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Original poster

School WhatsApp groups!!! (Spoof)

41 replies

MrMrsJones · 04/11/2021 07:32

Stolen from Popcorn for lunch (Facebook)

Love them or loathe them, school parent WhatsApp groups have become an inescapable fact of life.

Having been a school parent for a few years, I’ve observed some subtle differences between the new parents’ WhatsApp messages and the messages exchanged between seasoned parents.

New Parents:

MUM 1: Does anyone know what’s on the dinner menu for 30th September 2022? Veronica Margerie is asking and I want to be prepared!! If it’s anything with dairy I’ll probably just send a packed lunch, to be honest. The last time she ate dairy from a source other than the organic, sustainable, eco-embracing goat and hedgehog farm near our house, she came out in HIVES.

MUM 2: OMG 😱 It is SO hard to plan ahead, isn’t it. Personally, I prefer packed lunches. Viscal Luther had an incident with some peas that were inadvertently put on his plate three days into term. Have written to the school requesting a copy of their adverse incident policy and will probably ask for that to be updated in light of what happened, tbh. He hasn’t been the same since. Brought him to the GP and am pushing for tests in case he’s been psychologically damaged.

MUM 3: We’ve been to the GP twice this week with Tulip Flamingo! She came home on Thursday and said that someone coughed near the sandpit and then she played IN THE SANDPIT the next day.
Horror. Gave her a Dettol bath but, to be honest, she really needed a 50-day course of antibiotics. Thankfully the GP was sooooo accomodating after I threatened to bludgeon him with my handbag 🥰

MUM 4: Sorry to change the subject but can anyone give me the exact start and end times of the class Christmas party?! I know which day it’s on but I’d really like to know TIMES.
I’m going shopping tomorrow and want to pick a suitable holding spray for Basil’s hair. Need one that’ll last for the duration of the party. He inherited his gorgeous curls from his father’s great grandfather, who was the Earl of Pisswick-on-Thames 😍😍😍

MUM 5: OMG that’s soooooo amazing!!!! I went on a river cruise along Pisswick-on-Thames in 2003!!! SUCH a small world…..

Meanwhile, over in the veteran parents’ WhatsApp group…

MUM 1: What day is swimming?

MUM 2: Wednesday

MUM 1: 👍🏻

OP posts:
DrWankincense · 04/11/2021 07:36

Haha pretty much Grin.
WhatsApp group wasn't even a thing with my 1st.
I've turned off notifications on our one, once it gets started on a topic it goes mad. It's quite annoying because there is relevant info in there from parent council but it's tedious having to scroll through waffle to find it.

Comedycook · 04/11/2021 07:38

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

GaiusHelenMohiam · 04/11/2021 07:42

Oh god yes. Although ours isn’t even seasoned parents v new parents, it’s a core of ‘mummies’ who post the detailed shit and a few of us who literally use it for ‘what day is PE this term’.

I’ve had to mute it. They are lovely women who mean well but OMFG shut up. We are yr5 now so I’ve known these women for years and I do not need to know about their child’s reading level or that they are fundraising for endangered hippos this weekend.

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RedToothBrush · 04/11/2021 08:01

The school WhatsApp group just full of idiots to lazy to check their own email and think everyone else is their PE and parents complaining about school expecting them to do some actual parenting.

I have come to the conclusion that the ones who talk on it most are a good guide for who to avoid and hope your child isn't friends with.

dad11122 · 04/11/2021 08:12

Our school WhatsApp group has a Mum on it who posts everything that the school emails out and then asks questions that are answered in the emails if she ever read them.

SheWoreYellow · 04/11/2021 08:14

@Comedycook

Love them or loathe them, school parent WhatsApp groups have become an inescapable fact of life

Are you a journalist?

She said it was stolen from Facebook.
AosSi · 04/11/2021 08:16

One of 'those parents' kindly offered to add me (the teacher) to the class WhatsApp a few years ago. She was miffed when I wouldn't join - apparently I should be more open to communication Hmm

You can communicate with me through the proper channels and within working hours. Feck. Off.

millenialblush · 04/11/2021 08:17

We've got a splinter group solely dedicated to organising pub trips (without the ones who frantically ask about school menu changes, or the one who literally wrote she was giving 'formal consent' for other parents to take photos of her child on sports day for them to send to her as she couldn't attend Confused)

Original poster
MrMrsJones · 04/11/2021 08:23

Yes saw it this morning on FB and though mumsnet would like it ....

I'm so glad all mine are over the age of 23

OP posts:
JassyRadlett · 04/11/2021 08:28

I have one in Y6 and one in Y1. The Y6 group is exactly as above, with a side of ‘anyone fancy a drink next week?’

The Y1 one. Actually it’s settled a lot from last year when it was a LOT of parents of first children at school - so parents with kids starting school in a pandemic who’d never had contact with the school system before, had never seen inside the school, the teachers were less accessible, etc. It was… intense.

I was the class rep.

JassyRadlett · 04/11/2021 08:29

And the people who can’t read emails. There are only so many ways you can say ‘here’s the info the school sent’ or ‘it was in the newsletter’ without sounding short…

Christmasisnear · 04/11/2021 09:22

What annoys me is when the class reps sent info to us that was sent through parent mail seconds earlier.

Too much double info going on! I don't
message much in the groups but the two I'm on is in-between both of the OPs examples. Grin

Christmasisnear · 04/11/2021 09:23

@Christmasisnear

What annoys me is when the class reps sent info to us that was sent through parent mail seconds earlier.

Too much double info going on! I don't
message much in the groups but the two I'm on is in-between both of the OPs examples. Grin

Send
Crunchymum · 04/11/2021 09:26

I'm on a nursery, y2 and y4 group.

I'd say the y2 is probably the "worst" in terms of OTT messaging.

Nursery is just a constant stream of "Lola has D&V" / "Johnny has a temp of 40c" etc.

y4 is definitely the quietest group - and my most favourite Smile

JassyRadlett · 04/11/2021 09:28

@Christmasisnear

What annoys me is when the class reps sent info to us that was sent through parent mail seconds earlier.

Too much double info going on! I don't
message much in the groups but the two I'm on is in-between both of the OPs examples. Grin

I agree with you in principle but I can see the temptation for the class reps to take a belt and braces approach, given the number of people who clearly never read school emails, or don’t read them properly, and then panic down the track and ask all kinds of questions and get themselves and their kids into difficulties.

Some people really do need to be spoon fed, it seems.

WithMyEncyclopedia · 04/11/2021 09:33

Just to counter, ours is friendly, brief and helpful! (And no I'm not always the one asking things!)

Hoppinggreen · 04/11/2021 09:34

I was PTA Chair at my sons Primary.
This apparently meant that I read all emails and correspondence from school far more than anyone else so I regularly got FB messages from people I barely knew asking me about things ranging from Uniform Policy to asking whether it was true Mrs X had been sacked for being an alcoholic!!
I had no more inside info than the average parent other than about upcoming PTA events

Lockdownbear · 04/11/2021 09:45

That's pretty much it.
One group rarely used and the other new starts full of mums feeling isolated because of limited contact with the school.

Clocktopus · 04/11/2021 09:50

I'm in four of the bloody things.

Year 8 group - fairly normal, occasional grumbling about "flipping teenagers", one mum who was foaming that her DD was put in detention once for hitting another child and brings it up at every opportunity.

Year 3 group - absolutely ace, all really nice and friendly, no one seems to be a nob.

Reception group - sake as the Year 3 group and has a lot of people from the year three group on it too.

Year 5 group - fuck my life, they're a bunch of dickheads. When the DC moved from junior school to middle school it was like a Greek tragedy, umpteen posts about "my baby is growing up" and "I'm not ready for this", they were all trying to out do each other over who was the most upset and then in the last day of term they were all crying in the yard and then wondering why their DC were so upset. Me and the 2-3 other non-dickhead mums were Hmm They mean well but everything is so OTT. The DC went on a residential at the start of middle school, one night away and they were there to wave the coach off, again sobbing as it pulled away and then wondering why their DC were at the coach windows crying.

FreeBritnee · 04/11/2021 09:53

I’m not on ours as I can’t stand all the whittering about nonsense bullshit.

My older child has a Facebook class group and pretty much no one posts on it anymore.

RedToothBrush · 04/11/2021 10:12

@JassyRadlett

And the people who can’t read emails. There are only so many ways you can say ‘here’s the info the school sent’ or ‘it was in the newsletter’ without sounding short…
I think people short be more often tbh.

I am so done with the laziness of parents like this.

RedToothBrush · 04/11/2021 10:20

@Clocktopus

I'm in four of the bloody things.

Year 8 group - fairly normal, occasional grumbling about "flipping teenagers", one mum who was foaming that her DD was put in detention once for hitting another child and brings it up at every opportunity.

Year 3 group - absolutely ace, all really nice and friendly, no one seems to be a nob.

Reception group - sake as the Year 3 group and has a lot of people from the year three group on it too.

Year 5 group - fuck my life, they're a bunch of dickheads. When the DC moved from junior school to middle school it was like a Greek tragedy, umpteen posts about "my baby is growing up" and "I'm not ready for this", they were all trying to out do each other over who was the most upset and then in the last day of term they were all crying in the yard and then wondering why their DC were so upset. Me and the 2-3 other non-dickhead mums were Hmm They mean well but everything is so OTT. The DC went on a residential at the start of middle school, one night away and they were there to wave the coach off, again sobbing as it pulled away and then wondering why their DC were at the coach windows crying.

Oh god. I have this to look forward to then.

I swear one day there will be riots because of parents whatsapp groups and them all winding each other up and none of the 'sensibles' wanting to calm all the idiots down any more.

As I say the most purpose the whatsapp group serve, is to warn you which dickheads to avoid!

jjj321 · 04/11/2021 10:26

The mute function is a life saver. We've had so many parental arguments on our school WhatsApps. Not helped by parents thinking 180 strangers want to hear them preaching about whatever weird and wonderful views they hold.

But the batshit craziest winner goes to the parent who sent the whole year a message to say her son was leaving as he'd been bullied (which is obviously very sad). Followed by a list of the names of "nice" pupils and "bullies" in her view. Funnily enough, that created uproar. Particularly from the parent whose child was named as one of the "bullies" who'd phoned her to ask for a bit more detail on examples and she wasn't able to provide any.

Clocktopus · 04/11/2021 10:28

I've remembered another incident from the year 5 group: "there's a suspicious looking man FaceTiming another man outside the school gates and he was moving the phone around so the other man could see the school".

Cue eleventh hundred increasingly ridiculous messages including people asking if the police had been informed, someone asked if anyone had rang the school to "put them on alert", someone else posted that they had rang the school and informed them they need to "go on lockdown", someone else asked if the dads should meet up and go do a patrol, terrorism was mentioned as a possibility along with child trafficking. Anyone saying it was probably perfectly innocent, that terrorists and child traffickers are unlikely to target our arse-end-of-nowhere village, and that 'man makes a video call' isn't really a police matter were shot down and reminded that "safeguarding is everyone's responsibility" and "I'd rather say something and be wrong than stay silent and be right".

The new dad at the school then commented that it was him outside the school with the phone, his brother was picking the kids up that day and didn't know which gate to go in so he Face Timed him to show him where to go at pick up time.

Nobs.

Legomania · 04/11/2021 10:32

Ours goes
"Has anyone seen Steve's jumper?"
And then 30 replies from people who DON'T have the jumper...

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