To think that a RECEPTION teacher shouldn't have said this ???

[AutumnalPumpkin]

My daughter goes to a catholic school (it was the only school available to us) we are not a religious family, but it does not bother me that she is being immersed in religion. After all, she will only make her own mind up later in life anyway. But this is relevant.
They use god in almost every part of the day, and in all aspects of learning.
As those who are not religious will know, we and a lot of others view god as "made up" or a myth, if you will.
Now this brings me to where I have a problem - her reception teacher has picked up on some of the class talking about unicorns. A typical 4/5 year old thing... and has proceeded to tell them that Unicorns, fairies and dragons etc are all made up, and do not exist.
This is absolute insanity to me!!? They are 4/5 and all have wonderful vivid imaginations.
We regularly take my daughter to "the fairy forest" and she immerses herself into it and tries to find clues to where the fairies could be hiding, and loves to think that at nighttime all of the magical creatures come out to play.
She's now come home saying that it's all untrue and they are made up.
I'm actually really upset about this.
How can you push the belief of god, and they go all out for Santa etc. but actively shut down the belief of magical creatures ??

My grand dad used to say that if unicorns and fairys etc did not exist where did the stories come from. ( R.I.P GD )
Im not saying he was right but it was nice to no that he cared enough to say it to put my 6 year old brain to ease at the time.

Let kids be kids.
I bet if me or someone else started a post about strange things we have seen and no one believed us at the time.
It would get a lot of replies.

During lockdown I got a call from my sons’ teacher (at a catholic school) as her had told the other children in his class on teams they Easter bunny didn’t exist and this wasn’t acceptable! He was 9 at the time.

Yeah, I remember being totally baffled to meet Protestants at school/uni who didn't do Halloween! It would never have occurred to me anyone would have a problem with it.

Which is a completely reasonable thing for a teacher to do, otherwise you’d be implying that unicorns are an animal and not exactly “teaching”. I can’t believe any parent would be upset by this.

Children can still enjoy the “magic” of unicorns with them being a fantasy.

I am actually surprised some of these posts have been allowed to stay up, one of the last few forms of 'accepted' prejudice evidently!

Im sorry you feel compelled to throw your weight about like this and tell me what I’m allowed to say or not say on a public forum. If it brings you pleasure go for it though. Name calling is something I left behind when I was your daughter’s age but no worries if you are still employing this technique.

You hold some jolly eccentric beliefs in my opinion. You claim to live in a big city with multiple schools, faith schools and otherwise and yet you claim to have very few educational choices available because you will neither use public transport nor learn to drive. You claim that I have far more choice and yet I live very rurally and always have done since having children. Makes absolutely no sense to me but, hey, you do you 🤭

We said

“You will get into trouble and people won’t like you if you tell their children that Father Christmas isn’t real. I don’t know why”.

As far as I know they never did.

I recall a different child being shunned for having told the truth, not mine though.

My mother hadn’t warned us. I was old enough to know the rules. My brother told a child on a play date. He was told to leave the table and stand in the cold kitchen at someone else’s house. The mother said “He knows why”. I said “He doesn’t. I know why but he doesn’t”. I felt bad for not leaving the table and going to him, and even leaving and taking him home. It wasn’t far to walk.

@BurnToastAgain I am really not deeply attached to unicorns nor fairies. You are very active on this thread, so I am sure you have read most of my replies.
I just want children to be able to exercise their own imaginations and beliefs without being shut down unnecessarily by a teacher, who has CHOSEN to work with young children.. with vivid imaginations at that age, may I add.

In response to you defending your religion, you're well within your rights to. I am not attacking Catholicism at all. I know others are, but I am not.
I for one am actually shocked at the blatant hate towards it. I don't know if have lived a shielded life (I am only 23 and clearly not well educated on Catholicism) but I never knew that so many people found it so controversial. I didn't think twice about sending my daughter to a catholic school. Even as a non-catholic!
Although to some on here, the idea of a catholic school for their children seems abhorrent!!
On here, I regularly (more than I'd like actually) see blatant, nasty hate towards religion as a whole, but mostly Islam actually. So I am shocked nobody wants to come forward and say their piece for other religions. Maybe catholics seem like an easy target for people ?? I am really unsure.

@BurnToastAgain I have not called anybody a name... I jokingly said you will be fed to the unicorns for arguing with others. I do not have any beliefs. Why are you taking that comment so seriously ??

Religious schools in the UK must be very different from religious schools in Ireland. At my Catholic primary school we were taught all about Oíche Shamhna (Hallowe'en) and were encouraged to make Hallowe'en decorations at school. At DD's primary school they went a step further and they got all the kids to dress up in Hallowe'en costumes on the last day before the October mid-term break.

Sounds like a very mean teacher to me. If they were 9 or 10, you wouldn't expect them to still believe in unicorns fairies and dragons. But they're only 4 and 5.

Ok, thanks for your very reasonable reply 😊 Yes, it’s shocking to me that so many people feel that they can show blatant hatred for Catholicism. I feel upset when any religion is attacked really, but obviously I feel most compelled to defend my own religion.

I really had very little choice of nursery provision but choosing a Muslim owned and run nursery wasn’t a problem for me because, like the one your DD attended, it respected all religions and that’s what I try to do too. I’m absolutely not looking to be argumentative for the sake of it but I just despair of overt attacks on Catholics, for obvious reasons 😢

p.s. I have no problem with fairies or unicorns either, both fun and no harm to consider them real in the same manner as young children think teddy bears can talk or trains have adventures 👍🏻

Sorry, sense of humour failure on my part I think 😳 They have very sharp teeth and hooves, those unicorns 😁

Either UK Catholic schools are really weird or some posters have imaginations as vivid as some 4 year olds.

No way! I’m Catholic, attend church every week and all the rest of it and there is no way I’m telling my kid Father Christmas, Tooth Fairy and basically everything fun isn’t real!

Think this is a case of an arsey teacher.

Because they are!
why lie?
look out at Christmas, Santas not real either

Probably told to you countless times but catholics don’t agree with anything magical.

id of probably looked into it before sending my child to school that believes it so

But exercising one’s imagination is completely independent of knowledge or belief. Thats the whole point of an imagination! You don’t need things to be real/ concrete etc because you imagine them. Absolutely it’s important that children should be free to explore their imaginations to the maximum, that doesn’t mean you have to teach them to believe things that aren’t true (the latter can be problematic).

Yes thats my thoughts too. Almost all Irish schools are Catholic and religion is approached casually, there is an option out of it. Cultural stuff like Halloween, Christmas, Easter is celebrated according to the local culture, not the religious version. In 1980s we were still not allowed celebrate Halloween in school and Christmas was more about Jesus than Santa, but that has completely transformed. The version I'm hearing about here in the UK sounds like what my mother experienced in the 1950s. I wonder is this a common thing, where a religion is the minority in a country, it tends not to evolve so much with the culture and retains a stricter form? I am Catholic but like most I only follow aspects of it, I have never in my life met a fundamentalist Catholic and would be very wary of any.

@Cerealkiller4U I'd be concerned about the type of Catholics you know, I have never met someone who doesn't allow children have magical beliefs.

I posted before saying that it's not right but actually it does depend on the context. If someone asked her if they're real or if she's covering real & mythical creatures in some kind of topic (for example knights and royalty) she would have to be honest, but you would hope she'd do it in a way that doesn't end up with children going home depressed and not wanting to hear anything about unicorns anymore!
I must say the level of contempt and ignorance towards Catholics and people of any faith is quite shocking! As so often on MN the trolls are out in force, relishing their chance to try and belittle other people's opinions and beliefs.
About 7 years ago I posted on here for some advice in a moment of despair about something quite trivial which at the time seemed a huge problem I had some great support and then enough hateful messages to put me off until about 4 days ago.
I see not much has changed.
Good luck to you all, I think this is where I sign off!

@Rasell I don't think Mumsnet will ever change, sadly. I stupidly did not think twice before beginning this thread. And I again, stupidly did not realise it would cause a hate train on religion !!

I'm an atheist and against faith schools. However, I'm a bit surprised at your being so upset about the fairies and unicorns thing. You say children should be allowed to use their imagination. I agree, but it's not imagination if they have been told it's real. Children use their imagination all the time, creating things they know full well aren't real. And they will enjoy stories and games about dragons, fairies and unicorns, in the full knowledge that they are not real. I'm not sure my dc ever thought those things were real. They were fun, made-up things. Fiction.

Religion aside, I really don't get why you would make your kids believe that dragons and unicorns are real. What's wrong with telling them that they are magic, made up creatures?

@FastFood @AllProperTeaIsTheft
I don't make her believe this and I've never actively told her they are real. She does however, believe they are real. On her own accord. Without my influence.
She is 4.
So I wouldn't expect a literal reception teacher to ruin that for her