Tell me what random requests you've been sent by school this term

[listsandbudgets]

About an hour ago I got a notification there was a new message on the school app so as I had time I checked it.

DS is apparently doing a play IN FRENCH tomorrow and with apologies for the short notice school would like us to practise their lines with them (fine for us DP's French is almost fluent)

And please could we send DS in with :

A toy dog (probably got one somewhere in the loft)
Some Euro notes and coins (luckily we went to France in the holidays)

And best of all .......

An inflatable hammer

We knew about the play but until now we had no idea about props and DS certainly hadn't mentioned them. Anyone know how I can acquire an inflatable hammer by 8am tomorrow?

This made me laugh out loud. 😹

Well

le marteau gonflable
Le jouet chien
et les Euros

Sont a l'ecole

(Thanks Google Translate I had no idea what the French for "the inflatable hammer" was... for some utterly bizarre reason my clearly negligent French teacher forgot to cover that one in class)

Not quite the same but a few years ago, on a Saturday, the school Twitter posted a ‘reminder’ to wear tartan on Monday as it was St Andrews Day/Burns Day/we’re in Scotland so just want to wear tartan day.

I publicly replied that ‘it’s not a reminder if you’ve never mentioned it before’ and it was too late to be dropping this on parents. I had no reply, on Twitter or at the gates but the post was deleted and replaced with something along the lines of ‘if kids would like to wear tartan on Monday they can’.

Kids school don’t do world book day as such but they celebrate it by dressing as an adjective day. 99% of the kids are sleepy and the other 1% are cosy.

What on earth does the school do with all these potatoes?

To be fair, I love a cake sale. I just find it weird that you have to provide the goods and then pay to buy them back.

They also do an Easter egg tombola, where you send in an Easter egg and then your children have a go on the tombola to win an Easter egg. It's always carnage. There are kids crying because they have brought in a massive egg, given it in for the tombola, and then won a tiny one. There are kids crying because their elder sibling has won 3 big eggs and they have won nothing. There are kids crying because they've won a giant egg with 3 full size bars of chocolate attached and their parents are saying they can't eat it all right now. Before anyone says anything about resilience etc etc, I am talking about 4 and 5yos here, knackered at the end of term. By the time they get further up the school they are used to it (as are the parents, who have learnt to send in a small.egg and manage their DC's expectations!).

For anyone else wondering what schools do with the potatoes. My three DC took in potatoes.

DC 1 made a supertato character with pen and pieces of foam, which slowly went mouldy.

DC 2 made a spider with the potato and pipe cleaners for a mini beast sculpture display.

DC 3 was learning about sex in PHSE. We had a letter explaining they were learning in an age appropriate way, and everything would be taught in the context of relationships and consent. And please don’t forget to bring a potato.

DC3 planted the potato in a plastic cup and then the cup, soil and potato was put in a plastic bag. It was meant to be watered and start to grow over half term and then returned to school when it sprouted. DC3 dropped the pot on the bus and the soil fell out in the bag. It never really recovered, even though we repotted it at home in the plastic cup. Everyone else’s sprouted and DC3 was sad. My dad has an allotment, so we went there at the weekend and dug up a sprouting potato, planted it in the plastic pot, DC3 kept it safe on the bus, and the faked potato went on display with the others in the classroom.

I asked DC3 what the growing potato had to do with PHSE and relationships and they said, “it’s an example of asexual reproduction. Humans reproduce differently but we’re doing that next year.”

That has been the most stressful potato experience to date, but that’s only because we had to replace the un sprouting potato with a furtive trip to the allotments.

Please send your child to school dressed as an oak tree🤦‍♀️🤷‍♀️ brown top and leggings with lots of stick on leaves had to suffice 🙄🙄

The cake sale isn’t a lovely event! All the kids are knackered after school but wound up into a frenzy that they’ll get a cake, then the usual playground bedlam of billions of tired/hyped children plus at least one adult per child, plus an assortment of prams and toddlers (not to mention the people who view pick-up as a family event and bring grandparents) transforms into chaos as instead of being filtered out of three double-width exits we all try to enter the school building via a single door. The experienced parents then hog access to the single cake-covered trestle table by taking their time filling a giant Tupperware with the best cakes before flinging 20p into the collection tin while the reception parents flit around trying to get a look in to buy one (1) fairy cake with a £10 note, desperate for one of the few napkins on offer. For some reason, it has to be boiling hot in the hall but also ideally raining, for humidity vibes. Bonus points if you exit via some steps for every other cake-focussed child to fall down.

Chips at lunch every day that week.

Mine are adults now but my youngest daughter liked to keep me on my toes. She once told me on the walk to school that she was supposed to be dressed up as a daffodil, but never mind. Guiltily thought I had missed a note from school but it turned out to be a complete lie!
Amazingly she has gone on to be a model citizen and spends weeks planning her daughters book week outfits...the little boy only wants to be a Superhero so he gets ready made!

Maybe they meant you to decorate your ‘thatch ’ 😉

We had a note asking children to remember to bring a Wilson on Monday, children without a Wilson will not be permitted on the coach.

We went with Wellingtons? Not sure if it was right but he was allowed to go.

Nothing particularly strange from teachers, but the pta seems to be especially ambitious this year.
So far I have been asked for

• outgrown children's books for new reading snug

• if I'm able to give the use of light machinery/ diggers (I'm not, but someone did manage that)

• if I know a man with a van, who will deliver some donated furniture

• can I get my kids to try on any stored Christmas jumpers now & donate early if they've outgrown since last year

• can I commit to half a days gardening

• homade cake

• tinned goods

• raffle prises, followed by the obligation to buy raffle tickets to win my own or other people’s random tat back again.

Wow - we never had anything like these when I was in school in the dim dark ages of the 60's and 70's.

Junior school (private) -
Everything for plays etc made in-house under the watchful eyes of the craft teacher.
For harvest festival, anything from cans to home grown garden produce (we used to take in runner beans and beetroot from the garden).

Secondary school (grammar) -
I can recall about 2 cake sales in the time I was there, the majority brought in shop bought still in the packaging.
Just about all costumes for plays etc were crafted in house, we did have to bring in materials sometimes e.g. knackered white sheets, some gold ribbon or tinsel, coat hanger or thinner wire for angel costumes when playing angels for upper 6th nativity but turned into costumes by the A level students doing craft type courses. Some decorative items for events made by the lower years, all materials supplied by the school.
Those who were in the (completely voluntary) am dram society would sort out their own costumes if there was nothing suitable in the vast store of costumes from previous years - because who really wants to take home Edwardian clothing with green, purple & white ribbons after the Suffragettes play?
We did used to have to bring in our own ingredients for cooking lessons, but got to take the results home for dinner.

Must admit reading some of the posts above, I may have had some very passive aggressive thoughts on costumes
Mouse costume with a bleeding stump instead of a tail - 3 blind mice
Open sores oozing pus - Ring a Ring of Roses
Smashed egg with the yolk running out - Humpty Dumpty

Imagine a coach load of children all clutching their basketball with a cheery face drawn on with a Sharpie...

For next World Book Day, I will have completed my children’s bestseller:

’The Little Boy Who Lived A Generally Happy Life With His Parents In A Nondescript House In An OK Part Of Town, Who Went To A Mainstream School (With A Non Uniform Policy), Did Ok In His Learning, Had A Group Of (Human) Friends Of All Sexes, And Did Normal Kid Stuff.’

Ok, the title is a bit clunky, but the book is still in the editing stage right now. However, I can see it becoming a global phenomenon with the right backing. It was inspired by the frazzled looking parents driven to penury by the need for elaborate costumes that, like a wedding dress, will only be worn once.
Now that we’ve got a grandson, I think my wife and I have got about 3 years before the whole flipping process repeats itself, like an endless cloth Groundhog Day…

I remember the "memo" reminding us to send DS1 in with fruit tomorrow.

But the message had been garbled, and it wasn't supposed to be any sort of fruit. DS1 was the only one with a banana for a Christingle service (I'm not a Christian - I had no idea about these things).

Not a short-notice request from school, but rather from DS1 who informed me with 3 days notice that he had to be dressed as a chicken for Friday assembly as they were presenting to the school about the eggs/chicks project.

Thank goodness for amazon, said chicken outfit arrived next day and we set off Friday morning with him already dressed as a fluffy chicken. Got to school and loads of kids were talking to him and I noticed no one else was dressed up. Sat in the assembly and DS1 was indeed the only child dressed up!

I spoke to the teacher afterwards and it turned out that DS1 had asked if it would be ok for him to dress as a chicken for the assembly and the teacher assumed we already had a costume!

Oh, how we laughed...

I got my own back, the photo of DS1 dressed as chicken comes up every year on Facebook memories (he's 25 now) 🐔🐔🤣🤣

And a year later, DS3 came home with a request that he needs to wear brown for the nativity (because he was playing a donkey). We had no brown clothes whatsoever. At home time the next day I asked the teacher if he absolutely had to be a donkey? She said no. Could he be a chicken? Oh yes she said (she remembered DS1) 😁😁

I came here to defend schools...mostly they have warned you, told you once and then sent the reminder.....which is when the parent first takes notice.
But.....I've ended up laughing and laughing at these. Especially the Wilson and Decorated Hatch.....
Cake sales are a con!! (For the parents that make/donate cakes). But. They raise money. Although the irony of a cake sale for diabetes....

I have to ask with the inflatable hammer....is this a secondary school child that should have told you ages ago...and actually translating the list was probably part of his homework? But well done for sorting this at the 11th hour.

Some of these are hilarious.
I'm glad mine are out of primary school so we don't have any bizzare requests.
Although I have been asked to pay a £5 contribution towards food tech this term for ingredients. So far the ONLY ingredients the school have provided is water. I'm half tempted to tell them I'll send the water in send the £5 to oxfam so a whole village can have water for a month.

£40, for 'extras' for the children. This is a state primary, who are ignoring all the rules about branded uniforms and make you source it all from the world's most expensive uniform shop that you can't buy from online.

That had me weeping with laughter! 😂😂

I have been hooting with laughter at this - the mental image of all the children with their oranges, plus your DS with his banana, with a hopeful/ confused expression on his face...

I will buy a copy please.

You could write a whole series:
The girl who loved to wear Disney princess outfits from the supermarket;
The boy who went to cubs;
The children who were Liverpool fans;
The girl who always wore her wellies to school....
...and so on.

They will be a world book day phenomenon.

Nephew has a real published book all about being a footballer for the team he supports and has replica kit for. Makes dressing up for WBD very easy!