Do you remember your first day at school?

Paddy Cow · 24-07-2017 12:17AM #1

I do. My Mum had just given birth to my sister on August 31st so she was still in the hospital when I would have been starting school. She didn't know if she should send me or not while she wasn't there but she was afraid that if she left it until she and the baby came home and then sent me to school, I would feel like I was being pushed out because of the new baby.

It was decided that I would start school as normal and I was fine with this. My uncle Paddy came to bring me to school and everything went well until it was time to go. I remember throwing the biggest tantrum (can't remember why

) and insisted that I wasn't going. Uncle Paddy simply picked me up, kicking and screaming and headed out the door. I can even remember grabbing onto the door jams lol.

I was put in the car and driven to school, still having a tantrum. When we got to the school it turned out that one of the kids in my class was wearing the same coat as me and this caught my attention and my tantrum was forgotton about. I had a great day and was full of chat about it on the way home.

When my mother asked my uncle how I got on he told her I was grand and it was only years later she found out the truth lol. To be honest it did me no harm. I don't have many memories from that age (4) but this one stood out.

Does anyone else remember their first day?

Hector Bellend · 24-07-2017 12:19AM

No. Though having said that. I still couldn't speak irish on my last day of school

jamesbere · 24-07-2017 12:20AM

Yes strangely I do considering I remember barely any of the rest of my early years in school.

My aunt was a teacher there so I remember her showing me around and introducing me to the rest of the class

Oops! · 24-07-2017 12:22AM

I do, my mother was my first teacher! Kept calling her mammy instead of miss for a good while!

Noveight · 24-07-2017 12:24AM

Yes, first time I ever met someone with the same first name as mine, a steep learning curve

24-07-2017 12:27AM

Surprisingly yes because I can barely remember this morning. 1993. Was part of a herd that was ushered into a pen, was given a Capri Sun to keep me happy and off I went. Fast forward to 2007 when I left the herd and was given a can of Bulmers to keep me happy and off I went.

r93kaey5p2izun · 24-07-2017 12:27AM

Yes. I was very excited about it. I remember the girl I sat beside. We played with straws that you build with using plastic connectors. I accidently poked a teacher (not my class teacher - in hindsight I think she was a resource teacher) in the eye and got upset about it. I loved my class teacher and still think very fondly of her.

I met her in the supermarket last year and she remembered me. She said it was her first time teaching infants having previously taught 5th and 6th for years and it was a shock to the system having 43 little ones to look after. She was disappointed to hear I'm a teacher (post primary) now.

Shpudnik · 24-07-2017 12:29AM

It was only 12 years ago and I still can't remember it.

freshpopcorn · 24-07-2017 12:32AM

I remember bits of the first week! Twenty years ago in September.

vegetables · 24-07-2017 12:37AM

Can't remember last week.

Don't understand people who can say things like 'when I was 9'.

The idea that people not only remember the event but remember their age sounds very strange to me.

DontThankMe · 24-07-2017 12:44AM

Yes everyone kept on thanking me it was horrible.

Poor Uncle Tom · 24-07-2017 12:45AM

Yup, first time I skipped a class as well, first day and I was automatically in seniors....... thought I had school nailed until mother called me for day two...

Icemancometh · 24-07-2017 12:46AM

The only thing I remember is a couple of kids crying, and thinking should I be crying as well?

Subcomandante Marcos · 24-07-2017 12:52AM

No, but I remember my first day back after missing a lot of school when I was in junior infants because I was very ill.
On my first day back I was supposed to be in my old class, but I was really anxious for some reason and instead they put me in the same class as my best friend who was a year ahead of me for the first few weeks so that I could sit beside him until I was settled back into the routine.

First day back We were doing the Irish and math class work in the morning and eating fruit on a break and did some colouring in the afternoon before going home. The eventually just left me in that class because I was able for it and i essentially skipped a year of school as a result.

Robsweezie · 24-07-2017 12:52AM

not the first, but the 2nd/3rd/4th day when i had a meltdown outside before going in. my da was bringing me up to the yellow door in the prefab when i broke down in tears and wanted to go home. my problem was that ''the class took too long''. i remember saying that while whimpering to my da and the teacher, who promised me it wouldnt be too long.

when undergoing life changes, i still feel like that boy sometimes. going into the unknown and uncertain.

school at that age can be a big adjustment. i think preschool and playschool, Montessori and creches are a great thing to get a kid ready for it somewhat.

AllForIt · 24-07-2017 12:54AM

I do. I distinctly remember the day before and asking my mom if I was really going to school tomorrow. I remember I wore a pair of shorts on my first day. I also remember being given a copybook. I remember lots of things from when I was very young. I remember being in the cot I used to sleep in. I remember being strapped into a baby chair. My mother had to tie it to the leg of a table because I used to bounce up and down in it which would make the chair move across the floor. I remember my first xmas present which was a toy lorry that would make clicking noises when moved across the floor. I remember my Dad broke the clicking mechanism because it was driving him mad and was disappointed it didn't work anymore.

24-07-2017 12:55AM

vegetables wrote: »

Can't remember last week.

Don't understand people who can say things like 'when I was 9'.

The idea that people not only remember the event but remember their age sounds very strange to me.

Significant events maybe? I also remember going into GAME in 1996 to buy my Sega Megadrive with my communion money. Seems ridiculous now but the memory is there. I remember and I always will remember where I was for 9/11. Was 12 at the time. I remember taking a call from my mothers cousin who I didn't know and still don't know really to say my mothers last surviving aunt had died while my parents were abroad. I was 11. I remember said aunt (or my gran aunt) giving me £20 for my communion in 1996 which funded previously mentioned Sega. I remember my sister getting a welcome home from the people in my estate that sports teams get after she made a miraculous recovery from a life threatening brain injury in 1994. I can actually remember the drive home from the hospital in Cork to Limerick. I was 5. Plenty more too. Some memories just stay with you.

Arghus · 24-07-2017 12:56AM

I remember being shocked at how different it seemed from The Wonder Years. No lockers? What kind of a place is this...

The Backwards Man · 24-07-2017 12:57AM

I was dragged in by my Mum kicking and screaming, the headmaster confiscated my A-Team lunchbox and I shat myself at my desk.

Yep, I knew right then that teaching wasn't the career for me.

AllGunsBlazing · 24-07-2017 01:05AM

Vividly. I even remember The Police song, 'Don't Stand So Close To Me' playing on the radio as I ate my weetabix for breakfast that morning.

Shpudnik · 24-07-2017 01:10AM

AllGunsBlazing wrote: »

Vividly. I even remember The Police song, 'Don't Stand So Close To Me' playing on the radio as I ate my weetabix for breakfast that morning.

Weetabix huh? You must have been ready and gone in all guns blazing.

JupiterKid · 24-07-2017 01:16AM

Yes I do. It was Sept 1979, probably before 85% of Boardsies were even conceived lol! My Dad took a few photos of me standing in front of the house in my new school uniform.

I think I might have cried a little bit. The kindergarten teacher - Ms Larkin - was nice but firm. The classroom had brightly coloured hexagonal shaped desks that a few children sat around. We each got a sweet from a big plastic jar when going home.

I remember when going to, and coming back from the toilet, I would walk around every desk in a circutitious route before sitting down at my own. This had the teacher exasperated!!

_Brian · 24-07-2017 08:32AM

Remember small bits of my first day, 40 years ago this September. Remember me and my best friend and our mams walking behind us up into the school and classroom.

First year at school was fine, but seniors and first class was spent being hammered for writing with my left hand because that was straight from the devil. My handwriting has never recovered and am quite embarrassed by it.

Sam Kade · 24-07-2017 08:40AM

I remember it way back in 1968.

Nervous Wreck · 24-07-2017 08:42AM

Yep. I made a break for it and when the teacher tried to stop me, I kicked her in the shin. Made it all the way to the front yard!

osarusan · 24-07-2017 08:45AM

No.

I didn't go to kindergarten or playschool, just went straight into junior infants.

i have no memory of it, but apparently I fell and whacked my head of the corner of a table and got a black eye. This was at a time where corporal punishment, whether legal or not, was still happening, and when I came out of school with a big bruise, my mother charged into the classroom and the teacher was frantically explaining how I fell, before she ended up with a black eye too.

IvyTheTerrible · 24-07-2017 08:49AM

Yes I do! Our National School was fairly new back in 1984, and we still hadn't a uniform. I remember wearing a matching t shirt and skirt. Mum wanted to accompany me to the class, but I insisted I was a big girl and only let her come as far as the gate! One boy fell asleep at school, I thought that was funny. I loved my teacher Mrs Pettit, I was lucky to have her in 6th class too.

razorblunt · 24-07-2017 08:55AM

If we're talking first day of school at 5 years old, no, though I do have memories of events at school that year and even incidents in Nursery the year before. I definitely do remember the "new pencil case" smell though!

I remember the first day of 2nd Class though, it was before the year ended in 1st Class, we were brought up to the new school, where lads from a neighbouring school were already there in their black jumpers and we rocked in, in our blue jumpers. It was like War of the Buttons stuff. We had to sit with someone from that school and 10 minutes later we were all friends.
The 1st day back in September my friend broke down and started crying at 9:05am and cried for his Mam, he then managed to break free of the Principal and teacher and run out the door. Last we saw of him that day was the top of his head sprinting past the window and the teacher running after him. He was allowed home and came back the next day as if nothing happened.
We still take the pish out of him to this day for it.