Am I being overly sensitive about this comment from my sons teacher?

[Specksofwhiteallaround]

Just looking for some perspective as I have quite extreme social anxiety so could well be reading something in this comment that isn’t intended. Sorry it’s a bit long, I just wanted to include the background as it’s probably relevant to how I’ve read it.

For full context my son is 9, has autism and attends a special school. His school does a lot of dressing up days to raise money for various causes etc but they have form for some being very short notice, eg: the evening before in some cases.
I get that for a lot of people it’s probably not too much of a problem to run the shop and grab whatever they needed but for us it’s a pain in the ass as there are no shops near us that sell kids clothes, I have no access to a car and the bus service to the nearest town is very limited, which his school and teacher are aware of.

It's careers week this week and yesterday morning there was an email asking kids to come dressed as what they want to be when they grow up today. My son says he wants to be an office worker so we went with school trousers, a formal white shirt and a plain jumper as the shirt was short sleeved and it’s freezing. We mocked up an ID with his picture, laminated it and out it on a lanyard and he was happy.

There is a daily email home and in todays one his teacher mentioned the career outfits and made a point of saying some had improvised and specifically mentioned my sons outfit. My first thought was of course we improvised you gave us a days notice but then I felt kinda of deflated like she was implying I hadn’t made any effort.
A little while ago it was numbers day and again the night before they wanted kids to come in clothes with numbers on and unluckily we didn’t have any, his teacher mentioned in the email that she’d got some stick on numbers so no kids missed out, and it just made me feel a bit crap, like my son was missing out because we didn’t happen to own a jumper with numbers on which is surely ridiculous.

Would anyone else take this as a mild criticism or am I just being paranoid?

I'd read it as honestly just being complimentary!

It's an absolute joke the levels some parents go to in things like World Book Day - they start being competitive and spend a fortune, and everyone feels like they have to do it or they're a bad parent, which is obviously nonsense. I get so angry at it, just keep it simple everyone and stop the pressure! If I'd seen your kid in a fairly straight forward but very effective costume, I'd be thinking - hey, that's what it should be about!! At last!!

So she probably just means what it says on the tin - it was improvised (which is true!) and worked perfectly!

Please don't over-think it - it's really easy to feel you've been singled out, but you haven't - she's just making comment on the day and she won't have been thinking in anywhere near the depth you might imagine - there's too much else on her plate to be having time to think anything 'beyond' what she's written. If anything, I think she probably genuinely means it encouragingly. She might even recognise you have some anxiety and a few extra hurdles bringing up a kid with autism, so if anything she maybe was trying to give you a boost!

Don't stress it :)

Well just imagine the teacher in school, OP, chatting to the kids.

Teacher: Well, Specksson, what did you come as?

Specksson: An office worker. When I grow up that's what I want to be. We made a badge at home.

Teacher: Very cool. Now, Otherkid, what did you come as?

Otherkid: Eh, a policeman.

Teacher: Super, is that what you want to be?

Otherkid: No, we had a costume at home so my Mum put it on me.

Teacher: Great.

Dh didn’t help as he read the email and asked why the teacher was throwing shade at me

Haha 😆 Sounds like my DH.

Your sons outfit sounds fab and would have made all the staff smile I bet hence teacher commenting on it.

No I think it was either a compliment or meant in a reassuring "don't worry, what you did was great" sort of way.
I'm another that hates dress up day, they just seem designed to make kids feel crap if they don't want to wear a costume or don't have the resources to get one together. Could you sit down with the teacher and be really honest about how you feel.
I'm surprised a special school are so thoughtless.

@EmmaDilemma5 Sometimes I toy with the idea of emailing the office regarding the short notice but I hate confrontation and his school is actually brilliant in every other way so it feels wrong to complain.

@Oscarover For a special school they do a lot of dress up and wear particular colours etc, personally I fine it hugely stressful as my son absolutely will not wear a costume that isn’t normal clothing and even then he’s very picky so I always feel he stands out and it possibly looks like a lack of effort on our part.

I definitely think she meant that some people put together a costume rather than sending them in their Batman costume.

At the school i work at, we are always most impressed by those who have improvised an outfit rather than bought it off the peg!

I'm not sure if it was criticism but my God, all the dress up and short notice would drive me bonkers.

I think you can give them some feedback without it being confrontational.

My DS used to hate the dress up days. I can imagine lots of children (and parents) at this school are not happy with them? The lack of notice (and hence stress) and the pressure to have a ‘good costume’. I would send a carefully worded email. Or pop in for a chat.

That’s how I read it? It’s a compliment. Basically ‘well done for putting together a good costume instead of just going out and buying one’?

I actually remember at our primary it was optional as they recognised some children don’t like dressing up and the change in routine (not a special school).

I agree with everyone else, she was saying, wow, Harry came in a great improvised costume well done!

OP I love the lanyard idea, really good, and agree it's much more realistic than "wear the firefighter outfit you have". Also better for your DS as it showed what he actually wanted to be, so it would have made more sense to him as well.

There's no way a teacher would send a class email slating someone for their effort. It was meant as a compliment that you made his ID badge and improvised. You're definitely overthinking it.

I think you're overthinking it and your costume idea was great. I'm so glad my DCs are past the age of impromptu dress-up days with last minute instructions telling you not to buy anything for costumes but use what you have at home. No good for someone like me who is not creatively inclined and doesn't keep loads of random crap hanging around my house on the off chance.
I would have thought a special school which is likely to have a proportion of students who struggle with last-minute changes would do their best to give lots of notice for this sort of thing.

Id read that positively and as a hint that others shouldnt buy stuff.

Notice is good, but there’s never a need to buy a yellow or spotty top or whatever. No school would suggest that.

I read it as the teacher holding you up as an example to other parents who may not have the money to buy yet more dressing up clothes. ie. giving them an out, 'we had some fantastic improvised costumes in school today' etc And I say that as a teacher at a special school...

It’s not criticism to email. You want to take part but would appreciate bit more notice.
When dd was in reception they put a tiny slip of paper in book bag that children could wear party dresses next day. Next day 2 little girls in floods of tears as their mums hadn’t seen slip. I went in office and politely explained what had happened and how easily slips could be missed and they didn’t do it again. No drama.

We definitely had both those in primary - plus brown… dd owned nothing in required colours. For yellow one she wore a borrowed yellow sundress in November.

Oh they do. 'We're raising money for Marie Curie - everyone is to wear yellow and bring in a £1.'

Ours does! Christmas jumper, plain white top & black bottoms and black trainers(!) for a choir event, others too I'm sure. But if you don't do it, they don't care...AFAIK.

YABU she’s trying to be nice.

However, I would be emailing the headteacher and telling them that you disagree with such short notice I think that’s absolutely ridiculous and I would have complained the first time it happened.

I fine it hugely stressful as my son absolutely will not wear a costume that isn’t normal clothing

You don't have to do what the school tells you in every case.
My DC hated dressing up. So I let them not dress up. It's not compulsory and even if it was they'd struggle to enforce it. Nothing ever happened as a result of my DC failing to dress up for world book day or whatever other day it was.

You are reading too much into it. I have a child at SEN school. I don't do any dress up days. I am busy working and my dd does not like changing from her normal clothes. No one cares.