Year 6 children weigh in and measurements

[Yoyo2021]

Hi all,

Just received a email about the nhs coming in to weigh my child’s year group and measure height etc.

It said this will be done in a private room.

I’ve opted out following the link.

I just think what’s the point my child isn’t under weight or over weight!

If I had cause for concern I would go to the doctors!

AIBU

Such a good point. And Even more reason to support healthy habits via government policy.

If parents have a recognised difficulty in seeing the overweight child for what they are (I’ve not read the paper, only your post) then perhaps upping phys Ed at school or making swimming cheaper and more accessible would just make sense? Working on the junk food advertising? Better outdoor spaces

If the whole class is doing more running then it’s really not a case of obese child’s mum having to acknowledge her child isn’t in the perceived healthy weight bracket..it just becomes the normal activity level.

Like it was.. back in the day.. when kids were skinnier

Where do you live?
Even the most dim person would realise that you need to look at at least height and weight to see if someone is overweight.
And if someone made a conclusion w/o either of those I'd throw it in the bin.

Seems these days people won't do the most basic thing if there isn't something directly in it for them. These surveys are to gather data for public health reasons.

No its not new. Height has always been part of the data gathering

Loads of people on here saying 'Im not going to lie' when talking about why they told their children about the letter

Well sometimes information does need to be witheld from children, its part of protecting them from information that they dont need to know and in some cases might actually be harmful for them. Whether you want to call that a lie or not is up to you but its just good parenting to ensure they're not exposed to things they dont need to be.

But why did you even discuss it with her? When my DD was weighed in year 6, I don't think it was even mentioned.

If a child mentions they are getting weighed then the parents should be saying it's just for statistics . If they get a letter back saying their child is over or underweight then why share that information with their 10/11 year old, especially if they know it could make them anxious?

Because she asked - I'm not going to lie to her, and at that age she was curious rather than anxious. I don't think it caused her ED, but I don't think it helped either.

Not in the UK, but similiar initiative here. I did opt out, because I already knew my DC was overweight and I had a frank discussion and plan with our doctor. It wasn't nice to hear, but I'm so glad she highlighted it to me.

DC had no idea, she spoke to him about how important vegetables are etc. but no mention of his weight. He now swims 3x a week and thinks it's a massive treat everytime🥰Even if there are concerns, I still don't think a child needs to know. DC is now much healthier and DR is super happy.

Not something for the classrom IMO.

The government has to collect data otherwise what do they base policy making on? If they didn’t do mass data collection they wouldn’t know that 40% of year 6 kids are overweight.

So many people on this thread have completely missed the point and seem to be taking the request for a weigh in as an attack on their parenting. People are dense.

The point isn’t to identify individual cases, it’s to gather population level data.

I get that, I just don't think it's appropriate in a school setting

If you knew it was because she was muscular and not fat you shouldn’t have mentioned it to her. She was too young to process the information rationally. In fact, even if she was fat you shouldn’t have mentioned it to her, you should have just encouraged healthier choices.

I just opt in as it's a data collection exercise. I don't really care about at an individual level.

It’s in a private room. How else could they collect data on school children en masse? Should they come to your house? Would you be happy for tax payers money to cover that cost?

Plus, my children will never ever see the results or know what they are, no matter what the outcomes are.

I suggest you have a coffee. I just expressed my opinion and personal experience, nothing controversial. I didn't suggest anything from the 'taxpayer' or special suggestions for my kids.

Well where else do you get children en masse?

Doesn't mean they should have to be weighed at school. It's my opinion that's all!

but if you don’t think it should take place at school you must have a view that there is somewhere better to do it? Why don’t you share it?

But loads of public health things happen in school, like vaccinations for example. If it was done outside school so many parents just wouldn’t bother as they think their chubby children are “fine”

So where else then? Schools are also used for education, health and wellbeing, immunisations etc etc

You can give your opinion and others can question it. Thats rather the nature of discussion forums.

They relate the weight to their age because overtall children generally become overweight so growing far taller than the rest of their age group is an indicator not a reason to measure their results with an older age. The problem is there are children that grow overtall for other reasons - basically if both parents are over 6ft tall then probably safe to ignore the overweight designation but if parents are average height then be prepared for them to stop growing taller sooner and instead put on more weight. Basically the extra energy from excess food is going into growing height first for these children.

The government could do something with this data they collect, it was successfully done in Finland some years ago (but needs doing again as overweight children have increased greatly again).

That’s really interesting - do you know if that applies for tall but very slim children?

My son was monitored for failure to thrive as a baby - his abdomen was on the 2nd centile, his head 50th but his legs 75th - because of the long legs he never actually went into FTT but was SGA (just under 9th centile)

When he was born he was 6lbs6 but 57cm, so although he was smaller weight wise, he was really long.

Now at 1 he is on the 99th centile for height, but around the 9th-25th centile for weight.

Im asking if he is at risk for obesity in later life because my health visitor is actively encouraging me to feed him more. I personally feel he’s always grown proportionately for his norm, he’s always fed well but had a balanced diet. I have disregarded her suggestions to “give him an extra meal” - she even suggested I weaned him before 6 months because he was “too skinny”

I should probably add I’ve not just blindly ignored her advice - he was seen at paeds for an unrelated issue and I mentioned this to the paediatrician and she laughed and said he’s fine; I also had our GP check and she said he’s not skinny.

I'm a bit torn by it tbh. I appreciate we need data and I'm aware many parents of OW children don't see it. But I remember being weighed in yr6 and as I was also one of the tallest was also one of the heaviest (but not fat). My 10/11 year old brain didn't get that and it partly contributed to years of EDs as I figured I shouldn't be so heavy.
Clearly we were told our weights. I like the idea that the kids themselves won't be told the data. I'm not even sure if we did it for data collection or a maths lesson as I recall drawing graphs and plotting all the different kids weights on it.
We did a similar thing in Science at Secondary school which was soul- destroying and I still recall the anxiety today.
I really hope schools are more conscious these days of eating disorders.