To think Primary schools should ask less of parents?

[wonderstuff]

Supporting education is vital, reading, supporting maths, spelling homework in general I'm cool with.

But today I got an email that requests next Thursday I dress dd in a green top and brown trousers so she looks like a tree, all the children are having a tree themed muffty day. They are having an Eco day, guest speakers all fantastic stuff, it's a great school, but short notice, very specific requests like this are frustrating dd doesn't have a green top, I am fortunate in having the means to go get her one, but it seems a real imposition.

AIBU to be annoyed by this?

This will probably out me. Not dressing up but a letter in book bag said that it is Food Revolution Day tomorrow (WTF?) and can we send in an interesting piece of fruit to school for the class to discuss.
The bottom of my fruit bowl is very interesting I can tell you but I cant send any of that in - or should I?

I can cope with something spotty, or wear blue for anti bullying or whatever but World Book Day really annoys me. Neither of my DC have brown trousers or green tops though so that one would be a bit difficult.

ds has survived being sent to school in a colander on space day and jeans on 'India' Day (as worn in Bombay) - the latter was particularly frowned on by the painfully Caucasian HT who cut a dashing figure in turban as he showed off his 'Bollywood' dance moves in the playground

ds is only in reception and already this year we've had World book day, make your own hat to represent your favourite book day (with 5 year olds, are they kidding?) Red nose wear red day (thank God he was ill for that one :o) Children in Need wear spots day, come to school dressed in high vis day, plus three mufti days. On Friday there's a go green day when they have to come to school dressed all in green.

That's to go with the termly cake sales, selling ice lollies after school every day, costume for the Christmas play etc etc etc. It's bloody endless.

Yanbu, I spent £20 on a red rugby shirt for St. David's day so as NOT to be caught out AGAIN this year only to find that school decided NOT to wear red this year. Arghhhhhh

I actually think that dressing up like deters children from learning. Esp when they little, they are all to excited by being dressed in a different way. They all know they are supposed to do 'something special' today none of which will facilitate learning.

At our school we have Roman day, Egyptian day etc... depending on the year. All less than a week notice. All that for what? The children arrive dressed up and they just do whatever they would normally do during that day. Oh and they have a one half an hour lesson on the egyptians....

I agree that the one it does is to fill the pockets of Asda, M&S and Amazon, all that to try and have a reasonably decent outfit for your child.
All that because let's face it, in our school you actually DO have some parents mums who have the time and the inclination to spend a day making a costume. The dcs arrive and look great which means everyone else feels they have to live up to that and rush to buy an outfit for their dc.
And there is actually little regard for the parents who could hardly afford any of that. To have checked, buying material to make a costume is actually more expensive than buying one. You can buy one at £10~15 a piece or go into one charity shop after the other in the hope to find something sort of appropriate and usually not managing. That's either a lot of money or a lot of time required from the parents.

When not complex ie the roman etc...). I now usuall use a white PE tshirt and do some painting on it. You can have spots, lines, a guitar, flags etc etc....

Ninnah that is very amusing I can't picture it perfectly!

You are soo NBU, it's not just the costumes, I got back from a particularly arduous 12 hour shift at 9:30 PM to find both DS still up saying "we need a costume for world book day tomorrow", no sodding notice from the school at all.
But it's the home work too,DS2 has a Roman theme at the mo and I've been up to my eyes making Roman shields and the like, when painting eggs for Easter he told me that his teacher had told the class to make holes in the ends of the aforementioned eggs and then blow out the yolk and bake in the oven before painting like I've got fuck all else to do of an evening!
sorry went on a bit of a rant there.

I haven't read the whole thread but I know you're near me, what age top to you need? I have a green tshirt you can have?

My best one was when dcs primary gave us 24 hours notice to contribute to "world feast table" by bringing in a dish which reflected our family's "cultural heritage" I didn't engage with that one. I long for the days at my primary school when parents were only expected to contribute a multipack of crisps or a bottle of Tizer for the school xmas party

The one I will never forget was the re-enactment of the Battle of Hastings - yes in Hastings, coaches and everything.

I still remember DS's plaintive, as I sprayed the black primark pyjamas silver, "but johnnies mum has knitted him chainmail armour with silver wool" and trying to respond politely with johnnie is an only child and his mum doesn't go to work. He liked his shield and helmet though and he was small enogh to wear my black boots :)

When I dropped him that orning a more experienced mum laughed and said "oh ya, time for the bloody battle of Hastings again". She had three older boys at the school.

That was the worst one actually - a DS aspiring to knitted effing armour!! Wooly hugs on MNet et your hearts out!!

I couldn't agree more! So far we have had, superheros, book character, own clothes, pj's tomorrow is dress as an Indian (from India, not pocahontas) and next week is wear purple.

boffin, if you had cast-iron evidence that the school had charged some parents £300 and others nothing, in order for the first set of parents to subsidise the second set, why on earth didn't you take your evidence straight to the school governors?

And did the school really write to you and ask you to come in and talk about your "financial problems"? Is hat actually what the letter said? Had even one of those things happened to me, I would have asked to discuss it with the head, not moved my child to a different school.

This really makes me appreciate DD's school. We have a very high proportion of FSM so we don't have any of this nonsense.

In YR we had "French Hat day". We bought a beret but most parents managed to make a hat out of cardboard. In the summer we had Sports Week. They had to wear sports gear (that was a bit difficult since we didn't have any) and a T shirt in a specific colour. Luckily we got white . We also had Princesses day, and most of the class seemed to already have the obligatory Disney dress (the ASDA version, not the official Disney Store one) That was it.

This year so far we've only had red nose day wear something red. The uniform is red, so no change there. Sports week is coming up but I know what to expect this year.

They don't do world book day dress up, nor any of these other things, and the costumes for the nativity are supplied by school. The only downside is that DD is a dressing up girl and has a wardrobe stuffed full of costumes she never wears.

It's all a load of ====================

Lollyheart thank you that's very generous. Actually I have now realised that she is in the right house to have a green t-shirt for PE (there are 4 different colour t-shirt for PE, depending on what house you're in). She's just got to manage to keep it clean all day because its sports day the next day.

Has she got an old white tshirt? Have spring greens or spinach for tea and then soak the tshirt in the water. Rinse in cold water and dry. One green tshirt

Suburban, it's pretty complex what happened, and if I say too much I will out myself, but yes, the insulting letter did happen and I wrote back pointing out it was massively overpriced for what it was, and we just couldn't afford it. They had no answer for me really. They would not let me teach him at home for those days (I am highly qualified and have QTS) and instead they sat him at the back of the next class down with virtually nothing to do, demanding he was completely quiet and didn't talk to the other kids. He came home in tears, I phoned up in disgust and demanded to speak to the HT, and after that there was a slightly greater effort made but not much.

In terms of the info about why it cost so much, as well as the sitting of my youngest on a special table with minimal contact from the class teacher, one of the other parents, who is a solicitor, rumbled this along with a few other of the more informed parents, and came to tell me. She took a formal complaint, I believe. We were leaving the school at this time because of all the problems, and I was absolutely ready to bugger off and wash my hands of the whole lot of them. I was also about to give birth, and dignifying all of this by trawling a complaint through the governing body was not something I could be arsed with. I did insult the HT's leadership and management abilities publicly on the way out then (in relation to the four menacing letters demanding dinner money, when in actual fact they had been paid in full months previously and were just incapable of reading a budget line on an Excel spreadsheet). Plus I backed up the family whose kid had been hit with computer cables by one of the teachers .... spoke to the police when they rang me about it ...

Really, shit school, shit HT, should have pulled the kids out a lot faster, luckily we ended up in an absolutely wonderful school straight afterwards.

It's actually not a lot to do with either kids or parents - but teachers. A weak HT will just say 'Oh What A Good Idea - speak to the school secretary and organize it! ' when someone in the staffroom comes up with their latest idea. Keeping everyone happy.

My favourite bits of this thread have been Boffin's
The school wrote me a snotty letter and invited me to come in to talk about my financial problems.
and ninah's

jeans on 'India' Day (as worn in Bombay) - the latter was particularly frowned on by the painfully Caucasian HT who cut a dashing figure in turban as he showed off his 'Bollywood' dance moves in the playground

Writing about that shitty, stupid school has brought all their bollocks back now. Grr.

Sorry - haven't had time to read the whole thread yet, but am very jealous that the OP was requested for her DC to wear brown trouser and a green top .

I'm because if my DC's school asked for that outfit - I could actually do it, at short notice, and without having to buy anything .

I get asked to dress them as story book characters or head to toe in red....

Yanbu. so far this year we've had high viz day with a competition for the brightest outfit, autumn colours, spring colours, Scottish clothes, spring themed bike decorating, wear green for eco day, jammies day, make a bird feeder out of rubbish, bring in newspaper articles about food, egyptian costumes, nativity costumes and book character costumes. I'm sure theres more that I'm forgetting. next thing is the bake off competition.

oh and ds' s nursery is just as bad. He's 20 months and has had spotty day, union jack day, a whole week where they had to wear a different Olympic ring colour everyday, silly hats day, autumn colours, dress like a firework, Xmas dress up....

Kudos to ninah on India day. I think saying to parents 'dress your child as an Indian' is a weird thing to do- lots of Indian people I know wear fairly Western clothes and I don't think dressing up in a sari, unless you are from that culture, really helps children understand what it is like to be from that culture at all. It's not really about dressing differently (what, like an Indian schoolchild who might wear a smart uniform, or an Indian worker who wears jeans, like ninah said upthread), is it? And surely all the children of Indian heritage just wear their own clothes!

Thank god when we had Greek week, they dressed as Ancient Greeks! Although getting coverage in the right places with the safety pins was the challenge on that one.