Back to school essentials

The summer holidays are almost over, there is nothing you can do to avoid it. No matter how much you think about it, you can't delay the return to school for much longer. The only thing you can do is to be prepared for it and have everything ready to soften the blow.

Buying textbooks may be the most expensive and complicated thing to do, but there are many other things you need to have for the new school year. You can spend a lot of money on stationery, depending on how much you want and need for your subjects.

Some people love to carry the best materials and always want to be on trend with everything, including pencil cases and pens. But if you're a bit more practical, here's a list of basic supplies to get you through the whole course.

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Material needed for primary school

This is perhaps the most creative stage for children, and you will probably still need materials for playing, painting or modelling. We can create some kind of guideline list, but probably when they get to class they will be given a much more specific one.

The list of things to buy in infant school depends a lot on the school, as some will provide some kind of materials and you don't need to buy them. But if you want your child to do activities at home similar to those at school, take note:

• All kinds of coloured pencils: this is something that every child should have, one of the things that children like the most and that develop their intellect the most is drawing and colouring. For that you need to have all the options available, plus you will need to have them to use them in class. Some schools provide this type of material so that children learn to share and so that the economic differences between children are not noticed, but it doesn’t mean that you should have your own material at home.
• Play dough: there may be early childhood teachers who don't think it's necessary, but it's a good way to get the little ones familiar with shapes and give free rein to their imagination, so regardless of what they tell you in class, it's always good to buy play dough to learn through play.
• Craft supplies: the biggest fear of parents is that their child will say at ten o'clock at night "tomorrow I have a school project". If your child is not like that, congratulations, you are very lucky, but it is not normal. When you have children you have to be proactive for both of us, always have cardboard, scissors, glue, tacks, staples and all kinds of materials to make crafts at home. Although some parents think that the best way to learn is to be told off by the teacher the next day.

You start primary school as a child and end it as a teenager and therefore the materials you need at the beginning are not the same as those you need at the end. In the first years of primary school you will need things very similar to those in infant school, in the last years the materials will be more similar to those in secondary school. 

Although everything is changing, we can get an idea of what is needed. A much more serious type of material oriented more to study and less to play:

• Pencils and pens: coloured pencils are for special occasions, although it is still good to have a pencil case with colours in your backpack. We will start using pens, some of them allow you to erase what you have written, so you can start with them.
• Notebooks: perhaps one of the most important things in the whole of secondary school. Although many teachers work with computers and virtually, notebooks are still used and are very useful. There are all kinds of notebooks, checkered, lined, blank... Some teachers have preferences in this area, but it is best to use the one you feel most comfortable with.
• Cases and backpacks: clothes and accessories are very important in defining the personality and taste of each child. In primary school they are still very young but they are starting to want to be original. Every parent has a way of educating their children, but you have to know that pencil cases and backpacks will be important for them.

Materials needed for secondary school 

Secondary school may be the most complex stage for the youngest, adolescence and hormones wreak havoc on many people's bodies and minds. And everything is a drama, even the material is classed.

This is the time when the type of notebook, the type of backpack and even the type of pen is very important to them. That's why one of the most valuable pieces of advice is to give them freedom and talk to them when preparing for the return to school. For everything else, there is the list of essentials:

• Note material: we are no longer talking about notebooks because not all teachers want them. You will probably have to buy a large pack of handouts for handwritten assignments. You will have to check the preferences of each teacher before you start shopping.
• Organisational material: filing cabinets and diaries are essential at this stage. You will have to sit down with your children and work out a comfortable system so that their room does not become a tangle of meaningless papers.
• Pencil cases, backpacks and other accessories: as we have already mentioned, this will be part of their way of expressing themselves and they will always want to have the backpack that is trendy or fits their personality. It goes without saying that it is a challenge for every parent to make sure that their child chooses a backpack that doesn't break their back.
• Clothing: it is very important that at this stage you teach them how to dress appropriately for school and for professional life. Let your children express themselves and their personality through the way they dress, but teach them to be comfortable, clean and neat.
• Specialised material: in secondary school you will find subjects such as technology and technical drawing, and a good part of your salary will be spent on them. If you don't want to have a hard time, ask what materials you will need (square, bevel, cardboard, saws, hammers...) and buy them in advance at a good price.

It is important that the older your children get, the more freedom you give them when it comes to buying materials for back to school. Always supervise them, but try to educate them in a more independent way so that tomorrow they will be able to fend for themselves thanks to this stage of their life.