Juice in school

[Fubar01]

My DD’s teacher is being very combative about her taking juice to school (primary) in a clear drinking bottle. He says it’s against school healthy eating standards, but if she brings it in a non clear bottle it’s fine! She brings a very healthy lunch and has perfect teeth. She is also very sporty . She point blank refuses to drink water. Yet others in her class bring crisps and chocolate and nothing is said .
AIBU to stick with the (new) clear bottle?
i dislike petty rules that have no bearing on her education ! Especially when the rules are not enforced for others !

YABU to call it "juice" unless you are talking about natural liquid squeezed from a fruit/vegetable. I think what you actually mean is squash: sugar and chemicals.

You absolutely do not know this. Possible the teacher is having ongoing battles with those parents too. Maybe it’s a school full of arsehole parents! Poor teacher.

We did the same thing 😂

just to point out OP juice wasn’t an option in my daughter’s primary school, his suggestion is a perfectly reasonable compromise. The different bottle is obviously to stop other kids kicking off that they’ve got water. I always question rules and I don’t love authority but this is another level even by my standards

Well if it’s so unacceptable just send water then. I dare say your daughter will give in eventually and drink it, she’s not going to die of dehydration.

Of course, if you’d parented her properly in the first place she wouldn’t be addicted to squash in the first place, so this is on you.

This is a complete non issue. The teacher is probably asking you to not put squash in a clear bottle because their job is hard enough and they are trying to be flexible. They've offered solutions.

I think putting flavoured water in the bottle or buying a different one is easy enough for you to do if your DC really won't drink water. Everyone is asked to bring water to school not juice, pick your battles instead of accusing them of being sneaky.

The teacher couldn’t care less if your child’s teeth rot or not. There is a school rule (probably gov initiated) that juice isn’t allowed, so if an officious parent or member of staff see the juice they will kick up a fuss. He has given you a solution but you don’t seem to understand this and want to go into battle over something that does not matter. Do you just want to make his life difficult? Nice way to advocate for your child: really piss off their teacher at the beginning of the year.

Home educate your daughter OP and all your problems will be solved. Stop wasting teacher's time!

This is not an "all choices are equal" scenario though. Out of school, it is up to parents what their children have, and if parents don't want their kids to have ice-cream or crisps or sweets or whatever the other kids are having, then it's up to them to say no and mean it and ignore the whining.

The school wants to promote drinking water to kids. So it makes sense for those children who won't/can't drink water for a medical or other reason to be discrete about the fact they get juice. Otherwise it undermines the school's message.

It's not about bending the rules or parental entitlement. It's about a rule with a clear rationale (water is healthier than juice) subject to certain exceptions.

I'm very old so a long time since I was at school but I remember when a fellow classmate in junior school, in winter, used to bring in her drinking bottle from home filled, by her mum with - sherry!
She said it would " help keep you warm love".
Classmate was very, very popular at playtime.
Then the Headmaster found out............I learned the meaning of the word apopleptic that day.

Well what is it that you want? You want to be able to send her in with a clear bottle of “juice” (squash), just so everyone is fully aware she is not drinking water? Well you’ve been asked not to.

You want the teacher to stop being hypocritical and actually enforce no “juice”? Then stop sending her in with fucking squash then!

Slowly sipping “juice” all day means there is constantly sugar/chemicals in contact with the teeth. A chocolate bar is eaten in a minute (and if you have a drink of actual water afterwards largely washed away soon after). Your examples are totally different.

And also, being sporty doesn’t give any protection to your teeth.

I hear you. Left teaching July 2023 and have never looked back.
F'ing water bottles used to be the bane of my life. Always spilling, getting knocked over, causing a distraction, kids sucking on them continuously like babies. Parents arguing about 'juice'. Then they need the loo all the time. Up and down like yo yos. Mrs M - there's no loo roll. Mrs M - there's no paper towels. Mrs M - can I fill my water bottle. Mrs M - I've lost my water bottle. And on and on.

@ClaudiaWankleman

ClaudiaWankleman
Because teachers are choosing to burden themselves with minor things like the colour of plastic of a bottle?

It is/ would be a choice to pursue this, much less get so het up about it you change your career.

Not choosing to burden themselves, obligated to. When I was teaching, if the head or a member of SLT spotted 'juice' in bottles, they'd ask me why I was allowing it.

Same!! I never understand how young kids don't drink water?? My DD occasionally has squash but water is a default. Unless you were giving your kid squash from 6 months, which is lazy parenting, how does your kid 'not like' water? Water isn't there to be liked. It's a functional component to quench one's thirst.

Exactly. A previous poster said her 2.5 year old doesn't drink water, only juice. How? They didn't go from milk to juice.

Actually, parents were a huge factor in my decision to leave the pr

To leave the profession.

In fact, it was an unkind comment at parents' evening that tipped me over the edge and led me to resign.

Yep. Need a bigger problem.

Has anyone noticed the irony of the OP describing the teacher being combative?

Why do parents assume their children are entitled to what others are having

They are “entitled” to the school rules being applied fairly whilst they are in school. The school rule is water only. It’s not parents assuming they can steal another kids juice during class, it’s parents assuming that the no juice rule applies to everyone. It’s reception aged kids being told “no” by school watching someone else be told “yes”. It’s not the water drinking kids or their parents who need grips. Actual grown ass adults on this thread claiming water dehydrates people because it lacks electrolytes should also join the grip queue. Have you not heard of mineral water, or, you know, food? Water bad. Water plus colour, flavouring and acesulfane k good - sure, Jan. These kids aren’t moaning the lack of dioralyte - they are asking for sugar, or something that tastes like it.
School is a community and needs fairness and rules to function smoothly and for everyone to be able to relax knowing that some mad shit isn’t about to go down. Kids really benefit from knowing what the rules are and knowing they will be applied fairly. They learn where the boundary is and within those boundaries have a safe space to grow and develop and eventually they are developmentally capable of deciding their own boundaries and expanding their space. Not everyone wants to be part of a community- fair enough - another setting may suit better.

Im sorry you had those comments made towards you. But I’ll be perfectly honest, I avoided all of my eldest’s parents evenings last year because I would have ended up making ‘unkind’ (yet very truthful) comments to his teacher. Though it went far deeper than about water bottles.

I’ve been teaching long enough to remember when kids didn’t bring bottles of water (or juice, or squash) into school. A golden age in retrospect. Then, about 25 years ago, primary schools started telling parents that their children should glug water all day and they should therefore bring in water bottles. IIRC it was all linked in with that heap of unscientific bollocks called Brain Gym, that made a big deal of hydration and captured the primary sector early this century. Brain Gym has now all but disappeared but the legacy of water bottles lives on. There are good signs, though. I took a class the other day in which only about a third of the children had brought a bottle in. There’s hope for the new generation.

That’s fair enough, but there will always be instances where the rule doesn’t apply for genuine reasons. But that contradicts the ‘fairness’, especially when it’s over something as inconsequential as flavoured water. Is it really fair if a ND child gets squash when a NT child really can’t stand water has to go without a drink all day? Is it really worth implementing that rule?

What sort of juice is it? Maybe get the little cartons of apple or orange juice?

Do you know children at all? They will go home “so and so has juice why am I not allowed my Fanta!?” Cue stupid parents contacting the school asking why Mr has allowed one child to break the rules when their little petal cannot. Before you know it you will have parents adding energy drinks to their bottles because “that is all they will drink”. The teacher knows exactly what will happen which is why he’s enforcing the rule. Just put it in a different bottle and stop making an issue out of it.

Those will definitely not be allowed. The "juice" is in fact very dilute squash.