To insist on sending gluten free flour for DS's food tech lesson

[listsandbudgets]

DS is gluten intolerant. We've just had an email from school asking us to send ingredients for bread and also scones - fair enough not too complicated. However the email goes on to say that it's so they can look at the affect of gluten in cooking

I've emailed back saying that as DS can't have gluten I'll send the closest gluten free equivalents I can find so DS can at least participate and almost immediately got a response saying that it had to be gluten because that was the point of the lesson.

AIBU to insist? It seems very unfair to make him cook something he can not eat. I'm considering emailing back telling them that having a gluten free version will help illustrate the differences and actually enhance the lesson (but I don't want to be THAT MOTHER!!)

I mean, if you’re going to google at least go beyond the first result. 🙄

I'll be imagining the burning in my mouth, pain and the stench of death from being in the next room during home baking attempts that led to DP going gluten free as well, then.

If it’s about the effects of gluten in food, then a GF comparator would probably be useful.

This is one of these situations where contacting the school and trying to speak to someone would help.

Just as a matter of interest, has he been tested for Coeliac Disease?

Coeliac is not the only issue. And getting diagnosed with it, even if you have it, can be a battle on the NHS. If OP knows her son has an intolerance, whether he’s been diagnosed with anything or not, they’re wise to avoid gluten.

My DD, home from uni has been battling a nasty outbreak of what a private Dermatologist thinks is dermatitis herpetiformis since she’s been back in early December and all over Christmas/New Year. We can’t afford the additional Dermatology testing to determine it or the referral to private Gastroentorology atm and so far the NHS will only do allergen blood tests with no guarantee that they will follow up with the biopsy afterwards. NCGS doesn’t have a test other than exclusion but the effects are very real for those have it. So DD has been voluntarily gluten free for more than six months, without diagnosis, which has helped most of her symptoms immeasurably apart from the skin problem which could have been an accidental exposure despite being careful.

I wasn't a food teacher - but worked alongside them. This sounds more like an experiment, a trial rather than producing something to take home and eat for tea.

As a teacher I'd have expected to have provided the various flours myself/school bought - including gluten free. (Then I get the correct results)

I'd also be very careful offering samples to eat knowing that there is at least one gluten intolerant pupils in the class.

However many schools are so skint that this is the only way they can do some of the practical?

Is the and result of the lesson that everyone else will study the result and bung the bread/scone in the bin? Or will they likely all take it home to eat it? Because if it’s the latter then of course your DS should be able to make something he can also eat. Doesn’t mean he can’t observe and record the results others are getting.

And as for other PPs saying if he’s that allergic he shouldn’t be in the class and should sit it out. Pfft. Sounds a bit like my wheelchair using nephew being told if there’s a lesson that‘s up some stairs he should just choose a different subject to study rather than expecting any adjustments…

Yes, you tell the teacher how they should run their lesson, and then come back here and tell us how that went fir you

Oooh ‘ark at you, you edgelord.

I would send him with gf.

Whole point of the lesson is the effect of gluten. If your worried he is missing out on treat then send him in with some pre packaged goodies for after

teacher can think outside the box and say ok he could compare some different gf flour and see if any are stretchier than others, ie Caputo pizza flour, Doves flour and rice flour.

How do you adjust a lesson about gluten to avoid exposing a child to gluten?

That is more akin to the school being told that your wheelchair using nephew must be allowed to play in an able-bodied football team.

I don't say the point was to produce something inedible.

Just that the edibility is beside the point for this particular lesson.

It isn’t hard to let him make the adjustment necessary to make gluten free scones, I’ve knocked some up this evening with Asda free from self raising flour.
if a cookery lesson is excluding a pupil from learning to bake then the teacher and syllabus is clearly losing its way.
no wonder children are being deskllled, and cooking is seen as difficult

Hopefully your son ismf thinking of training as a chef when he is older if the criteria is to only make whar he can eat.

The Intent of the lesson has been explained to you, do as asked.

Only if ds ate it. Id expect any teacher to be able to remind some children they can’t eat the experiment, or all children they can’t eat the science experiment or whatever instruction is specifically relevant. That seems a pretty low level teaching skill to be honest.

But OP hasn’t mentioned that…..she WANTS him to participate in the lesson, only with gluten free flour.

Great so the teacher has to pay for the child! How is that fair?

Couldn’t he bring home what he makes? Unless you’re all gluten intolerant of course.

Why must he eat it? Saying no thanks is an option.

I can't imagine having this amount of free time on my hands.

Pick your battles, surely.

I have diagnosed ceoliacs. You’ve asked - they said no - insist and yes you are that mother because you were told the lesson was to see the effects of gluten and you are making the lesson about your son eating the results.

i would understand if it’s a whole term of cooking but it’s a lesson - he won’t be emotionally damaged by not eating something he made. As a mother I make food with gluten I can’t eat everyday.

my bigger concern is if there are a lot of children making a floury mess with flour powder everywhere he will likely be exposed to gluten in the air.

Just send some gluten free scones in his lunchbox that day. He can learn the process with normal flour and eat your scones.
i can imagine lots of kids scones being like rocks an inedible anyway.
plus it is helpful for a ceoliac to understand why our bread falls apart sometimes…

I'd keep him off. My ds has coeliacs and a whole classroom full of flour flying everywhere and a clueless teacher sounds like a disaster in the making.

The school are paying not the teacher!