To ask school to stop sending me these texts?

[SquiglePig]

I have 3 kids in same high-school.

They've started to send texts to parents everytime a child is late to a lesson, basically saying 'your child is late for lesson, please don't allow this to happen again etc'

My kids are never late to school in the mornings, ever.

It's my responsibility to get them into school on time, which I do.

I've had the discussion with them about getting to lessons on time but what can I actually do?

I feel like once they're on school grounds I don't really have physical control over how long it takes them to get to lessons even though I keep telling them.

Also it's not a text to my phone it's a text via the school messaging system which means I have to log in to see it.

I'm at work and I don't know if it's something important or not and have to check and I can get in trouble for being on my phone too much.

Please don't think this is me saying I have no responsibility over my children's behaviour in school, of course I do but I feel that I do not need to recieve a text every time one of them is late to arrive to a lesson when I've got them into school on time.

In my day there were teachers in the hall to usher kids to their lessons?

The whole class is not always coming from the same place.
My DC had a issue getting from PE to history - so sometimes he and 3 others were late. All given detentions, which were then removed when the reasoning was explained - but I would get the detention email and then the detention cancelled email.
DS consequently did not take GCSE history as he said it just wasn't worth the hassle!

That's true, but then you run the risk of not being aware of things that are happening and then you'd be whingeing on here that the school haven't informed you of a problem such as finishing early, short notice school closure, upcoming events, etc. Ultimately, any kind of messaging is in the recipient's control as to how often to check, scheduling their responses, etc.

It's really interesting that you jump straight to punishment and slagging off young people rather than actually thinking about some systematic change that makes them responsible for their own actions. My own school (years ago) gave a warning bell before the end of break times to help being on time, and it worked.

Teenagers tend to enjoy doing what their parents have told them not to, it's one of the features of teenagehood isn't it. Having parental crackdowns every ten minutes might get them to do the desired behaviour (unlikely) but is it going to make them self-motivated to behave well? No. Is it helping them to learn the correct course of action independently? No. It's the type of thing that results in adults at university claiming not to have been told how to do things or accepting any blame for wrongdoing, because their parents haven't been involved in chasing them to do it every 5 minutes.

I kind of agree with you but we are both being unreasonable. My DC leave the house with plenty of time to get to tutor on time (5 min walk and they leave half hour before school starts) one is semi regularly late and I get an automated message. I have spoken to him but as his attendance is 97/98% I haven't put sanctioned at home as I think that school should first (he has never had a detention for being late).

Schools really can't win!

Of course they're all important to some degree and it's not convenient to ring every parent about the boiler.

PP were suggesting OP ignore app messages while at work as anything urgent would be a phone call - I was merely pointing out that actually, the app messages can be more "urgent", such as making sure someone will be able to pick up/be at home for their child who needs to leave school unexpectedly!

I am well aware about students coming from different classes, @Nicelynicelyjohnson .
I have 7 in my GCSE group who come from a different block
They're a couple of minutes after the others, it's not a problem. Please realise that whatever problem you have identified - we've already identified it.
If someone doesn't want to do a GCSE because they have an issue with a ks3 teacher, I'm going to say that defies logic, and I've no idea why someone would make such an irrational choice about their future rather than the parent contacting school and getting a solution.

So an entire class and their teacher should put up with disruptions and interruptions to their work because of your children, but you shouldn’t?

You are still the parent. It doesn't matter if they are at school and you at work.

It should be your problem, as above, talk to your kid instead of moaning against the school

@Spinet "teenagers tend to do the opposite..."
No. I teach hundreds of different teenagers. There are some with ODD, but it is rare.
However, mostly they understand organisation and the importance of punctuality.

You misunderstand,I haven’t explained myself very well. I’m not advocating detention, a previous poster was . And I should have said that the majority of pupils manage to get to class quickly . A warning bell at the end of break is fine, but between lessons this wouldn’t work.For the persistent minority who do cause disruption for the teacher and other pupils I do think that parents should be informed.
There’s a difference between a pupil being late for a specific reason, and a pupil who is late constantly.

Hm, amazing how it’s always the same 2 or 3 kids isn’t it? 🤔 Tgey don’t get lost after the first 2 weeks of year 7 (when allowances are made). After that, they’re farting or dicking about

And I’m not slagging pupils off, I’ve seen it with my own eyes on a daily basis. There are some fantastic pupils out there who don’t need telling by their parents to behave , they’ve been brought up to do so.

This.

Take some responsibility - the volume of texts you refer to shows that there is clearly an issue. They are disrupting lessons and the education of others by arriving late.

I don't think you are being unreasonable. If kids are late, do they not get detention? I think the school should be dealing with lateness during school hours, not the parents. If they are persistently late then fair enough, the teacher can contact you to have a chat about their punctuality. I understand why you find it unreasonable to receive messages whilst you are working. If the school isn't careful it becomes like the boy who cried wolf. Too many notifications and you might miss something important. IMO, better to have a conversation if lateness is an issue rather than drip-feed text messages without any context. Why are they late? Do lessons finish on time? How far is it between classes? Is there a valid reason why they are late? If it's happening regularly with all 3 of your children, it suggests to me that there is something not quite right.

100% this

Yes OP teachers are in their workplace and shouldn’t be bothered by children! 😂

Once the kids are in school SirAlfredSpatchcock part of their job is making sure the kids get to class. Teachers job isn’t just sitting at a desk and tapping the board with a ruler 😂

You are funny 🤣

Awk behave ur self

Sounds like yr kids behaviour needs addressing, as the parent its yr job.

This is a good idea.

No worries, I misunderstood your post when you said about the whole class being on time.
You sound like a nice teacher who takes all of this into account, like 90% of the teachers at my son's school. There are always a few though who deal out punishments without speaking to the children to ask why they are late (maybe they just don't have time.)
This was not my son's only reason for not taking history. I was trying to be lighthearted and to say that sometimes kids do make choices for strange reasons. However, liking or not liking a teacher does play a big role with some kids and he is one of them.

I would definitely want to know why my kid was being persistently late for lessons. It could be something like dealing with their period and not having enough time to get to the toilets over break time, which can be a problem in some secondary schools. It could be an organisational issue, especially for a younger age child in secondary school.

Or it could just be low level, persistent bad behaviour and the school needs you to reinforce that it's not acceptable.

The school should give a sanction not just send you repeated text messages.

I think your job is to tell them to be on time and to support school's sanctions, but not to give home sanctions for minor stuff like this.

It sounds like school isn't managing things very clearly - if this is a big issue they should be giving detentions etc. and if it isn't a big issue they don't need to tell you.

which teacher should be monitoring punctuality and contacting home? When should they be doing this? it is automated for a reason

When the children are in school, the school is the parent. It's called being in loco parentis.

If OP couldn't deliver her children to school on time that would be different, but exactly how can OP police her children when they're at school and she's at work. The alternative is for OP to go to school with her dc.

Ok, yes it makes a difference.
Everyone is just trying to do their best!