LACK OF POTTY TRAINING BEFORE STARTING SCHOOL.

Hmm interesting views in here. My DC (all three of them, NT as far as I'm aware) were all trained before preschool, and two by age 3, one at 3y3m, all easily done within a week or so and no ongoing regular accidents. Starting preschool was the hard line for me- I wanted them done, for both mine, the child's and the schools sake.

I do agree- notwithstanding SEN issues- children should be reliably trained by reception- that is a very low bar indeed.

However, all the people harping on about being trained by 18 months/2 years just remind me of older family members and competitive friends who say this but in reality their DC has multiple accidents a day for MONTHS, if not longer. To me that's not potty training, that's just letting your DC piss and shit themselves and being smug about it 😅

“They get paid enough”.

You're joking, presumably?

It is utterly crap advice but this is why some parents ‘wait for the signs’ until they’re school age 🥴

That depends. What if you are refused medical support?

If a child is thought to be NT but is having soiling issues, the incontinent team isn't going to be interested if they are 4. I doubt a referral would even be accepted.

Not really that hard for working parents (we did it in a bank holiday). All the children at nursery were working parents (obviously as otherwise they wouldn’t have needed nursery!), and they were all potty trained before pre-school. The nursery followed your lead (some preferred to use pull ups, others no pants, others regular pants). This was the same with all other nurseries around here.

Mine has just started school (60 children) and in the teachers’ briefing they commented on how all the children could use the toilet unaided. They did mention that more of the children this intake were fussy eaters though!!

But if you’ve been seeking medical support you wouldn’t be fined, would you? Just the parents whose kids have not been toilet trained and have not sought help at all? It’s very easy to download medical evidence from the NHS app as a parent, to supply to school with their new starter questionnaires. HV are often involved in preschool assessments and can also give their input. I down load and screen shot medical data from the NHS notes for my [SEN] kids and their school/college/uni admin all the time. It isn’t onerous if you HAVE been seeking support to evidence it.

The fact is, many many parents are NOT toilet training their kids, not teaching them to use cutlery etc, not seeking help. People don’t step up unless there is the risk of censure/fine or their kids not being allowed to take up a school place. Your circumstances are easily evidenced and can easily be discussed with the school.

Screaming "lazy parenting" right, left and center without actually looking into what's happening is certainly not going to help. If your child potty trained without issue like most of them, then you just have no idea what you are talking about.

My almost 4 yo refuses to use the potty/toilets for poos. That's it, we can force him to sit on it, we can't force him to actually go. He will hold it for days, if we insist too much he ends up impacted which takes weeks to clear and means daily accidents and leakage at nursery.

We've tried every method on the book, we've ask GP and Health visitor for advice: beyond prescribing laxatives and sending us the link to ERIC website they've been absolutely useless.

So the question now is how to we get him ready for school in September? We have no idea.
As far as everyone is concerned, he is NT.

It's apparently a common issue between 2-4, and "you just have to wait", like it will miraculously go away when he turns 5 🙄. They won't even investigate anything until kids are 6-7!

The thing is, at 4-5, it isn't always obvious that the child does have SEN and/or medical needs because unless it is very obvious, it isn't unusual for a child of that age to still be undiagnosed.

The vast majority of 4-5 year olds won't want to be in nappies and it is much easier for a child who is capable to use the toilet than to change the nappy of an older child.

I think the fact nurseries are struggling also isn't helping this situation.

We have a 3yo in an our care who isn't potty trained because of circumstances. His current nursery, and all the other local nurseries I've since discovered after being curious, play no part in potty training whatsoever. His current one don't allow them to come in without a nappy until they've been fully dry at home for two full weeks.

When my kids were at nursery there were potties and pretty much all of them went after a few days training at home and it continued at nursery. With my twins (now left in) it was their nursery that said "they're getting nosy about the potties we've got for other kids so unless you have an objection we're going to let them try"

Luckily for us I have the freedom of not working, but I know quite a few parents who'll have to gamble that potty training will work in the school holidays as they don't have an extra two weeks annual leave to use just for that.

And where do you imagine the capacity is for professionals to supply “evidence”?

I had a late toilet trained child - I started at age 2 and they were just about trained by starting reception, but only because they are an autumn birthday and were approaching 5.

I raised concerns with various professionals in healthcare and education about autism from babyhood and it still took until midway through year 1 for my child to get a diagnosis. And that was pre-covid, it’d probably be a couple of years later than that given waiting lists now. So exactly what evidence would you have expected me to provide and from where?

Everyone always says “except SEN or medical” - you cannot always tell at age 3/4 if a child has SEN!! Or medical issues for that matter - it took a year and multiple GP visits before my child’s chronic constipation was diagnosed, which I’m sure was a major factor in their struggle with toilet training.

Fining me and stopping my child attending school would have been grossly unfair.

I wouldn't be surprised at all, as I see many of these more privileged parents who just don't parent at all.
Inversely, the poorer parents are probably more likely to train quickly, so they can get rid of the nappy costs.
I also find so many poorer children are quite proud or try to maintain as much dignity as they can, so their children won't be hungry and peeing themselves too.

The only child I know who has gone to school not fully toilet trained and unable to use a knife and fork is the one who has benefited from having a parent at home full time, the rest of the children I know with two working parents have all had a very different experience and have gone to school fully toilet trained and much better prepared despite being much younger in the year. Of course there are exceptions and some children have additional needs which should be supported but this seems to predominantly be a parenting issue rather than a time issue in my mind.

Potty training is not hard. Even with two working parents. That's like saying weaning is hard with working parents so we're just going to feed him milk until school.
Parents need to parent.

That's what I received when my daughter was starting reception about 12 years ago and I'm glad to hear it's still being sent.
I was wondering if that had been axed, since so many children are starting unprepared.

I do know there's a lot of 'nursery, school, childminder etc should follow parents' leads and parents are following the children's leads', and no-one seems to be getting anywhere.

I hope all schools are and continue to send them.

When i was teaching we had a young lad in nursery (3+) whose DM (A primary teacher, taking time out)) hadn't even attempted it because she didn't think it was fair on him when the new baby had disrupted his life! He was 3 and brother was over a yr. That was pure laziness and the kid had no issues and pickd it ip immediately.

When she brought him she had to take him yo the toilets, get him to go, pants on instead of pull ups. She didn't like that we didn't do that for her!

I’m sure for some parents it is far easier for them to keep their child in nappies. What could be easier? For my mother (I’m 60) the incentive was getting rid of changing, soaking and washing nappies. Getting rid of a nappy bucket. The incentive for them was enormous. My DC were out of nappies by 2.5 and they just used the loo with a seat and skipped the potty stage. I took a week off work, we stayed at home a lot and cracked it.

A friend’s daughter works in a nursery and they are very keen to train the children. A child may have had an excellent week at nursery with no accidents and when she asks the parent at drop off on Monday how the weekend went nine times out of ten she’s told they put them back in nappies.

This is a definite representation of lazy parenting.

This ⬆️. I can't believe the whole "lack of time" excuse.
I've no idea why parents don't make time to support the development of their own children.

We got a letter from school once our son’s place was confirmed in April (I think, or May), laying out all of the different things they needed to be able to do before starting this September. So everyone had the summer to practice anything their child wasn’t confident on.

It included things like toilet trained, can dress themselves (including shoes and coats), can use a knife and fork, sit a table to eat, follow instructions, share nicely with other children, confident in communicating with adults etc.

It was really helpful! I don’t know if other schools do it though.

In reception I used to go in every fortnight and 'read' with the children and was told which of them was in nappies in case it needed changing when they were with me and who to notify/what the process was because obviously I wouldn't be changing them, even though I hold higher levels of vetting than teachers due to my job.

To the one asking where that is.
I don't want to name the areas so as not to accidentally devalue someone's house prices... oh wait what are the chances anyone on mumsnet lives in one of those vast and many areas, zero if that😂

Very well put.

I don’t think there were any untrained children when either of mine started school. When my youngest started there were many children having accidents until half term when they sensibly introduced a toilet schedule.
If your child isn’t ready for toilet training and you have to force it, as it did with one of mine, it can takes weeks, difficult if you’re also working and impossible if nursery aren’t working with you and will continue the potty training.

How can you be totally sure of that? It was only part way through my daughters reception year that I learnt that 3 of the kids were still in nappies, none of them had SEN. This was in a class of 18

I can understand a little later, I don't think we pushed ours as young as my mum would have liked 😂but we were definitely ready and trained by 2 or 3. One of ours was still bed wetting and not great at wiping but could still manage himself to use the loo if he needed it.
Still in nappies at school age could be seen as lazy and probably is in some circumstances.
However, it would be interesting to see the data around the family set ups and poverty issues for children that are not ready. Lots of people are worrying about food on the table, foodbanks, working crazy hours for wages that don't cover the basics. Living in mould ridden one bedroom flats with no family support. It doesn't take an awful stretch of the imagination to see how living a chaotic, stressful and crappy existence could have an affect on how much time and headspace you have to potty train.
I would be flabbergasted if the non potty trained kids are from families where the cuboards are full and days out are plenty and homes are spacious with lovely bathrooms and money for fancy toilet papers and handsoaps.

That is just lazy parenting though - me and DH were both working and potty trained DS well before school