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.

From what I’ve read on here, the constraints and pressures on teachers in Scottish primaries are not as hideous as in England, maybe they have more time!

I would love to hear from any current Scottish P1//2 teachers who do this. It clearly isn’t in every school and is only pitched at 20% in areas of high deprivation. Is additional funding allocated for staffing?

If we're going to be in the business of copying Scottish teachers, can we have their pay deal please?

No way.

The comment I was responding to didn't specify English schools.

Incidentally, neither did the OP

Scottish teachers also have a 35 hour working week contract (I'm aware that they work longer hours than this!) so this means that if the govt wanted to introduce a scheme that would add an extra hour and a half of work to their week, they would rightly be able to ask what would be removed from their working week to account for it.

It definitely makes you question people’s agendas when they misrepresent what is happening and in doing so give a false narrative 🤷‍♀️

@noblegiraffe dont worry- it is only until age 5… so actually a nursery problem not a teacher problem (beyond possibly year R).

It definitely makes you question people’s agendas

Go on, tell me what you think my agenda is? 😂

Been ongoing for years in Scotland.
It's great

You started a thread claiming Labour want all primary school teachers to be responsible for teeth brushing and that this would be massively detrimental to the time table of the school day, lost learning time, unpaid teacher time, who will be teaching algebra while the teachers are brushing teeth etc…

and the policy is actually about nursery aged children, and maybe some children in yR…

So, what impression were you hoping to give by misrepresenting the facts?

You started a thread claiming Labour want all primary school teachers to be responsible for teeth brushing

No I didn't.

that this would be massively detrimental to the time table of the school day, lost learning time, in paid teacher time, who will be teaching algebra while the teachers are brushing teeth etc…

And you'll be able to find that quote for me? Particularly interested in the bit about teaching algebra to primary kids.

and the policy is actually about nursery aged children, and maybe some children in yR…

So, in fact, it will involve primary school teachers. Thanks for confirming.

So, what impression were you hoping to give by misrepresenting the facts?

I love that you claim I'm misrepresenting facts in a post were you make up shit and pretend that I said it.

So what do you think my agenda is, hmm?

Until recently I worked as a teacher in Wales (year 1). We have been supervising daily toothbrushing in school for many years. It takes teaching time and can’t undo a poor diet. Also, the kids who need it aren’t always given permission by their parents. So we are preaching to the converted.

You knew full well how the thread would go, and what implications you were making.

You didn’t pop up to point out “oh actually it’s only for under 5’s!” when everyone presumed that when you said ‘teachers’ that you meant primary school teachers throughout primary school, hours out of the curriculum affecting learning time better used on sats, feckless parents can’t manage to teach 11 year olds to brush their teeth, etc.

Either you read a headline and didn’t bother to actually look at what it meant or… what?

The problem is that it is not currently an expectation of teachers in England, and Labour want to make it an expectation

But it has become the expectation of lots of school staff in lots of schools across England already. It is happening and has now become and expectation.

Absolutely. Imagine if one child out of thirty refuses. Other children will be upset and refuse. It will become a nightmare for school staff.

Imagine if one child out of thirty refuses. Other children will be upset and refuse. It will become a nightmare for school staff

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.

Can I ask where it is happening across England already?

We already do this in our primary 1 class. It's a pain and takes away from learning time. We got told off by the teeth cleaning woman that comes in for opening more than one toothpaste tube at a time, as if one teacher with all these dc - many with asn or behavioural issues, has time to double check the tunes among everything else. Apparently data has shown it helps but it's at the expense of other things

Lots of areas in the midlands and the north west.

I remember visiting a public school years ago, and telling the Head of the Juniors that I wanted a school with similar values/ethos to our family.

She was shocked, and explained parents expected the school to teach values, life skills etc, as well as formal subjects. She said she was really glad to hear of parents proactively teaching values and life skills at home.

I was shocked, as I believe this is part and parcel of parenting.

However, having worked in state schools for some time now, it would appear I'm in the minority.

Can I ask where it is happening across England already?

Sorry, o replied without stating who I was replying to so again :-

Lots of areas in the midlands and the north west.
And not sure where people on here are from who have already had it rolled out sine time ago?

Why you ask?

And at the moment that's a school/trust decision. Labour want to make it a government expectation.

My problem with this is the crisis in (English!) schools. There is a distinct lack of political acknowledgement of this from the Tories (let's abolish A-levels and teach everyone maths to 18!) and now this is also coming from Labour ('teachers can just supervise tooth brushing to help out dentists!')

Here's a story from yesterday. Baroness Barran thinks that teachers don't believe the government's pledge to reduce their workload. Why do you think teachers don't believe it?

And what signals are Labour giving that they will be any different?

https://schoolsweek.co.uk/barran-worries-teachers-dont-believe-pledge-to-cut-workload/

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

FFS.

I ask because I have been teaching 25+ years in a variety of schools and have never heard of teachers supervising daily teeth cleaning.

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.

And at the moment that's a school/trust decision. Labour want to make it a government expectation

My problem with this is the crisis in (English!) schools. There is a distinct lack of political acknowledgement of this from the Tories (let's abolish A-levels and teach everyone maths to 18!) and now this is also coming from Labour ('teachers can just supervise tooth brushing to help out dentists!')

Here's a story from yesterday. Baroness Barran thinks that teachers don't believe the government's pledge to reduce their workload. Why do you think teachers don't believe it?

And what signals are Labour giving that they will be any different?

I don't disagree with you that currently our schools are expected to be all things to all people and failing drastically, because the current government have shown such a contempt for the teaching community by the continued underfunding and overloading of work and pressures.

I don't think, in my opinion and those around me, that teeth brushing is the worst of ideas, they encourage it, if managed correctly within the school for the cohort it is aimed at.

I don't see how turning this into a "labour" issue is relevant really, it dilutes the current issue that this government now have shown you who they are, they have shown the disrespect they have for us and they have shown they could not give two hoots about kids and those who go in every day to do there damnest to make a broken a system work or at least to function.

Adding more and more time consuming things into an already over crowded school day is setting schools up to fail.

Tell them something that they can now NOT do, in order to make time for this…

Parts of Yorkshire