Most Australian children will spend 13 years of their life attending school. That’s a long time! So as parents it’s important for us to think about how to set our kids up for a positive and meaningful experience of schooling.

That was the focus of our most recent conversation on the Timeless Parenting podcast with our guest, preschool educator and mother-of-five, Kat Ashton Israel.

Many parents agonise over the seemingly all-important question: When should I send my child to school? For children born in the first half of the year, parents have the choice of sending them when they are turning five or turning six. We can become preoccupied by getting this decision ‘right’.

This is indeed an important question to consider, and one that we discuss in this episode. But actually, it isn’t the only question we need to think about. In our conversation we also talked about:

How can we begin preparing our child for starting school?

How can we develop a positive partnership with our child’s school and teacher?

When concerns and conflicts with the school arise, how can we navigate them well?

As Christians, how can we make a positive contribution to our school community?

One question we chose not to discuss was which kind of schooling to choose for your child—public, church or Christian school … or homeschooling. If you would like to think more about that topic, check out Emily Cobb’s chapter of Parenting in God’s Family: ‘Weighing up different types of schooling’.

This conversation brings a balanced Christian perspective to the topic of schooling and will give you plenty of ideas for having positive starts and positive partnerships at school!

Listen, be encouraged and share it with your friends!

—

You can also find our podcast on Spotify, Apple Podcasts and other platforms.

Mothers Union Sydney runs an annual seminar about Christian life and parenting. Listen to talks from previous seminars on Soundcloud.

—

If you want to get in touch with us to offer some feedback or suggest a topic, you can write to us at: timelessparenting@youthworks.net

Timeless Parenting is brought to you by Growing Faith, a ministry of Youthworks Media, and Mothers Union Sydney.