Bringing home the class mascot might be fun for my children, but it's just another chore for mums and dads.
Every few weeks one of the class mascots comes home; Billy the Bear, or Badger, or Josie the rag-doll. So on top of getting supper, doing homework, packing tomorrow’s lunches and heading out to the PTA meeting, I have to find something amusing to do with a bear.
Parental peer pressure
Accompanied by their diaries, the mascots silently demand entertainment far beyond that of a normal Monday evening, and the pressure increases when you see what other families have done. Trips to the pub for an early supper, fireworks displays, baking extravaganzas... I was hoping for a cheese-on-toast tea and the kids plonked in front of CBeebies while I did the ironing. Instead I feel pressurised to create fun activities we can write about, and to suggest amusing poses for photographs to print out and stick in the diary.
Josh has only just turned five, so activities like this still need parental supervision and take a fair amount of time. I daren’t write the diary myself because every other entry in the book has been written by a child. That means I have to sit with my son while he laboriously writes up the diary letter by letter, and I fend off his twin sisters who think that shouting out random letters and sounds will help him out. It doesn’t.
It's just extra homework
I’m not alone in dreading the arrival of a class mascot. My friend Anna admits to once making up a diary entry when she discovered Polly the Parrot languishing in a rucksack long after her daughter had gone to bed. “I knew we wouldn’t have time in the morning,” she says, “and I couldn’t send the thing back blank, so I just wrote a few lines about how we’d been for a walk after school and that Polly had helped make tea. I think we got away with it.”
Victoria Wallop has three children, who have all brought home cuddly friends at one time or another. “I’d never just make something up,” she says, “but I do confess to groaning a little when they come home. It’s basically just extra homework, isn’t it?”
Class mascots provide fun learning opportunities
Melitsa Avila doesn’t agree. She runs www.raisingplayfultots.com and thinks class mascots are great fun and an excellent opportunity for learning.
“I loved reading all their adventures and liked seeing that both parents and children had written in the books. It connected us all, when so often parents are disconnected with their children’s teachers and with other parents.”
Melitsa believes that writing for an audience outside their immediate family and their classmates is good practice for a child. “Other people will have to decipher their marks,” she explains. It also shows children what goes on in other families, so they learn what constitutes ‘normal’ for others.
If a class mascot is going to be part of your children's lives, consider asking for warning: Melitsa suggests talking to your class teacher about using a sign-up sheet at the start of term, so you know when the mascot is coming home and can plan around it. That would certainly make life easier for me.
In the meantime, please excuse me. Clara the Clown Fish needs entertaining.
Photo credit: Josh with Billy the Bear, by Emily Carlisle
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mum
09 November, 2011
We get it for the whole weekend, as a 'reward' for being Star of the Week. While I'm proud when my children are chosen (I'm not sure why, I'm pretty sure every child is chosen at some point) the extra homework aspect annoys me. We're expected to take photos, and therefore print them out, and some children, once they're in year 2 say, write reams. Sigh.
editor
09 November, 2011
We lost a bear's glasses on a press trip to Portsmouth. I have never got over it.
mum
09 November, 2011
Blimey what kind of parent bating is this? I vaguely remember getting a bear home one night some years ago, but there wasn't any requirement to entertain it.
On the other hand, perhaps I didn't notice there were conditions of bear custody and consequently we never got it back again.
mum
09 November, 2011
Linda, I can't believe you lost a bear's glasses! That's terrible :)
Victoria, thanks for lending your voice to this. I think the expectation to print photos is one which really annoys me - imagine the pressure felt by those who don't have the technology at home to do that.
Ellen, I guess your bear had lost his instructions :)
admin
09 November, 2011
I can quite smugly say that my children have never had a class mascot, so we've never had this trouble, although my friends children in other schools do and they dread the "weekend bear". I do know however that their children love it, and feel really special when the bear wants to come and stay at theirs for the weekend. "If" I was in this situation I might get my children to do a list of what they did with the bear in one word points e.g. walk, beach, dinner, garden etc, and get them to draw a lovely picture of the bear in their home... job done! Alternatively you could send back a sicknote and dry cleaning bill on Monday to say the bear had a D&V bug all weekend and didn't leave the house :-)
Leigh
Ready for Ten Team
mum
09 November, 2011
LOL Leigh!
mum
11 November, 2011
I took our Bear (William) supermarket shopping and thought that was adventure enough until I read what he'd done in his diary that comes home with him for your child to fill in.. He had a blast at The Royal Wedding. He also had an overnight bag with pyjamas, a passport (I), a jumper, sunglasses, and a bus pass. He'd obviously packed for every eventuality! I do think parents were trying to out do each other with what they write in the diary. Another strike for competitive parenting!
mum
11 November, 2011
It is absolutely part of competitive parenting! I was talking about this with the mums at the bus stop this morning and we've all made a pact not to do anything exciting the next time we get a mascot home.
12 November, 2011
Feel Iike I'm the spoil sport here for saying that even though it may feel competitive.. it doesn't have to be if we don't join it.....well that's the approach we've taken. Although knowing it was coming was the best thing to plan. Surprises aren't always fun on a Friday night.
mum
12 November, 2011
No, I don't think you're the spoil sport at all Mel, and in fact I've really taken on board your comments since we emailed about this piece. I'm going to talk to the teachers about a sign-up sheet, and chill out a bit next time we get one of the (many!) mascots home. Thanks so much for sharing your views.
admin
14 November, 2011
I just wanted to update you all - I have been jinxed!! After gloating that my daughter's school doesn't have class mascots, my little cherub came home today and informed me that she had a new person in her class called "Percy the Penguin", and that he would be coming home with her very soon!!!! :-)
Leigh
Ready for Ten Team
mum
15 November, 2011
Oh no, Leigh! I'm sorry, but that really did make me chuckle!
admin
28 November, 2011
Having read this post and everyone's funny comments, I'm amazed that this mascot world exists! I can see how it would potentially be quite fun both for the kids in writing the diary and showing everyone back in class - and for me too, if I had the time! I think as a regular occurrence, I would find it hard to fit it in - our weeks tend to be jam-packed with activities, chores and errands as it is and my boys aren't even at school yet!
I'll clearly have a lot more organising to do in the next few years!
Thanks for the warning! ;)
Sue,
Ready For Ten team