To not send dd to school with a tie until school returns the other two?

[Lowla]

My daughter has recently started primary school. Last week was the first week of gym and she came out of school with no tie on. The teacher said another child must have taken it home by mistake, and not to worry as i'd sewn dd's name on it so it would be returned.

This week, on Monday, she had gym again. The first tie still hadn't been returned and she'd been wearing her spare one to school since.
She came out at hometime with no tie again! The teacher apologised and said - again - her name's on it so it should be returned soon. I told the teacher that 2 ties going missing in as many weeks in not on, and i'd have to send dd to school with no tie until they'd been returned. The teacher was a bit funny about this, asked if i had another spare tie instead. When i said no, she sent out a letter out to parents the next day (Tuesday) asking if my dd's ties had been put in their children's bags by mistakes. Yesterday, none of the ties had been handed in and dd was still being sent to school tie-less. The teacher said that she has a spare one in her desk i could borrow in the mean time. I had a look at it and it has a big paint stain down it, so i said no. She then asked if i would consider buying another one and she'd make sure that it would be safe during all future gym lessons. I said no. Ties are £7.50 each and i'd already lost £15. I wasn't prepared to spend anymore.

Anyway, this morning, the HEAD came up to me and said that it looks bad for the school if a pupil doesn't comply with uniform rules, especially a primary one. She said that children's stuff goes missing all the time at school, it's all part of it and tried to make out it was dd's fault for not being responsible enough.

DD has told me that she left both ties on her desk each time before heading off to the gym hall, and when she gets back afterwards, the children are very excited and throw the uniform all around the room - so obviously mix ups happen.

I asked the head if she could please look at all the children's ties in dd's class to try and identify hers as her name's stitched in. She said she couldn't do this as it would embarrass the children. I refused to buy a tie, she offered to sell me one for £5 instead and I still said no.

She was really annoyed by then and said dd's golden time might suffer as a result of not wearing the correct uniform.

Sorry, this is much longer than i thought it would be.

Am i being unreasonable not buying another tie? Should i stand my ground and wait on getting offered a free one?

I'm in London and all the schools near us wear polo shirts. Thank goodness - five polo shirts are bad enough to iron.

Also, I am 39 and I can't tie a tie, so not sure how four-year-olds are supposed to manage it.

OP - have you checked lost property? Am also surprised they can't just check names on ties - or better still, like someone else said, ask them to check. Eudcational AND useful.

Our primary children wear ties. Thankfully neither dc has ever lost one yet but even if they did, even more thankfully, they're only £1.99 to buy. £7.50 is a huge amount to spend on a tie.

I would be tempted to ask the head if you could borrow the offered tie until one or both of your dd's are returnred, seeing as you've spent £15 already and they were labelled. What more can you do?

And maybe en.courage your dd to put her tie in a shoe when she's getting change.

All those saying that state schools don't/shouldn't have shirts and ties- my DD is at a state primary which has ties from reception. We have never lost a tie and it has never been a problem to tie them etc. I would go mad if this happened to my DD- in fact when her entire brand new ( labelled) PE kit went missing after 1 week in year 1, I told the teacher I would not be replacing it until the end of the year and DD took pink shorts and a white Tshirt in for the rest of the term. Funnily enough the school found her PE kit fairly quickly, but they didn't punish her for having the wrong kit
I agree the discipline needs to be looked at if they are chucking their stuff everywhere.

Whenever you get a new tie, don't use a removable name label for it. What about indelible marker pen or, as a poster suggested upthread, one of the labels that you iron on although it might be possible to peel that off.

I would guess that the majority of 4-year-olds can recognise their own name by the time they start school. They would at the very least know which letter their name begins with.

ties not compulsory in infant school surely. my ds wore one for the first week. came home with it round neck once, round upper arm once, round wrist once, hanging from bag once, round neck but not on collar, and decided he was fed up and gave up. he was the only one in his class with a tie.

We're in London and DS has just started school- no ties there, and no ties at other schools (lots of first day at school pics on FB and all the kids are wearing polo shirts).

I agree with whoever said the teacher really should have picked up on OP's child not wearing a tie. If it's such a strict policy then the teacher should be enforcing it at times where it is possible the children are not wearing their ties.

OP I would encourage your DD to take a bit more responsibility and put her clothes away properly. I know it's hard, believe me, but if no one else is going to help you, then you'll just have to help yourself.

I think you're getting a hard time here OP.

Things go missing at schools. You and the school both do everything you can to reduce this risk, but it will still happen sometimes. To a degree, both you and the school need to recognise this (as in, you think the school failed and should buy a tie, and the school think your DD is wrong and you should buy the tie).

Sod the tie!! Is your DD bothered? If she was I would buy the tie. If not, then I would stand my ground, saying I'd buy a new tie at if none of the old ones had shown up.

The school should have a system in place and something is clearly wrong with the process for PE changing. The teacher should have picked up on the missing tie immediately after changing back after PE, as then it would still have been in the room.

Once you do get a new tie (however that happens) , I'd be tempted to embroider (or sew nametape) onto the front of teh tie, so it'll be immediately obvious if someone else has her tie. A mum I know has access to an embroidery machine, and has embroidered her DC names onto the front of the sweatshirt.

Why anyone would send their child to a school that thinks 4 year olds should wear ties completely escapes me. I would assume that it would make crappy choices in other areas too and avoid it like the plague.

The OP says all the ones in the area do though Seeker. Not much you can do about it then, is there? Other than stand your ground against stupid policies...

We have 4 local primaries, 2 faith, 2 not.
All have ties and proper shirts from reception. However, in the reception year, children wear the PE kit to school on PE day because schools accept that at 4/5 kids simply take too long to get themselves changed. Year 1 onwards they change.
Works well.

Could the tie/ties have been scooped back up into a PE Bag?

We bought 2 brand new waterproof school jackets for our boys for over the winter. DS8 had his two weeks before some other bloody kid took it home (they all have their own peg for their bag and hook, so it was hardly a mistake). He's asked everyone, and so has the teacher. Nobody owned up. I got him a secondhand one and wrote his name in BIG BLACK LETTERS in permanent texta on the outside of it. Strangely enough it hasn't gone missing...
YANBU, I'd be furious too. I always check my kids stuff when they come home, and I would know straight away if they had something that didn't belong to them. In my kids last school we were always told to check the lost property box, and if our kids stuff wasn't in there to "just take something that isn't named". Everybody did this. Too many thieving bastards about... It's certainly not little ones fault especially if they can't read the names, but parents can, and apparently don't care. It drives me mental.

The head teacher isn't going to replace the tie. Is she the only child losing her tie in the classroom? If so, perhaps your dd needs to take better care of it. Tell her that when she takes her tie off she needs to put it in her desk drawer, in her shoe or pe kit bag. I doubt she will lose it or it will be stolen if she does this. Also tell her that if she can't find her tie she must tell the teacher. Easier for her to get it back at the time than a day later.

bag and coat, not hook :P

YANBU :)

Its really annoying isn't it?

I'd get her one more tie, if its not on her when she comes out , go in to the school and make a big effort (in front of everyone) to look for it.

I'll bet they won't want you doing that regularly, and they will keep a crafty look out for your DD

mine dont wear a shirt and tie - the uniform is polo shirt with trousers, skirt, etc (I am Scotland too). My sisters school (also Scotland) also has a polo shirt as the uniform.

My children go to a school on a combined campus (one catholic school and one non-denominational school) and the children in the catholic school do wear a shirt and tie but have a polo shirt option for PE days.

YANBU, and I feel your pain. I would also be digging in my heels at this point, as clearly something is wrong with the system if your DD can lose 2 ties in 2 weeks, which are both clearly labelled.

DC3 started wearing nursery uniform this month. It took me a couple of weeks to sort out all the bits (she's 2, so I wasn't that arsed organised) and I had a few snippy emails when she went in without the requisite school sweatshirt. Day One (this Monday) she went in wearing the full kit. And came home without the (clearly labelled) sweatshirt. I have refused to send her in one again until the missing item is found and returned....or replaced by the nursery. She cannot remove her sweater on her own, so one of the staff must have taken it off (because she was hot, or it got wet), so on that basis it is their responsibility to make sure it is then put safely in her bag on her peg to come home. To be fair, they have agreed...!! :)

OP, if it were me I would stand my ground with the Head.

You have supplied your daughter with two ties, both of which have been STOLEN from school premises. The Head is unwilling to check the ties of the other children in the class, although this could well recover the stolen property. I would tell her that the responsibility for your daughter being tie-less is therefore HER responsibility. And that IF this impinges on your daughter's golden time, that you will be having words with HER about it.

If she's going to impose stringent uniform standards, then she needs to take steps to stop uniform items being stolen. (Because even though 4 year olds can have the benefit of the doubt, their thieving parents cannot.) And if she's going to get annoyed, you can get annoyed right back. £15 worth on annoyed.

Silly question but has her PE bag been checked? I've taught dd to put the clothes she takes off in her PE bag so I know she's more likely to come back with hers and not someone else's.