Mayflower primary school - nappy changing facilities for school aged children

[2011j]

AIBU to think this shouldn't be necessary?

Not including those with sen, children should be potty trained before starting school - AIBU?

But there will be a few diagnosed and many undiagnosed children with SEN all main stream schools.

How have we dealt with this in the past? Why are we needing new facilities now?

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cj098l9z3m7o

full article

It might help if you disclose your interest in this? Are you having to change nappies? Clear up mess?

Many Children with SEN it won’t have been properly identified or diagnosed before a child starts school.

Even if a child isn’t potty trained upon starting school due to parenting issue they will still need to be changed so school will need facilities.

Many schools have nurseries attached and so will need nappy changing facilities for them anyway.

No, I'm a reader of the news and wanted to discuss

The article is clear that this is an increasing common issue. Why is that? Surely there is some truth to the fact that us as parents aren't developing our children early enough. In most cases.
My 7 year old still can't blow his nose properly and I get so cross when I try and teach him, I've left it.
I'm sure there are loads of us like this

Newsflash! It’s called a discussion, and as such the OP doesn’t have to ask for your permission.

Lots of SN children, even ones with profound and obvious disabilities, are sent to mainstream school and their parents will spend time and energy fighting for an EHCP and a special school place (rare as hens teeth in many areas).

Until more funding into SN materialises expect more of the same.

I'm wanting to discuss the fact that the need is increasing.

I see it daily at nursery. So many 3 year olds untrained, or half-trained and given up.

I suspect parents are very much like they were 50 years ago, the same mix of people.

Society has changed hugely. Years of austerity has taken away valuable resources and funding.
More parents are working, more people in general are mentally ill. None of this is conducive with getting tiny children school ready.

• More SEN schools
• Ilegal exclusions from school

In an ideal world, YANBU but it's not an ideal world so YABU.

Not much help, I know, but with appointments and assessments etc. being subject to such a long wait list and school attendance being compulsory, how can you assure every single child meets this marker of progress or has received proper diagnosis of any issues in time to start school.

There's too many people and not enough help for everyone exactly when they need it for everything to run to schedule.

My friend is a K2 teacher in an international school close to a large VW plant and she said to me she doesn’t know what the heck has happened to German kids, they are very much not potty trained since 2023

Two separate reasons.

One is because there are more and more parents that take no responsibility and send children who don't have additional needs into school who are not toilet trained. We started noticing this at the school I was teaching at over 20 years ago, but it has become far, far more of an issue.
I think that's for a wide variety of reasons, but one of them is that schools, or Nurseries, or playgroups aren't allowed to refuse to take children who aren't toilet trained. I have dc in their 20s, and they couldn't start at playgroup until they were 2.5 and toilet trained, which was normal then. Nowadays there are many people that don't even try to teach their children to use the toilet or potty until they are 3, 3.5 or 4.

The other is, the has been a massive increase in the number of children with special needs. Massive. None of the children I taught in special school in the 1990s would even get an EHCP, let alone get an appropriate school place if they had an EHCP. There really has been an explosion in the numbers, which it seems no-one is aware of unless you work in a Nursery or Primary school, or associated services. Where I live, all schools are expected to somehow look after multiple children with really significant needs.

So you see it daily in the nursery so surely understand the struggles;
Single parents exhausted and can’t push toileting issue fully.
Lack of extended family support again to continue pushing skills.
Two parents working exhausted and no energy to push through.
Many believe children “toilet train when ready”. Some consider toilet training to include washing hands afterwards (so might not pass the study despite being fully dry and wiping properly).
But similar to brushing teeth and hair it’s easier for parents to do it than nag.
For some it might be financial due to washing/drying expense.
Sometimes these life lessons make a parent feel mean and they want their child to be their BFF.

There isn’t enough SEN schools or help in place for children who struggle.

Ive worked with many parents and families who’ve struggle with potty training.

My SIL has a child with a rare genetic condition, didn’t master potty training until in secondary school, he needed a specialist school however council refused for multiple years until she had to appeal… it took over 4 years of fighting.

Loads of children clearly have SEN however waiting lists are as long as 4/5 years…. So because they are undiagnosed they will be in the “needs are increasing” category.

Most NT children are physically and emotionally capable of being able to use the toilet by the age of 4 but sometimes their parents haven’t managed to train them for whatever reason. Sometimes it’s laziness yes. Other times it’s disruptive home lives, inability to take time off work, mental health problems, health problems within the family.

Other children have SEN. In the old days children that we now recognise had SEN were institutionalised and chained to radiators. They were not expected to attend a mainstream school.

At 4 it can be difficult to know the difference.

When my DD started school she was in nappies. At 10 she's still in nappies. If she survives to 20 she'll still be in nappies.

Yet at school starting age she was allocated to our local mainstream school.

It took 2 years - despite obvious medical evidence from when she was a few months old that she was always going to have serious health and development issues - and constant fighting by us (and her school who were actually wonderful) for her to be allocated an appropriate SEN school.

When I was a kid she wouldn't have set foot near a mainstream school.
In the support group of other parents with children with the same conditions the only one they hasn't had the same fight is one who went private right away.

Lack of specialist provision is the biggest reason.

That we don't stick children like DD into children's hospitals/homes and pretend they don't exist anymore is wonderful progress. That there is pretence that everyone should go through mainstream education is absolutely not progress.

My 9 year old still wears pull ups at night and still has continence issues, he wasn’t diagnosed with any SEN until he was 7.

He certainly wasn’t soiling because he was lazy or I couldn’t be bothered.

It can take years to get a diagnosis.

When my first child was born 10 years ago I could go to the health visitors clinic without an appointment twice a week if I wanted. I could go to the Surestart centre any times between 9-5 on a week day. Four years later when my second child was a baby the Surestart had been closed down and the HV clinics were by appointment only and 3 weeks wait. Toilet training was during covid times so next to little support. Thankfully he was my second child and so I had some experience already. Dread to think what support there is now.

A cousin of mine (30 years ago) was late to toilet train, and ended up going to a special school because of it. He is autistic but other then toileting, his needs could have been met in mainstream, and he transferred back at around 7/8.

If he was starting school today I suspect the LA would have compared the cost of a special school place against the cost of fitting a changing unit, and sent him to mainstream. Even kids with extensive needs often start out at mainstream today, as there just aren't many specialist places available, so it can take years to secure a place.

Schools offer places from age 2 now in some schools, 3 in others.

This this and the this.
And a cost of living crisis so partners are working more.
And a housing crisis so potty training is not as high a prior with frequent unplanned moves and children are less settled.

A lot of people have less support now. Less of a village to go to and ask for help with things or to get proper help.

The closure of things like sure start again reduce availability of support. DS is 15 and when he was little our sure start centre offered specific support around potty training but now it seems there is nothing?

so if parents don’t know where to start, or they try and it doesn’t work it’s often much harder to get proper non judgemental support