Back to school blues

'September is the Monday of the year' says B sadly.

Sadness descends upon France, another summer stopped in its prime, another miserable return to the grindstone, the insults, the threats, the scolding, the pressure...

R began his return to school by enduring an hour long lecture by the Headmistress Mrs Scruton;  all  6 classes in his year assembled in a hall fitted with four microphones, so that when Mrs Scruton shouted 'TAISEZ-VOUS' it caused the children to clutch their ears in pain.  She then went through the same kinds of threats as last year, including repeating the chewing gum rule to make sure it sticks  and then she added three pages of new rules, which as R points out, are mostly as a result of the success of last year's pupils in getting round the old ones.

• Now all pupils must have their ID papers to get into the school on pain of immediate sanction (it was previously possible to borrow someone's ID to get out of school if you had forgotten yours, no longer...)
• The sanction for arriving without ID will be written in a special Book with a P-E-N (not on computer as Some Pupil has hacked into it and not in ID book as you have forgotten it).
• No teacher may take the ID book of any pupil for any reason and so there is No Excuse for not having it on you (I wonder how long it will be before they microchip the pupils?)
• Anyone in the corridor during class time must have a special coupon signed by a teacher giving permission, reason and duration of stay, on pain of immediate sanction.
• No pupil is to fall ill during the class and ask to see the nurse (unless demonstrably vomiting or pooing pants)  they must wait until break and make sure they miss break time to see the school nurse and will not be admitted at the end of break-time only at the beginning.
• No food (complaints that pupils were stealing one another's food, so ban food and end complaints).
• No showers, as pupils turn showers on dressed colleagues, fling open doors to expose colleagues, have water fights and all the other things males in groups do...
• No spray deodorants
• No magnifying glasses...or thick spectacles...and all the flints have been removed from the prison yard...leaving only a handful of sticks to be frenetically rubbed together.
• No earplugs (I jest you not)

Then she announced that 250 sessions of the School Discipline Commission (kangeroo court) had to be convened last year and this This Will Not Do, and that no child is to come to school hungry or suffering from lack of sleep, the school nurse will show no sympathy and will not be giving out food any more.

The hour long threats and rules session finished by reading out the class lists, surname, forename, class number...you had to listen to all the names until you spotted your name and made a mental note of the class.

'Did you lose yourself in your thoughts once you had your class?' I asked R

'I couldn't, because the microphones were booming too loudly' he replied. 'It was BORING'.

Our young neighbour T was in high dudgeon because she was in the last class to be read out;  also she was separated from all her friends and put in a class with people she did not like with a notorious teacher.   When she came round to our place her resounding shouts and squeals made me think she was arguing savagely with R and I intervened to avoid the drawing of blood, but apparently she was just talking 'normally' ie venting.  Everyone has been split up into different classes with a totally new set of teachers, which has made most of them rather miserable and disorientated.

The final fact of the first day, which thankfully only lasted 2.5 hours, was that they went to their classes where the new class teachers told them what books they needed and what forms to fill in and Mrs Scruton and her 'team' came round to each class to issue further threats;  all to no avail as everyone is bored stiff with threats and know that once the tiresome chest beating is over normal school life will resume.

I couldn't help noticing that R and his friends are all shouting and short tempered today  as a result of all the shouting-at that they received on the first day and will continue to receive on a regular basis.  R's friend M was locked down for 2 hours after school because on the first day, his mother had not furnished him with a regulation passport photo on his ID book.    He was beside himself.  They would not let him phone his mum.  Eventually his mum phoned the school, she beside herself and shouted them all down, quite right too, it's outrageous.

 R always laughs when he recounts his tales, he is a born survivor, but... sigh sigh sigh of frustration, there IS another way...counting days to next hols.

Meanwhile bombarded with 20 books to cover in plastic film, a job which causes grown mothers to weep, unless they buy Le Bon Eleve Crystal system with self-stick corners.  Any entrepreneurs out there, if you invent plastic covered exercise and text books, you will clean up in France and drastically reduce the national consumption of tranquilisers.