1 hour detention. No excuses. 2nd offences are worse, but I can't remember what the punishment was. Might have being isolation or something.

Because of this we don't even have to wake him in the morning :) He's up and raring to go as he knows it's on him if he's late.

Thinking back to primary school though. Oh boy things were different then.
 
Haha I feel your pain. We have two boys 7 and 10. The 7yr old is always the slowest. No attention span, at all, ever. Or any concept of time. He stares in to space all the time.
Eldest is very good at cracking on, can tell the time, which is very handy as he knows when they must leave. Youngest can tell the time, but it wouldn't even dawn on him to look what time it is as he's probably too busy poking holes in the table with a spoon.

We have no TV/electronics in the morning. Unless they're up super early and smash through getting ready with bags of time left, but they must ask us first.

We have the 11 month old as well, so she's a different kettle of fish, so it's nice that the boys can crack on now and get themselves sorted for the most part. It does sometimes feel like a stressful start to the day though.
Shouting to get ready, stop doing this, do that... what are you wearing?! That's got a hole in...! That's clean on, why have you got milk / toothpaste/ anything around the house on it already?!

Just popping out the house with 3 kids isn't I'm just popping out the house. It's a project, which needs to be managed in detail.
 
Ah you can argue that back and forth with the nature / nurture side of things. It's a bit of both. You can instill values, boundaries, morals and manners to your kids, but ultimately you still have the nature and personality side of things which will have an effect on what they are like and how they behave.
 
Haha, sounds like my childhood. Mother had to almost drag me out of bed. It was a rite of passage to see just how angry she could get. :)

I'm still not a morning person. When I used to have start shifts early I had two alarm clocks the other on the opposite side of the room so I had to force myself to get out of bed just to shut the bugger off if the first failed to raise me from the dead. :o
 
SpeedFreak said:
My twin boys are completely different in personality. Same parents, home, sister, discipline etc... It is not as simple as you infer.
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Are they identical? If so surely it can't be nature and must be subtle ways in nurture has made them slightly different?
 
Stolly said:
With two you can be off helping one find something and come back to find the other spaced out with one sock on.
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THIS, every morning :)

Stolly said:
We agreed this morning to have a period of no TV to stop the distraction.
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Morning TV was banned last year and things have improved since. Now it's the threat of no TV when they come back from school or no consoles/tablets on the weekend. This always gets them moving.

If the school has a breakfast club sign them up. I wake them up (boys aged 5 and 8) at 7 and out of the door at 7:30 for the 15 min walk to school. Not having to make sure they have eaten proper breakfast is half the stress taken care of :)
 
alx said:
Are they identical? If so surely it can't be nature and must be subtle ways in nurture has made them slightly different?
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That's up for debate lol. They are incredibly similar in looks but we are told they are fraternal.

The difference was evident pretty soon after birth. Niall has always been quite calm and relaxed, George has always been more restless. This hasn't changed in 18 months lol.
 
Simple process in this house.

I wake my 7 year old up and put the shower on for him. Thats it.

He needs to shower himself, dress, get his breakfast, hair/teeth etc done. When he's ready, I'll drop him off at school.

If he's late, it's his fault, no one elses. He can then take the punishment/telling off etc from the school.

Works 99.9% of the time, he's never late (bar one time this year)

No TV time unless he's super early ready, breakfast at the table away from distractions etc.
 
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