what incidences do teachers have to tell parents about?

[ALovelyBunchOfCoconuts]

my daughter has come home upset today as a boy in.her class has spat in her face. she said she told a grown up but doesn't know whether he was spoken to. i wasn't told when picking her up. should i have been? i find spitting totally disgustingand im surprised i wasn't informed. they are in reception, what discipline o they use for things like this? should i mention it tomorrow?

[2cats2many]

I suppose it depends upon the kind of spit. If it was blowing a rasberry, or talking in a sloppy spitty way or just accidentaly spitting as he was speaking/playing, then I wouldn't expect to be told.

However, if he did a nasty, on-purpose spit in her face, I would just in the same way I would expect to be told about someone biting my child.

[clam]

Hmm, tricky one. If there's an incident involving some sort of injury where the child was seen in First Aid, then someone would either phone you, catch you at home-time or pop a note in the book-bag. Spitting, whilst revolting and unpleasant, didn't result in an actual injury.

However, in our school, the 'spitter' would have been given a behaviour slip (to take home and parent to sign and return straightaway) and the 'spittee' would have got an incident slip, explaining that the child had been the victim of bad behaviour by another pupil and what had been done about it. In the absence of such a policy, I think I would have had a quiet word with you and apologised on the child's behalf.

[clam]

But, in answer to your question, what do they "have" to tell you, I'm not sure there's an official list, but it's down to good practice.

[ALovelyBunchOfCoconuts]

it's difficult isn't it. i didnt want to ask dd too many leading questions, i didn't want her to think it happened in a way it didn't nor did i want to accuse her of lying. ill see if she mentions it in the morning and see if she can describe how it happened. if it was a proper spit ill ask the teacher why i wasn't informed. he might have just dribbled he seems a nice boy.

[auntevil]

Same as 2cats - depends on the source of the spit. If accidental or raspberry, or cough, splutter and sneeze, no I wouldn't imagine it to be mentioned.
I would have thought that if there was some intent that the spitter would have been made to apologise, in which case your DD would have known that it had been dealt with.
If it was a spiteful incident, then yes, I would have thought that staff would alert you so you would be aware if your DD was upset. You are unlikely to be told how it was dealt with, just that it had been dealt with.

[boxershorts]

Its probably down to the Head. And you do get zany Heads One put a child in a yellow jerkin all day and said on tv it was not a punishment. It ruddy was

[DeWe]

I wouldn't expect to be told unless my child was upset, or had visible injury.

I was surprised to find they called raspberries "spitting" at school, yes,they want to discourage it, but to me "spitting" is a deliberate act of contempt, blowing a raspberry when I was at school would generally be done in fun, and often done from one child to another and back again.

[auntevil]

DeWe - it's the children that describe any spittle that finds its way on to them as spitting. I had a 'spitting' incident today. Turns out both were blowing razzas at each other. Lets just say that one has a dry style of making the sound, the other didn't.

[LittleEdie]

I wouldn't think twice about talking to the teacher about this. Not necessarily in a 'why wasn't I told?' sort of a way (could be loads of reasons, maybe she was talking to someone else and didn't see you or something) but in a 'DD has told me about something that happened yesterday...' And take it from there depending on her reaction.

I would expect them to have taken to seriously if it was a spit. It's just as antisocial as hitting.