Parenting failures.

Kate he sounds a treasure

When we lived in Holland our children went to the local school on the corner and they used to come home on their own. When our DS was about 7 we moved to another house a couple of streets away. I thought I had made sure my DS knew where to come to but I got a call from one of the other mothers who told me she had found him wandering around not knowing where we were. She fed him and took him back to school.
He always says now we moved without telling him!

He is jane

Dragonfly what dreadful parents , Was he traumatised or just enjoyed reminding you?

My DF wrote a diary and he wrote about sending me to school. I was under 5 and they put me on the public bus. I didn't get off at the right stop so that decided not to send me to school again until I was a bit older. I have no recollection of that incident at all.

My father used to tell the tale about when he started school, they lived in a market garden on a main road with no other properties close by.
A farmer used to pass the gate each morning with his horse and cart and Dad was thrown up on to the hay in the cart. Grandfather asked the farmer to drop him off at the school gates as he passed through the village.

From when I was 7, I had to walk to school . This was a 45 minute walk , including a main road and several crossings . This was regarded as normal then - to me it's unthinkable but times change. My grandchildren live 5 minutes walk from school and DD picks them up in the car every day.

We had the rule that if you could get out of bed, then you went to school. I was a newly qualified teacher so my daughter dutifully went to her new Grammar School. Just before lunch I was called to the school office to take a phone call. My daughter’s PE teacher asked if it would be alright if she took my daughter home and put her to bed as she had flu. When I got home from work my daughter was even tucked up with a hot water bottle!

@Kate1949 & @NotSpaghetti
I was one of those kids off to boarding school with my cases etc. Not as many parents had cars back then, or if they did it was the breadwinner of the family who needed it for work! My parents thought it was good for me to go on my own and once I got to certain points other pupils would join the journey, too, tho I had at least the first 11 miles on my own - as had my older sibling a few years before!
Things just seemed so much safer back then.

We had several kids and we had been at the beach all day and everyone was tired so we bundled the kids and large scotch collie into the car and headed for home. Except we left the 6 year old behind! We returned 10 minutes later and found her at the little milk bar down there with a nice shop keeper - who just happened to be her prep teacher a couple of years before. When I think what might have happened I am horrified. That daughter was always the quietest one in the family so that was probably why but what were we thinking?

On one occasion, soon after we moved from the city to this small town, DS3 was in P1. It was a cold winter's day and I happened to be shopping when I overheard 2 women discussing the closing of the school due to the boiler breaking down and the children were being sent home.
I hurried home to find my little boy on the doorstep. I phoned the school to ask why a small child was sent home with no warning and was told the teacher had asked the children if there was anyone at home before they sent them and anyway most people have a neighbour to go to . They obviously thought it was my fault and certainly not theirs.