Nativity rage!

BabyLayla, I need to join you off track here, just to say that my DGS3 thinks the correct word for reindeer is reindiator.

Our school used to issue tickets (2 per family) but couldn't stop the rush for seats. However the head teacher in her 'welcome' bit would very firmly lay down the law regarding expected behaviour from the audience. First came the usual instructions requests:

Fire alarm/ house keeping.
Phones on silent.
Take little ones out if they get fractious.
Stay seated

Then the one that I'm not sure was unique to our school:

Stay for the entire show. Do not leave after you have seen your child perform.

Each year the performance ran in the same order...FS then KS1 then KS2. One year a lot of FS parents left after the FS performance and more went after the KS1 performance. That left the poor KS2 children performing to a small, scattered audience. We swore we would never let that happen to our children again.

The parents who left even had the nerve to demand that they could take their children home early as 'nothing was happening'.

Happens other end of the spectrum too. Went to a political soiree last night, reserved two chairs in a large freezing room out of the draughts, only to see an elderly (ie older than me) man lift our possessions off the chairs and sit down with his wife. When I pointed out that the chairs were reserved, they both affected deafness and stayed put.

Apologies I went off track there, "proud grandma moment"
The point I wanted to make was that it was fantastic, the teachers, support staff, PTA etc obviously work so very hard to make this happen, last week was a Christmas fair. Such a lot of additional work for the staff.
I know lots of them have families themselves and school finishes so late this year, so little time to prepare for their own Christmas.

We loved our youngest grandsons nativity this year, he had proudly informed us he was going to be a"Radiator"
Very modern, must be a centrally heated stable!
Not so, he was actually one of many Narators ?

As a primary school teacher I have spent many hours in the hall rehearsing Christmas productions. The time and effort put into these is enormous. Hard work and stressful. Trying to give every child a part, learning the songs, dealing with children who for religious reasons are not taking part. However, on the day it's wonderful to see the faces of proud parents and grandparents. One thing that really annoys the staff is when a crying baby drowns out the actors.

durhamjen I do recall reading about a very compassionate child playing the role of the innkeeper at the Nativity play at school. When he had to reply that there was "No room at the inn", he ad-libbed, "but you can come in and have a drink if you like."

Last nativity for granddaughter next week. I'll be rather relieved.
Apparently their play has 9 innkeepers in it, all with something to say.
I wonder if any of them will say that Mary is underage, or not allowed in with those sandals on!

My DDIL had to sit on the back pew with DGS3 as DGS1 strutted his stuff as boy sheep number 1 this week. She couldn't see much of the action so asked a friend how he'd done. Apparently he was picking his nose a lot.

Changed times. I can just imagine a 'Vicar of Dibley' type meeting to try and prevent this kind of bun fight!

I do like the 'buy a ticket' idea.

Thanks for that Jalima.I thought it was very good but I don't think my grandchildren have any religious education at all at school.They do a lot about building self confidence but nothing spiritual the more's the pity.

We’re very fortunate in that dgd’s school is only a few years old and has tiered seating which pulls out from the wall. Dgs’s school holds their Christmas service/nativity in the local church which actually has cctv and a large tv screen mounted on the wall. No visibility issues in either case but still an unholy rush for the front row - can’t understand it!

OP - Surprised no teacher moved the tall lady on H&S grounds!
Worst I've seen was an entitled mummy in an ancient church moving about most of the time to film her precious
snowflake. We already had a restricted view next to a pillar! She was even wearing a large furry hat!
Different occasion in a church hall, no filming as a cd was to be available. We duly bought it and concluded that it was filmed by Humph the Camel's DF! Few other children got a look in and my shepherd DGCS appeared only as a hand waving his lamb! Humph indeed!

sorry, that is a link to a dvd to buy, I meant to just link to a synopsis of the play which was very enjoyable but meaningful as well.
Here's a bit of the script
www.edgyproductions.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/Bethlehems-Buzzin-script-sample.pdf

Greenfinch would they not even put on a more modern Nativity such as this one?

www.edgyproductions.com/shop/bethlehems-buzzin/

The HT should have told her to move!! The mother should have known better!!

Ours was very civilised in comparison.
HT did ask very nicely that if anyone had a noisy baby/toddler would they please take them out as the children had been rehearsing so hard and everyone would want to hear everything they said. One small child did murmur softly at one point but that was all.

We always had two performances of the Nativity on different days. One was 'quiet' . No young children or babies. The second was absolute bedlam . You could not hear the children speak or sing for screaming babies and toddlers scraping chairs around. Hardly any mothers took a noisy child outside., even though the head asked them to do as it was unfair on the actors.
Parents started queuing during lunch time, even though the performance didn't start until 2 , and then rushed for the front row. On one occasion a Mum sat on a front row chair clearly marked for the class teacher. She made a dreadful fuss when asked to move.

I've never seen anything like it. Usually parents understand that everyone wants to see their own child if possible and move around as needed to help each other out. I have been to a good few nativities over the years and this is the first time I have seen such behaviour.

You are lucky to have a nativity. The school my grandchildren go to is so politically correct that they have absolutely nothing at Christmas apart from a Christmas dinner !Sad!

All the seats for gd's nativity are numbered and the race for the front row is a week before when you pay £1 for your tickets. Only two per child as well.

You were unlucky there I think, but there is always one!
At DGS’s nativity everyone was well behaved, but the Head gave a pep talk beforehand, so maybe that was why.

Anything involving their kids seems to bring out the worst in some Mums sadly :-(