To complain about teacher weight comments

But there will also be kids who are self conscious about their height and would rather be taller/shorter. Why have you decided that's OK to highlight but weight isn't?

No please don't tell her this.

Unless she is a body builder herself of course.

I'm very surprised at the school allowing this when the subject of weight has become so taboo, while the nation continues to get fatter.

I'm sure you won't be the only parent to complain about this teacher, although ironically some of the parents complaining will be allowing their kids free access to Instagram and all its disordered eating influencers.

Don’t complain. The teacher meant no harm.

Nobody needed to be weighed at all. The teacher could have drawn up random weights and plotted them. Completely unnecessary and the fallout is always for the parents to deal with when teachers do these ill-advised 'tasks'.

I'm usually on the side of teachers but not this time and a complaint is warranted.

Tell your daughter BMI is ridiculous. I work with a weightlifter who has absolutely no body fat but his BMI classes him as obese.

They are not teenagers, they are 11, and would have been weighed in school a few months ago in year 6.

This used to be a very standard activity to do in a classroom which led on to work displaying the data. It’s not done much anymore because people worry about it triggering eating disorders etc. if the teacher let everyone weigh themselves and didn’t insist on sharing the weights then I can understand why she thought it was ok.

unfortunately these days it’s just another activity that is best avoided.

school will have told her not to do it again.

i moved to doing heights instead which was actually quite interesting.

I lnow my size of clothes. Both my private clothes and my uniform at work. We can request smaller/bigger if needed. I have had the same for +10 years.
None on my medication is based on weight.
I know that my weight isn't 'overweight'. My GP is happy with it. She never ask me to be weighted in clinic but ok I see her every 2nd-3rd year.
I am not worried. People seem a bit obseesed with weight/BMI.

My DS 11, soon 12 weighs 35 kg. He's 145 cm and not particularly skinny, very average. He would hate this exercice as well because he would like to weigh more. And he would he ashamed if the teacher said that the normal was 50 kh. Did the teacher weigh herself ? Would she propose that her collegues weigh themselves? And this is teens/preteens we're talking about so very sensitive subject. YANBU.

Agree, 50kg is well over the average as it is so if your daughter is heavier than that then it needs addressing, she can’t be oblivious to the fact she is overweight. The teacher was trying to be sensitive by saying 50kg.

But 50kg is a normal weight. Surely you just told your daughter that her weight is normal too? I hope you haven't made the situation worse OP.

Its not ideal but making a complaint about it feels a bit like going after the low hanging fruit. Is your DD allowed a phone and access to SM? Because if so, complaining about this teacher's remark in the context of the messaging she will be receiving from sources far more influential on teens than a teacher, is like trying to keep your roof from leaking with sellotape. You cannot protect your DD from issues with food by trying to police and silence other people. The only protection is from building confidence the best you can and encouraging dialogue around what she sees and hears.

She won't get in trouble and she will be following a school approved scheme of work. They will labe laughing and rolling their eyes at you op!

What? 50kg is 8 stone! That's really heavy for an 11 year old, the average is much less than that

No

Eating disorders are mental health conditions, they are an attempt to control other stressful areas of your life.

Simply mentioning the concept of weight won't cause an eating disorder.

I do think YABU to complain to be honest. The teacher was obviously trying to be sensitive to children who might not want to put their weight down (which is a good thing), though yes, it is unfortunate that she did choose a relatively low number. I might have mentioned it directly to her rather than raised it as a complaint.

I think it’s fucked up that a teacher gets a bunch of 12 year olds to weigh themselves in a public setting. This would’ve been my nightmare as a child/teen. Saying they don’t have to get on the scales if they don’t want to is not helpful when others around them are. It singles them out and is likely to bring classmates’ questions about why you don’t want to weigh yourself, and speculative comments particularly if a kid is over/underweight. Even the healthiest of kids is impressionable and can have disordered thinking.

I don’t think I would complain, but I’d contact the teacher and express my concerns. And I wouldn’t even care about being labelled ‘that’ parent.

They should not be weighing themselves at school in class. That’s a terrible idea.

Often used to figure out clothes sizes to order online. Can be used to decide how much medication to take (especially when transitioning between child/adult categories). Can be used to give an indication of health (though agree that is not the be all and end all).

Mainly, I am sceptical of the idea that the truth is something to hide away from. There's a balance to be struck between obsessing over your weight and purposefully hiding the truth from yourself.

Surely the ideal would be to teach our children that weight is just one factor among many, something we can be aware of but don't have to obsess over.

The teacher didn't insist the students had to share their real weight with the class. The teacher just asked them to weigh themselves (privately, I assume) and write down a standard average weight if they preferred.

Is this serious? You'd rather a potential eating disorder over a supply teacher??
Wt actual f?

I can't tell what is real on mn anymore, this is absolutely batshit.

I think educating teens about bmi is positive as long as children can keep their weight private from peers and the focus is on strength and longevity.

Weight needs to be talked about more as we are in crisis with it, and i say that as someone who has been overweight previously.

It should be something that children learn about in a healthy controlled environment, i believe it should also be talked about frankly including the consequences to health if you are overweight

The focus should be around health and not ideal beauty standards and i think tats where alot of it can get lost in translation.

"Around one in eight children aged between two and 10 in England are obese, an NHS survey published today found.
New statistics show around one in seven children (15%) aged between two and 15 were obese in 2022 – similar to 2019 (16%). Obesity rates in 2022 were 12% among those aged between two and 10, and 19% in those aged between 11 and 15.
The latest Health Survey for England shows 64% of adults were overweight or obese in 2022, including three in 10 (29%) who were obese, with more men (67%) classified as overweight or obese than women (61%).
The figures for adults have remained similar to 2019, when 64% of adults were overweight or obese, including 28% who were obese"

Good grief. People weigh different amounts, its a (biological) fact of life so why be so dramatic about it? The kids had to weigh themselves and if they didn't want to, they could stick down 50kg. Presumably because that's bang in the middle of the bell curve they're about to draw. Teacher did nothing wrong.

If someone doesn't want to know their weight and finds it 'triggering' then that in itself is a red flag for disordered thinking @Itssofunny

Yes exactly, and could lead to a potentially life threatening eating disorder.
Which isn't so funny.

Not sure why "triggering" is in inverted commas, it's almost like you think you're winning the argument.

Op the teacher has been at best irresponsible. There will be children in the class already with eating disorders and probably won't even tell their parents what took place.