16 Back to school together

 

Gym was an issue again. Peter had been punished because he had forgotten his gymkit. That was my fault of course. Are there any seven year olds who are able to remember such a thing by themselves? I have no idea. Mine certainly didn't. Apparently, it had happened before. I didn't know that either. Well, I didn't realise. There was a note in his bag. It must have been there for a long time. I hadn't looked in his bag and Peter didn't tell me such things. I felt guilty. There were at least three mouldy sandwiches stuck to the bottom of his rucksack, along with something that looked like a piece of fruit, some sticky old biscuits and that note, which, incidentally, could no longer be read. Peter had stayed home from school for a few days. Almost every week he stayed home for a day or two. The stomachache was back. My mother had undergone a minor operation in hospital the week before and couldn’t babysit. My father told me to try and be more strict, but when I told him that Peter often woke up crying at five o'clock in the morning, he was shocked. ‘No, in that case he should stay home for a few days. That might be better.’ I had to take time off work. That had also been happening more often lately.

Ingeborg promptly started yelling her head off when she heard that Peter could stay home, because she didn't want to go to school either. It was a quarter past eight. Sweat was on my my forehead. Ingeborg was under scrutiny at school because they considered her too solitary. She didn’t make any friends. She was supposed to be at school early because that gave her time to ‘land’, as Mrs Rascals called it. Sam had a presentation and suddenly couldn't find his folder with pictures. I was supposed to call the school before eight to report Peter sick, but I had also forgotten to take out the bread from the freezer the night before. Sam and I had been working late on his presentation. The bread now had to be defrosted in the microwave. I had got up too late. The five o’clock sessions with Peter were taking their toll.

 

Lately Ingeborg had been picking fights with me all the time. How she managed as a five year old I don't know, but every single time she knew how to make me angry, whereupon she’d put her thumb in her mouth and turn her back to me. I knew what she was doing. I had read about it. It's called drawing negative attention. Had I neglected her? Was I worrying too much about Peter?

Oh God, what would they think at school? They were going to be late again. The second time already this week.

Sam was stamping his feet in the hallway. He had long wanted to ride his own bike to school like his friends, but it was just a bit too far away, with a dangerous crossing. ‘When you're twelve,' I had told him. He thought me stupid. And now he was late through my fault.

I had to leave Peter on his own for a short while. He could handle that. He was already seven. In the hallway Ingeborg made a drama with her coat. She wanted to wear the pink summer coat but it was raining outside. The teacher would think me crazy if I brought her to school in such a thin cotton coat. Besides, she had to ride on the back of my bike. It would have to be the thick coat and that was that. Where are the bicycle keys? ‘Sam, your bread is still on the table. Have you got those pictures? I think they are upstairs because you wanted to practise in bed, right?’ I would tell them at school that Peter was sick. Sam furiously stomped upstairs. Ingeborg had taken off her coat again and put on the pink one. I stuffed her mackintosh into a separate bag. At least then she would have a good coat when they went out to play. I had to remember to tell the teacher.

 

We were late. The square was already empty. Ingeborg refused to go inside. She was cold. ‘Are you cold, sweetheart? It's nice and warm inside.’

‘I'm not cold', she said rebelliously with shivering purple lips. ‘I want to go home!’ And she put her thumb in her mouth and turned her back to me. I felt myself getting hot again.

A woman with a heavy shoulder bag was approaching across the square. 'Are you Mrs. Troost?'

‘Yes', I said and panic struck instinctively. What have I forgotten now?

‘Oh sorry,' said the lady kindly, 'were you waiting for me outside? I was a bit early and had gone inside. It's so cold, isn't it?’

What a pity it is that human beings are generally spontaneously honest. If I have one flaw , it's that I wear my heart on my sleeve. ‘No, I'm just late. Did I have an appointment with you?'

'Oh?’ Now the eyebrows did go up. My name is...' whatever, I don't know, 'we did have an appointment. I'm with partnership X north division south.’ Or something or other.

‘You know, Back to School Together, she added when she saw my surprised look. ‘I am supposed to observe your son in class today, but you wanted to talk to me first.’

‘I understood you insisted on that,’ she added, as she still got no response from me. I felt myself blush with embarrassment. ‘Yes, of course. That’s right. My son is not doing very well. He is staying at home today.’

Ingeborg was still there with her thumb in her mouth, being obstinate.

'Oh that's too bad.'

'I have to take her inside.'

'I understand. I'll wait for you. Maybe we can talk a bit then?'

'Yes, yes. Of course.’ And I dragged the struggling Ingeborg along with me. I only got hold of a sleeve. She worked herself out of her coat and ran away from me. I got impatient. ‘You have to listen!' I had another attack of idiotic self-assertion. You’ll see that of all people this woman now will think I can't handle my kids.

 

Mrs X was studying her feet.

 

At the sandpit I got hold of Ingeborg. I tried to pick her up but she went limp and started to scream.

Mrs X walked up to me.

‘You take it easy now. We’ll just make another appointment. It will take a few weeks, because I'm going on holiday next week and after that my schedule is already very full. But I'll call you after my holiday. OK?’ I gave her a stressed-out nod, and she marched off.

Ingeborg took a few steps away from me, jerking her shoulder free, angrily put her arms across her chest and stuck her thumb in her mouth. I lowered myself onto the edge of the sandpit.

 

‘Come on, we’re going home,' I said to my surly looking five-year-old daughter. I couldn't care any more what they thought of me. As I walked out of the schoolyard, with Ingeborg hopping beside me, suddenly happy again, I got a glimpse of the surprised face of the headmistress through the first floor window. She immediately turned away from the window, but she had seen me, I was sure of that. Now I could not tell her that Ingeborg was sick too. I had to think of something else.

At home Peter was lying on the sofa, fast asleep. He too was tired after so many interrupted nights. How is a child affected by fear?  By being unhappy and not feeling at home? I decided to bring it up when I had another discussion with Dad. My child was tired.

I am reading about children's holidaycamps. At the end of the nineteenth century, they were invented for delicate and nervous children. Until the late sixties of the twentieth century, underpriviliged, undernourished children were sent to the countryside for a few weeks to gain strength. At the beginning of the twentieth century, the main reason was physical health, or rather, unhealthiness, such as all sorts of lung diseases caused by the soot-polluted cities, and tuberculosis that was still rampant throughout the world. Moreover, it was thought that in those few weeks time, the children could be taught good behaviour according to the prevailing Christian norms and values, instead of the street urchin behaviour of the backstreet children of those days.

After the Second World War, when tuberculosis was under control and the standard of living was rising, the holiday camps were still there. The mental health of the child became a concern. Children with 'nervous weakness' became the main target group. In 1954, 32,000 children made use of such a holiday camp.

The government questioned the necessity of the holiday camps. There were already all kinds of other facilities that cared for children’s health, such as ‘infant consultation centre’ (Consultatie Bureau CB) and Medical Educational Centres (MOB). Moreover, children were taken out of the classroom for six weeks for such a holiday and there was concern that they would miss too many lessons.

I would give anything to spend six weeks in a holiday camp with my family. But actually parents were not welcome there. The parents were said to be the problem. Parents are the origin of children, but they are also percieved as the cause of nervous breakdowns and school drop-outs. The people who judge them are themselves the product of parents. They belong to the approved section of the population that make up the rules and conditions.

 

Were those holiday camps really necessary? Were they not necessary? Beyond doubt, despite rising prosperity and increased equal opportunities, the number of 'nervous' children is not decreasing to this day.

 

The need for mental health care gave us Medical Educational Centres (MOB), specifically for children with a problem. For parents with a problem. Whose fault was it really? In this day and age I find it remarkable that children who do not march along in the system are still labelled as deviant. It is a known fact that they’ve always been there. We are not all the same. If that is a given fact, then it is normal to be ‘deviant’, isn't it?

 

Instead of providing for this given fact, we still assume an average child and a fixed standard for education. And all the children who drop out, as can be expected, we put in special schools. When the Mammoth Act was drawn up, people knew, or could have known, that a group of children would not fit in.

That must have been clear, because special education grew like crazy after the war. In 1950, there were 33,000 pupils in special education; in 1986, there were 106,000. But still they opt for education that irrevocably leads to a division in society: those who fit in and those who do not. Moreover, I know for a fact that many so-called normal children are deeply miserable, working their way through regular education. I have seen them myself, those children. Hanging on by their fingernails, with counselling and therapies, because just being yourself is not allowed. Will they be able to say at some point: 'I got my diploma'? And then what? Why do 10 to 12 percent of all minors appeal to youth care. Because they can grow up so happily and well balanced?

 

Back to School Together was an idea of the State Secretary for Education in 1989. His predecessor had believed that the growing number of children in special education could be reduced by simply freezing the funding for special education. After all, the idea was that you could calculate from the statistics how many children would drop out. If more children drop out than the statistics predict, the schools are not doing their job properly. Then they are referring too readily. The schools just had to stop doing that. A coercive government. That too is of all times.

When that did not work out, the new Secretary of State had a more sympathetic idea. Schools had to start working together, so that all children would be at the same school again. Expertise could then be exchanged through this collaboration. What expertise? To begin with, all children have never been together at one school, so the expertise needed to achieve this did not exist at all.

 

In 1989, no one in The Hague was guided by scientific insights or, for example, the experience of the LOM schools. The Secretary of State's plan suited the ideas of people who were fighting against stigmatisation and exclusion, besides being very advantageous for the state coffers. It took them years to introduce it. By the time the ladies with heavy shoulder bags, the specialists from the breeding ground of LOM education, tried to make a difference at the schools, it had long since become clear that it was not sufficient. The successor to the State Secretary had already thought up something new for the growing problem of failing children.

 

As a young mother, I did not delve into all this. As a young mother, I complied, as best I could, with the requirements of society, which were determined, among other things, by my fellow parents, who all marched along and were more succesful.

 

It is 2003. Peter and I got a lady from Back to School Together on our case. I had forgotten the first appointment. The lady with the expertise was now going on holiday and after that she was busy. Peter was staying home. Ingeborg loved it.