to move my child to another school because of PJ wearing parents and other things.....

[fiftieslover]

Hi there, your views would be appreciated.

My ds is currently in yr 3 (8 yrs old) he is in a mixed class of years 3 and 4. Since Christmas I have had really serious doubts about the school he is in.

He has asked to move schools a couple of times in the past 6 months and I am seriously considering it. BUT I know at 8 this is a massive change for him. He is a social little boy who makes friends easily and can articulate his thoughts really well. The issues I have with the school are as follows.

1. Parents dropping their children off still wearing their PJs. I not talking lounge wear here, I'm talking fullish sheep adorned pink things. I turn up at school dressed for work, smart and ready for the day.

1. Leading on from 1 is the reason for the PJ wearing. There is a very high number of unemployed parents in the school. I live in a nice part of not a very nice area IYKWIM. Unemployment has always been a problem. I have lived in this area for over 30 years and alot of the children in ds class are 4th and 5th generation unemployed. So I assume the pj wearing is because they have nothing to get ready for? I need to add that sometimes the children are picked up from school at 3pm with said parents still adorning the sheep attire.

I have never been unemployed so struggle to empathise really with the other parents. I work in recruitment and know there are always things you can do to improve your chances but I have never been there so know I dont fully understand the effect unemployment has on you.

1. There are ALOT of kids in the class that are morphing into absolute horrors. The behaviour is getting worse as each school year passes. Once lovely little 4 year olds are now 8 year old swearing, disrespectful kids. My ds went over to one of them the other day to show him his homework. The other kid looked at my ds as if he were stupid and said I dont do homework - I wouldnt dare!.

1. I'm aware this is getting long so going to cut it short. The teachers appear to spend alot of time on discipline - taking actual teaching time away from the good kids.

1. In the past out of 26 kids, there are approximately 8 that behave really well. If the other 18 are playing up, the whole class has been punished. This really annoyed me.

I could go on and I think I have answered my own question seeing it in black and white but would still appreciate your comments.

Thanks fifties x

Sparks1 I posted a little further up about a bad situation I was in when I lost control. It wasn't a matter of CBA. But you lot only see that and judge that way. So it is a generalisation.

But that's an isolated and thankfully rare occurrence. When it's endemic it indicates something else entirely. Pure laziness.

it is snobbery because there are more than one reason why she should move her child. First and foremost because he was unhappy enough to ask to be moved. But OP choses to highlight the plight of the PJ wearing disenfranchised on a public forum. I can't think why for any other reason than she is looking down her nose.

Why even bring it to a public forum when her she already knows she is going to change schools, she just wanted to have a little go and making herself feel good, is how I see it.

Like a forum is going to really make up her mind, when it's clear from her first post her mind is already made up.

Why shouldn't she highlight the plight of the PJ wearing disenfranchised? it happens and it's indicative of a mindset, to think otherwise is just naive.

Agree the sartorial habits of the other parents are the least of her worries if the level of education is low but pj wearing will illicit a bigger reaction and therefore a longer nastier thread. She could easily have started a thread saying her son was unhappy and she thought his learning was suffering.

If having basic standards is snobbery, then fine, we need a lot more of it. If people are so lazy and lacking in self respect that they won't to dress themselves before leaving the house then they can't complain when people don't respect them and assume them to be lazy.

Mumsnet needs an edit button

How's this for assumption:

1. Leading on from 1 is the reason for the PJ wearing. There is a very high number of unemployed parents in the school. I live in a nice part of not a very nice area IYKWIM. Unemployment has always been a problem. I have lived in this area for over 30 years and alot of the children in ds class are 4th and 5th generation unemployed. So I assume the pj wearing is because they have nothing to get ready for? I need to add that sometimes the children are picked up from school at 3pm with said parents still adorning the sheep attire.

How does OP KNOW that it is 4th and 5th generation unemployed? How did she get to know them all from her nice part of town?

I'll come back to this thread when I get back from town

Move him to another school where you are happy with the parents and the teaching.

Do we ever so blokes in their candy-striped jim-jams with the white cord tied at the waistband ever walking around the supermarket??

Haven't read all the posts but we are in a similar position. Our daughter starts at private school in August. At the end of the day we just want to do the best for our own child.

How nice. Glad to see people like me are being looked down upon because im unemployed (well ok work six hours a week in shitty asda due to personal issues)

My sweet, kind, INTELLIGENT avid book reader, one of the top achievers in her year 9 year old daughter has already been bullied for having free school meals and a subsidised trip. Words fail me.

I seriously cant believe people are that worked up about people taking their kids to school in pyjamas, who cares! Ive done it with a long coat slung over the top. I take my dc education very seriously,they go everyday, they do homewo
rk, I get involved! Shock horror an unemployed pleb actually giving a shit about education
My dc school is in the middle of a council estate with gasp many people like me but most of the parents do care about their dc, the worst behaved ones are quite often from those households that have working educated parents

I think you should worry more about how the school deal with bad behaviour, yanbu to move your ds for that reason but not because all the parents year pyjamas all day which I dont believe by the way

YANBU- maybe check out other schools in the local area.

This is much more than PJ wearing issues...you have to be comfortable with the school that your DS is attending, that includes what the other kids are like as they will be his friends/peers.

YANBU, I am in the north west and made the decision to send DS1 to a pre prep when we got rejected from our first and second choice school. apparently if you are not eligible for the many many faith schools in our area there is only and very poor option.

Not only is there sheep PJ's, but fluffy dressing gowns too. the children swear, physically fight and eat their bags of sweets for breakfast on the way to school, all while continuing to run out into the main road. As i walk home from dropping DS1 off the same group of 6 mums are all sat in the cafe and when I go out hours later to collect him they are still there, in their PJ's.

If you have a better option OP then take it, I feel so sorry for people with no option but to use the local non faith school in our area. If that was my only option and i couldn't have afforded private then I would have looked at home education.

I'm sure I too am now branded a snob but don't we all want what is best for our children.

I struggle to get up in the morning, due to depression and anxiety but I do, I am not lazy but I feel like ive achieved something in my crap life by getting them to school on time every morning.

Even if I am in my Winnie the poohs with fluffy slippers sometimes:-)

I think you need to move him if he's asked and you want to then your question is answered. Regardless of sheep wearing clothing or not.

OP, in regards to your earlier comment, I wore pyjama bottoms on my wedding day. They were under my dress, which was blue and short enough for them to be noticed even if my dress wasn't particularly stand out in any way, and I did take the pyjama bottoms off for the ceremony, but I did walk around town before and after in my dress and sparkly pyjama bottoms (they gave me some warmth on that freezing day). And wore them through the dinner and the movie afterwards. I have no idea if that makes me lazy or lacking pride, but it was quite fun. Different strokes for different folks and all that.

Yanbu. I'd move him, although the discipline/behaviour would be my primary concern and the attitudes of other parents would be secondary.

I lived,up untill a couple of years ago, in an area where the houses were a million plus to buy (I was renting in a rare small block), and the people in the houses were obviously working and not short of a bob or two ( flash cars and dcs' uniforms definitly not the local state school). I always saw them on Sunday mornings buying their broadsheets at the local shop looking like crumpled tissues and needing a brush through their hair

Thanks for the link emsyj that's made my day.

You've already established that he wants to move and you believe you've found a more suitable school, so you didn't really need to post the stuff about pyjamas and unemployment.
You mention further on in the thread that there aren't many jobs in your area. There is a high-level of unemployment amongst the parents at my son's school but you know, unemployment happens to good people! If all the hard-working kids leave a school, there's less aspiration, fewer positive influences, integration etc. I don't judge your decision to do what's best for your child and I don't expect children to be sacrificed on the alter of inclusion but it does make me sad that schools become stigmatised and children identified as coming from a 'bad school.'

I also drop off in pjs sometimes and i am working I even dropped dh off in my pjs at 7am this morning,very comfy.

Its not nice behaviour but you are being ridiculous asuming all bad behaviour comes from the unemployed. I saw some shocking behaviour in a resturant the other day and it was some pupils and their parents from the local posh school

But OP choses to highlight the plight of the PJ wearing disenfranchised on a public forum.

PJ wearing disenfranchised?!

WTAF. If you choose to be a lazy arse who does not change your bed clothes to take your children to school i'd say you're disenfranchising yourself.

The PJ's are not the issue, they are simply a symptom of the problem. Which in the OP's case is sheer laziness. Jesus christ, is the correlation that hard to grasp?

Make your reasons for moving him about the school, not about what the parents wear & whether or not they work!

FWIW, I moved my dd in yr 1, because of similar issues with behaviour & the teacher having too much on her plate to educate all her pupils equally. The school she was at isn't great, but lots of hard-working parents send their kids there, because they have low expectations. At her new school she is thriving & doing really well, so it can work & if you feel your ds would benefit them do it because you want the best for him, not because parents sometimes wear pjs to school.

Re the 4th/5th generation of unemployment, that isn't the kids is it? alot of the children in ds class are 4th and 5th generation unemployed Because children can't actually be "unemployed" I think you meant the parents of the children are & really, unless you know all the families personally, I don't see how you can make that generalisation.

As for employers are very picky, they too have standards and dress codes Well op, I have been known to drop dd off in my pjs (dd2 is almost always in hers as she is 3 & it is a battle I won't fight) but in my defence, I only ever do it when I am in the car & I always have a jacket on. The reason being is that I am recovering from an op on my tummy & normal clothes make me feel too 'scrunched up'. But in line with your above statement, I am employed, on a voluntary basis at weekends. And guess what? I know that I need to wear proper clothes there.

Good luck if you decide to move him though. It can hard not knowing if you are better off with the 'devil you know' or if you should go for it. I know that I agonised for a while, with dd it started off as an 'instinct' that I had & escalated. For us, it has worked really well!

YANBU to move him if you can.

The discipline would worry me far more than the pyjamas but I have to say I'd raise an eyeborw at that too - I have never seen anybody out in public during the day in pyjamas! I just can't imagine why anybody would, it's so odd! Even if you've overslept or are in a rush - well, it takes less that a minute to at least appear dressed (jeans and jumper on top of pj top, sort the rest later?)

Very odd culture and I'll admit to not knowing it existed.