Rhiannon had a couple of trial days at her potential new school on Monday and Tuesday. It seems most international schools in Germany do this as a way to gauge the suitability of the child to the school, and the school to the child. Well, this is what they told me, anyway. The school will also asses her German language skills so they can allocate her to the correct class.
Although the school is only three kilometres away, it starts at 8am. And we haven't been able to sort out a bus yet, so this means I have to do the dreaded school run again.
Monday morning hadn't even dawned when we got up. And it was still dark when we set off. Ugh!
However, we were cheered by the first snow of the winter; it was quite a heavy fall of small flakes and for a short time, the world was dusted white. Sadly, it had all gone by lunchtime.
Rhiannon was delivered safely into the hands of the Admissions Officer and I left her to get on with her first day.
She has changed schools a few times and has shown absolutely no nervousness about it... until now. I guess it must be her age; she hadn't slept well the previous night and was rather troubled. But when the chips were down and she was actually at the school, she pulled herself together and got on with it.
At the end of the school day I went to collect her.
It was make or break time now; did she have a good day or not? If not, what on earth would we do?!
Anxiously I waited by the gates. She came bouncing out of the school gates with a massive grin on her face and the words, "That was the best day of my entire life!" Yes, she's a little dramatic...
She didn't stop talking about her day all the way home and once back was eager to show me her new workbooks - proper exercise books and a big folder. And then she insisted on doing her homework straightaway! Who was this child?
I couldn't quite believe what I was hearing. And then she said, "Mum, I have to interview you for my homework."
It turned out that the very first lesson of the day in her brand new school was about puberty! And for her homework she had to do a 'generational study' which entailed asking me about my puberty. That was interesting...!
What a massive relief, though. So far, so good.
Organisation wasn't quite over yet though. While we were sure she (and the school) would pass the trial days, it wasn't yet officially confirmed. And this meant having contingency plans in place.
We planned that she would return to her 'old' school for the rest of this week before starting at the new one at the end of January. Or even next week if at all possible. But Rhiannon was absolutely adamant, to the point of tears, that she wasn't going back there. A problem...
Tuesday would be spent sorting this out. I promised her I'd do my best to get her settled as soon as possible.
I spoke to the school and they were equally as pleased with Rhiannon and suggested she just remain there from now on. Fantastic! Then I had to pull out all the stops to let her old school and bus company know.
It was fun passing that news on to her at the end of the school day yesterday.
While I was there, I saw the timetable for their extra-curricular activities... and to my delight spotted that Aikido was amongst them! Let's hope there is space for her when they start again in February. They were all very interesting too, I can see Rhiannon signing herself up for many of them.
All in all, changing schools has (so far) been a resounding success.
There are a few aspects that don't suit me as well, though. The main one bothering me at the moment is the early start and end of the school day.
I really hate getting up at 6.30am and doing a school run. In the dark. I also loathe having to do a return school run at 2.45pm. I've lost a heck of a lot of my day - she used to be collected by bus at 8am and was delivered home at 5pm. And on Fridays she will finish school at 1.45pm! That's crazy! But it will be better for her and I suppose I will just have to find a way of rearranging my days somehow.
I'm still waiting for contact with the bus company and hope the cost isn't too high for us to take this option up.
And there is the sartorial aspect too - more about that another day.