To think school should be more responsible for my childs' stuff?

[Mama234567]

My son (nearly 6) keeps losing his coat outside at lunchtimes. Today it was raining all day so coat got carried home wet while he got rained on. Lunchbox keeps getting left in the hall. He's in year one and we did not have this problem in reception. He's also come home in another child's trousers instead of his own, I sorted this with other mum and we laughed about it.

I do think this is partly down to his personality and I tell him everyday remember your lunchbox etc.. but he's not the only one. Another parent has had an expensive logo jumper lost already.

YABU- son should be more responsible for his things.

YANBU- school should help more.

As PP said, label clothes clearly so the child can recognise them. Clear sew in or stick in label with name and a picture or something on the neck or waist where it can't be missed. Maybe a keyring or fun zip pull that he will remember. Make a big thing of " Have you got your red bus lunchbox" etc.

Some children just take longer, or turns out they are overwhelmed by school and can't focus on the details. I was lucky our school let parents in to search the lost uniform box.

Some children need more prompting. My eldest certainly did (summer baby, don't know if that was a factor). Fortunately her teachers in KS1 felt sorry for me being in the cloakroom almost every day hunting for lunchbox/shoes/coat/jumper etc and started giving far more prompts during the day. It really helped.

I know it's not their responsibility, but I'm rather grateful that they took that little extra step to help a young child and her exasperated mother!

Get used to it unfortunately. My Son is nearly 11 and has had countless named and label items stolen.
His school jumpers are £22. New one for school photos as his was too small. They were told to put them on a bench while they did pe and some other kid took his home as the one left on the bench was 2 sizes smaller.
I asked on parent forums etc and it wasn't handed back so someone's cut the label out and now has a lovely new jumper at my expense.

This happens a lot and I've even seen parents picking up two at school uninform sales and trying to say they only have one

I'm more surprised that grown adults will steal things like this than kids for losing them

First born I’m guessing.

would you rather a teacher didn’t encourage them to become independent?

would you rather a teacher lose 1.5 hours of learning with them per day to spend 1 min per child making sure they have everything after break, lunch and home?

would you be ok to have them ignore your child for the 1 hour 27 minutes that they were checking everyone else’s stuff?

He needs to learn for himself to look after his things.

Some get it quicker than others!

I do tell him off a little bit but I don't feel that it's something he's doing to be deliberately naughty. As he gets older I might get angrier. Some people are just airheads by nature, men and women can be. People have talked about their daughters also on this thread who are the same.

Yes, we know they get into the rhythm of the "check" chants but me and the TA do a visual check as we ask them to hold up the item. This takes just a couple of minutes at the end of the day as we're waiting for parents to arrive.

Oh, and they were sewn and non removable labels do definitely weren't pulled off by mistake 🙄

Not the teacher’s job. You need to teach him strategies to help him
organise himself.

@mathanxiety Absolutely, it's like herding cats at the best of times in KS1.

I have one child like this. One September he lost 4 coats in a week and I had to scour school on the Thursday night looking for them. He kept taking them out at dinner and forgetting them so they would get picked up and put in the nearest classroom. I get through it by labelling things really relentlessly. In y5 now and they go look for lost items themselves. Second child has never lost anything and gets upset at the thought (except a rain coat at the end of term in y1 which I'm pretty convinced someone else stole because it was torrential rain unexpectedly!)

I think school staff already have enough on their plate to deal with. This is on you to teach your son to look after his things.

Yabu op. I have a 6yo and would expect him to be responsible. In fact our teachers would also expect this of the children. Hugely unfair of a teacher to keep track of these things.

Primary school children have pegs, trays and chairs they can leave their coats/jumpers on. Some even have pegs next to their lunch halls so they don't have to put them on the floor. Children are responsible for putting their own stuff in the designated places. Teachers and TAs aren't there to keep track of it for them; waaaay too many children for that and they have other things to do.

've been a Reception teacher for 25 years and this happens day in, day out. Angry parents at the end of the school day demanding we find DC's jumper/cardigan/coat/bag/lunch box. Me, "is it named?", Parent, "No but it's an age 4 red/green/blue jumper".

I have always found the most 'outraged' parents are those that don't even bother to label their children's clothing. And uniform pieces all look pretty identical.... They're ridiculous.

I think schools can do a lot more to support pupils with this.
My DD (now 18!) has always had working memory problems due to her severe dyslexia. She can only follow a maximum of 2-3 instructions at once.
Even now, as a university student and in part time employee, she has to remind people that she needs allowance taking for this.
at school she was frequently given multiple instructions: stand up, go to your drawer, get out your pens, sit at the table, start your work. She would stand up....and not remember the next stage.
a number of people struggle in this way: yes they need so much more support and understanding, whatever the reason for it.

If the coat was labelled, it’s likely the school would have got it back to you pretty quickly, just not on an afternoon when it was left in the playground in the middle of a downpour that didn’t let up until after school.

My 6yo has a sharp learning curve in year 1 with water bottles and cardigans. It drove me mad. She is getting better in year 2. When you collect you have to check everything. Much easier to deal with missing stuff immediately.

I did forever find that she was much better at holiday camp where there was still a bit more care and a higher ratio than at school. Sometimes they do just need a bit more support to look after their things.

Goodness opening posts like this one make me feel sorry for teachers.

In my son's school the children could wear school branded jumpers or supermarket ones. He had branded ones and supermarket ones. When he always lost his super market ones they were finally found. When he lost his branded ones we never got them back. It was his fault he lost them but it was intentional that people kept his branded ones. It was stealing.

He kept loosing jumpers and before the world wide pandemic he lost 4 new jumpers in 3 weeks and could not find them. We made him contribute some of his pocket money to new ones. Only £5 and he plenty of money in his pocket money account so it we were sure it was more symbolic than impact but he was angry with us but he never lost another one until this week when we think he has lost one again.

It is not the school fault.

In my school coats and jumpers go on pegs, book bags in their drawer and lunchboxes on a trolley on on a tray.
Every single day I’m holding up a coat that was on the floor asking who it belongs to.
The other day a child managed to lose their coat between sitting on the carpet and meeting their parent outside. I already spend far too much time reuniting children with their possessions.

It’s how he learns to look after his things, through suffering the consequences. I work in primary. Some chn are great at looks after their things and others don’t give it a thought. We give reminders ALL the time but some still don’t listen. Still,50% of parents don’t name uniforms and items.🤦🏼‍♀️

It is labelled and he wore it to school this morning. Then had to walk home with no coat on in the pouring rain, at 5 years old. I wouldn't have started this thread if he was older. And I'm not planning on having a go at his teacher, I'm not that sort of person. I just feel he may need more reminders than maybe some of the others in his class at this stage.

We encourage our pupils to keep their coats on at lunchtime for this very reason!

My goodness.

So many parents want to shed any burden of responsibility these days.

I just feel he may need more reminders than maybe some of the others in his class at this stage.

You may be right, but I think I would wait to see if today had an impact.

On Monday morning say to him 'remember how your coat was wet on Friday? Don't leave it outside again'.