To be cross with the school (school trip related!)

[schooltripwoes]

DD is 7 and has been on a school trip today. It's been a sunny day and the class spent a lot of the time outdoors.
I have just picked her up from school and her cheeks and ears are bright red - as in they look like she's caught the sun. Suspicious of the fact that her sunhat was rolled up in the same way that I packed it this morning, questions were asked and she confessed that she 'forgot' to wear her sun hat. She had suncream on before leaving home, and says she applied more at lunchtime (but 7 year-olds aren't great at this job, as I'm sure you know!). So I'm fuming that she didn't wear her hat to keep the sun off her face.
Whilst I accept that children need to learn to look after themselves and have some degree of responsibility, AIBU to expect the teachers to gently remind infant school children to wear their sun hats when they're spending the majority of the day sat in the sun?

Middle ground - polite e-mail saying your dd and at least one other had sunburn, despite the precautions you took of packing her hat and asking her to wear it and supply suncream and instructions for her to apply; could they perhaps ensure their trip plan/risk assessment includes midday checks on sun protection needs.

The once a day creams do work for us honestly even in New Zealand we used it and had no problems.

These threads are always so odd. People are so defensive of teachers (sometimes quite rightly) but this whole 'they have enough to do' is nonsense. We entrust our children to the school. If we took them out for the day, we would provide adequate care, which would include protection from the sun. It's not like it's just the teacher and 30 kids out on a jolly. The class would have had a number of helpers and most likely been split into small groups. Most school trips, young children are in groups of 4-7 depending on how many adult helpers there are and it is reasonable to expect the adult assuming responsibility to remind children to put hats on etc if the weather is sunny. Why on earth shouldn't a parent raise that as an issue? It doesn't have to be a big complaint but if a school are responsible for the pupils welfare then that includes reminding a 7 yr old basic care. Children are not all the same and just because 1 7 yr old would mange this responsibility themselves, many would not.

I think it would be unreasonable to expect teachers to go through children's bags checking they have hats and making them put them on. But it sounds like your daughter has very sensitive skin - I don't think its unreasonable before the next trip to explain this to a teacher and ask if they could keep an eye out and remind your daughter she needs to wear a hat. I'm sure at 7 they would not mind. My son also has sensitive skin and sometimes the redness was down to wind burn.

OP YANBU I work in a school and sun hats are non negotiable. We keep spares for those who have lost / forgotten theirs, and would always check every child has a hat before we leave for a trip.
Oh and when doing one of the very frequent head counts during the day it’s easy to spot who is wearing their hat and who isn’t.

Thank you all. I have emailed the school to outline my concerns. Not a big rant and I kept it polite but I do think they need to know that leaving small children exposed to the elements all day is unacceptable.
It was a foundation & KS1 trip so I'm sure my child wasn't the only one who struggled with making sensible clothing choices without guidance from adults - lots of the reception children looked equally pink around the face at school drop-off this morning!

So if you have lived in Australia you know the drill. Sun cream kept by the front door so kids are covered in it before leaving the house. Reminder to wear a hat. Why do you think the teachers in England are suddenly more responsible for sun safety? Teach your kids the drill, reinforce it, stop blaming others.

Perhaps the children without hats should have been left behind. Or parents phoned to bring one in.
We certainly get complaints if hatless children aren’t allowed to play on the field and have to sit outside under the canopies.

I think that's the best thing to do Sumer. Children who do not have hats have to spend the day in the coach.

I bet they'd find their bloody hats then. In any event, I'm sure the school is very grateful to know that leaving small children exposed to the elements is unacceptable. I expect this will lead to an overhaul of their safeguarding

YABVU it's your responsibility to teach your child to be self sufficient, you should ensured she knew she was supposed to wear it.

It's not one on one teaching there are 30+ kids.

Your DD needs to take responsibility for herself, and your job as a parent is to ensure she is able to do that.

Tell your DD she must wear her hat. By 7 she needs to be self-sufficient.

We had a trip the other day and 8 of the children in the class said they had no hat. So we searched for spares. One suddenly remembered she did have a hat as soon as she saw that the regulation school ones were coming out. TA found another one's hat on the floor of the cloakroom. We managed to find enough spares for all but one child. The whole performance took about 10 minutes (plus time finding water for all those who had no water bottle). The next day the mum of the one child informed me that he had his hat in his bag the whole time. I spend so much time in the summer asking children about their hats and feel tempted to say no hat no playtime/ trip but for the grief I would get from parents.

I would say by 7 your daughter should've put it on herself. The teacher absolutely may have reminded them about hats but wouldn't have had time to check everyone's bag or grill them about why they weren't wearing one. You'll probably be known as 'that parent' now. I'm a teacher and I'd be pretty annoyed that instead of a 'thanks for taking my kid on a lovely trip' I got moaned at for something like this. It really is a thankless job most of the time!

The Reception classes have a set of hats for trips because so many parents can't seem to manage to send their child with one.

Problem with generic hats is headlice.
At 7, they should be able to listen to a reminder and check properly for a hat, but some little poppets can’t be arsed, because mummy always does everything for them. I used to find one method that worked was to put the most officious children in charge of the feckless and reward them for taking care of their less skilled classmates. After PE too. Buttons and kit on the right way round and such.That way I had help, and the pride of the parent ensured that the playground gossipers knew how advanced some children were in basic life skills. Often motivated other parents.

I hope you have had a serious talk with your daughter about her bad behaviour too.

How do you know the teachers didn't remind them a gazillion times and that your daughter just chose not to wear the hat because she didn't want to for whatever reason or forgot she had it.

What bad behaviour?

She knew she had a hat in her bag. She knew she should have been wearing it but she didn't. I call that bad behaviour.