School coming to home to view sick child - Normal?

Sounds very OTT to me, more like a safe guarding issue to me! I certainly wouldn’t ask my child to come downstairs, no way! I’d be devastated too. I would be definately want more answers as to why she has to look at him

Not normal at all, I've never had a teacher come unannounced for either of my children (ones in secondary and would have a fair way to travel if they wanted to come see him mind 😂 and the other is at primary) I highly doubt its because you live in a low income area or are high earners etc it's most likely a safeguarding issue.

I’m a TA in a Primary School and this is not unusual, the school I work at does check children at home. I believe this is based on County Council guidance, as we didn’t check in the previous school year.
Hope your child is feeling much better soon.

Probably some school initiative to make teachers do more things they don't agree with? X

That's unusual. And she came alone, which is very unusual.

Just read ops update that it WASN’T a teacher - that makes more sense.
They have concerns op - ask why.

I work with several schools that would do it, the LA has an attendance agenda atm and anything below 95% is being challenged.

No way. Really weird. I’m a parent of 4 and a teacher of 20+ years and I’ve never heard of it.
make sure that the head is aware - might be a very odd teacher. It doesn’t sound right to me.

My teenage DDs teacher came to the house when she was bunking off and took her in to school 🤣

Oh dear, I missed the 19 pages of responses including the OP's 😬

I still think it's wrong. Anyone who does this with me will get what for!

I would have told her no and it is an invasion of your privacy. She needs to prove that you consented to the policy to be visited. I would email the school to ask for proof of this.

I've been a teacher for 15 years, across many schools and different parts of the country, and have NEVER seen or heard of this before. Absolutely not normal practice.

They should probably do it in more schools, having one child in school doesn't mean the other isn't at risk.

OP have you spoken to the school to confirm it’s their actual written policy? Hope your LO is feeling better.

If this is a whole school policy it will be clearly documented on the website. If it is not, the school will have to provide evidence for non-policy action.

Parents need to sign written consent to abide by school policies.

Schools cannot introduce new policies by stealth and assume consent.

Policy is not law and some policies are illegal or do not recognise legal rights.

I think people are shocked that someone has visited GIVEN one child attended school and OP rang about the sick child... you wouldn't expect a home visit. Unless there's more to the story

I don’t understand your post? OP has pointed out the staff member who visited wasn’t her child’s teacher but a member of the pastoral team. No doubt in a role similar to the one I just posted.

Sad indictment of our society... but it's not a teaching role.

Just want to post this current vacancy here for all the PP on this thread saying this is not normal… this is a job vacancy literally for this purpose! My SIL works for this trust and the school carries out almost daily visits for absent pupils.

One of the requirements of the role is a clean, full driving license. This is not a teacher. People have roles specifically for checking on absent children.

i assumed they'd moved after the child started at the school.

This wasn’t a teacher

This was a pastoral safeguarding member of the school staff

I am guessing she knows the law and school policy

Did the op ever come back and explain how her son got a place at the school despite being out of catchment and…. Regularly late “because outside of catchment area”

what? 30 miles out of catchment?

Teacher here- not unusual in some areas-
if the school is trying to improve attendance they may make a policy of it (ask around at school gate to see if it is unusual in your school),
if the school has significant safeguarding issues with particular families, they may make a policy of it across the year group in order to avoid tricky conversations with the family at risk who will already be defensive about being singled out
generally schools avoid, bc it is labour intensive, but if they do have staff available for it(sometimes support staff become unexpectedly available through the year to cover a teacher) they will do it, as it is v effective with certain issues (ie attendance)
covid has made it much more commonplace as a way to get a handle on attendance problems across the whole school
it makes parents very uncomfortable if they think it can happen, and so can change a culture of poor attendance across the school,
in partOcular if this is what a school is doing they will focus on absences that tag onto a holiday (you mentioned the inset day) as commonly people take holidays like this to avoid costs, and phonevthe child in sick.
unlikely to be a first step in a safeguarding issue though- so unless you have had some previous safeguarding chat with them I would be worried about this.
no teacher will be worried about him sitting in his pants, I promise!

@Onnabugeisha has it. If you aren't involved in education, you would be shocked at how much time can be taken up by serious safeguarding matters. I don't mean knocking on doors, either. If there's a whole school policy of sending pastoral staff out to check absentees, there will be a reason for it.

Spoken by someone who has no idea how even the worst of abuse and neglect is often very well hidden behind closed doors. More often than not, there are no visible signs of abuse or neglect outside the home. More often than not, abused/neglected children appear to be very happy when outside the home..this is literally because they know they are safer in public or at school than at home.

It’s utter naivety to think you will spot anything concerning based on behaviour or appearance outside the closed doors of home.