Labour want teachers to supervise kids brushing their teeth ARGH.

[noblegiraffe]

People can't get dentists for their children.

Children's teeth are one of the top reasons for child hospital admission, with 9 out of 10 extractions in 0-5 year olds being due to preventable decay.

This is clearly an area that needs addressing urgently.

BUT schools are in crisis, if they're not literally falling apart they are running out of teachers or unable to hire teaching assistants. Primary schools are increasingly unable to meet the needs of children with SEN and disabilities, where numbers are going through the roof. Where is the time to supervise teeth-brushing going to come from? Who has the capacity to implement this? It seems that Labour are willing to accept that there is a crisis in dentistry, but pushing extra workload onto schools to solve it is just failing to recognise the crisis in schools in terms of ability to take on extra responsibilities.

There is an increasing trend to see a problem in society and expect schools to do something about it. There's also an increasing trend whereby underfunded support services for children reduce the offer of those services, and schools are just expected to pick up the slack. An example would be NHS Southwest deciding to stop accepting referrals for autism diagnosis except in cases of extreme need, saying that schools could just deal with these children not having a diagnosis. CAMHS collapsing under the weight of mental health issues in children was met with the policy that schools should have a member of staff given a bit of training to try to replace expert services. Special schools are saying that some children are too needy for their specialist setting, so those children with extreme needs are left in mainstream schools who are just expected to get on with it.

Why is Labour's go-to that teachers should supervise teeth brushing and not that parents should supervise teeth brushing and be supported in this?

What do people want the purpose of schools to be? If it is to educate children, then the rest of this stuff needs to be farmed elsewhere.

If it is to be that schools should be a one-stop-shop for all issues relating to children, then we need funding, staffing and infrastructure that acknowledges this new role.

"Teachers can just" add sanctioning pupils for not brushing their teeth to the list of tasks they 'can just' do

FFS

Sorry you appear to be quoting me with speech marks around words I haven't said, think you've got the wrong person.

If it’s widespread across the midlands and north west, I’m sure loads of teachers will be able come on and be able to tell us how it works in practice though

The ones I know the MDAs do it after the kids go in for lunch.
Line all the toothbrushes up in the holders ready, have splodges of toothpaste ready, the kids wipe the toothpaste onto their brushes,and then the key stage 1 brush their teeth for "2 mins" and put their toothbrushes back in it's holder. They are then cleaned/rinsed in Milton every week.
The YR, have the MDAs brush their teeth.

Some have the same sort of set up but it is only YR that do it.

How sad that we live in a society that expects teachers to parent our children.
Things like washing them, cleaning their teeth and feeding them healthy nutritious food are the absolute basics. As a country we have such a low bar set for parents and some of them can't even achieve that. It's sickening.
It probably would benefit the poor little ones who's parents don't bother with them but, and it is a massive but, the children whose parents do these things already are missing time they could use learning other things.
Rather than forcing the failures of these parents on to teachers perhaps the powers that be would be better off improving funding for social workers so that it wasn't only the worse cases that are being picked up and early help/intervention could be offered to those that are feckless rather than down right abusive.
If they are not cleaning their child's teeth I would be willing to bet there is a lot more they are not doing that they should be, what's next, a weekly bath at school on a Monday morning?

Decay is caused by dietary sugars. Limiting sugar is the most important way of reducing decay. Toothbrushing is all very well but it will be of limited help if the children still eat rubbish.

How about a National campaign for families to promote teeth cleaning-adverts on the telly, video clips on you tube, warnings of what your teeth will look like if you don’t look after them?

This shouldn’t be yet another, ‘but can’t the schools just…’ solution.

I went to school overseas and we had a weekly fluoride mouthwash supervised by teachers. All sat round the tables with our little paper cups of bright pink mouthwash and were timed swilling it around. It was disgusting.

No, I quoted your words. My quotes around my words were to highlight that you were simply doing the same thing as Labour. Casually adding to teachers’ workloads as if it means nothing at all.

As in, your words were in the quoted post.

You’re making up shit I didn’t say again. What’s your agenda?

@Shinyandnew1 I wish PP’s would read the thread. There has already been links posted to the Early Years Framework and the linked document, with associated comments.
https://help-for-early-years-providers.education.gov.uk/safeguarding-and-welfare/oral-health

This is already government expectation of teachers ( dependent on the age range they teach).

People have already pointed out that that document does not say it is a government expectation.

Teachers are professionals and can therefore be trusted to care for children. Teachers are the first and best opportunity to make significant contributions to children's health and are best placed to spot changes in children or signs of neglect/abuse. Spending 5 minutes watching a class full of children brushing their teeth doesn't seem a huge ask. We know there are a lot of parents who don't care and and don't bother to instill good practices in their children so schools are perfectly placed to bridge the gap and make sure all children are able to look after their own health. It would seem a better use of teachers time than having to spend much longer catching children up on lost learning when they've been off for dental infections or time in hospital for extractions. As others have said, years ago it was common for this to happen in schools and its time it should be brought back. Schools aren't just for academic education but health, social and other forms of learning too.

Many, many early years teachers supervise teeth cleaning.

Spending 5 minutes watching a class full of children brushing their teeth doesn't seem a huge ask.

”Teachers can just” plus “Won’t somebody think of the children”.

Needs to stop.

The bar for social care involvement for neglect is very high. Horrifyingly so. Social care would not be interested in unbrushed teeth (even when alongside being unkempt, late for school etc)

The problem teachers have is so many 5 minute jobs have already been added in. It is generally accepted the primary curriculum is too broad and virtually impossible to fit in. Much of what is taught in Reception now was taught in Y1 pre-2014 and probably aspects in Y2 in years before that. Schools have also had to take on speech therapy and mental health interventions. You simply cannot compare to previous decades.

Teachers are the first and best opportunity to make significant contributions to children's health

I am not actually massively anti this idea but thus sentence leaps out at me.

First ? Parents are the primary agents of socialisation

Best? To make significant contributions to health? Best? Really? I rather thought that was parents, too. And health care.

Schools should not just teach and drill children ( pun intended). Anyone who thinks this speaks utilitarian bonkers. But schools are not first or best in terms of rearing children, or providing health care.

Teachers are the first and best opportunity to make significant contributions to children's health

Really?!

Really? Do you think the world needs fewer maths teachers then?

My DC’s school can’t recruit them for love nor money.

Oh mate.

Our MDAs are also our TAs in class. They would need to take time from English and maths to prepare and clean up from this or leave 1:1 children alone in lessons.

Plus we have two sinks for 60 girls and 2 sinks for 60 boys. It takes forever for them all to wash hands before lunch let alone brush teeth.

Anyone suggesting this is easy and can be fitted nicely into 5 minutes has no idea of working with young children in a school environment.

How about a volunteer rota of all the feckless parents supervising a class teeth brushing session? Let's face it, if they can't gaf about their kids teeth they're probably not that arsed about their own. We've all seen the toothless types stuffing sweets in their kids mouths...

No, I quoted your words. My quotes around my words were to highlight that you were simply doing the same thing as Labour. Casually adding to teachers’ workloads as if it means nothing at all

No, I didn't say that at all. Please don't put words in my mouth it's really annoying and counter productive for the discussion.

What I said was

"The school staff deal with the refusals the same as they do for any other refusal of a requested task. It's not like this will be new territory for them"
Which was in response to someone saying that it would cause an issue for the other class if one was being disruptive. I simply pointed out it would follow the same process as any other issue or refusal to follow instruction.

If you read all my posts properly you will see I agree the way school staff are treated is horrendous by our current conservative government, and I never agree to casually adding things to teachers workloads, however if you read again, you will see my point again is, this is one that I wouldn't deem as ridiculous as others that are currently imposed on school staff due to the complete underfunding of other services that are now also at breaking point, like our schools.

Again, this is not a labour issue, it's because of the situation the current government are forcing our school staff to work under, that brushing children's teeth is evoking such a reaction in some school staff.

There really is no evidence to suggest brushing three times a day is effective. Most effective would be parents not meeting their children with sugary snacks at 3pm. In the absence of sugar, there would be no decay even if there was also no brushing.

Do you work in a school?