First week of school!

[autumngirl714]

And my son has come home from school having wet himself and none of the teachers knowing (he said he did to at dinner time so had wet paints all day)
lost his school jumper during the day
lost his drinks bottle during the day the following day
and now I’ve just had a message from school saying he hasn’t got his book bag when he took it in this morning meaning that has gone missing at school too!

Aibu to be really annoyed and concerned about the attention teachers are taking in him?
he is undiagnosed of anything but suspected autistic traits so he is in the SEN radar and I’ve been told he has extra eyes at school.
he’s 5 and in yet one. He’s finding this really upsetting as he’s thinking he’s done something wrong.

im also told that 2 others children’s jumpers have gone missing and one school coat in the same year.

i know that stuff goes missing at school, i know the teachers have a lot of children to look after but to me this is absolutely not ok!!!

all this is ONE week!!!

Is everything labelled with his name? If that's the case you should get it back, if not you will probably never see it again.

Did he ask to go to the toilet? Did he tell the teacher he had wet himself?

I’m sorry. It’s so hard. But I have to tell you that apart from the being wet… all you have described is very very common for a lot parents. You have to keep remind him to check he has all his belongings.

Teachers have enough to do without constantly checking the whereabouts of every kid's coat or jumper.

They are constantly leaving them on the floor, dropping them in the playground or doing who knows what else with them.
When coats and jumpers are found abandoned, moved etc, the majority of them don't even have any discernable name tag.

Teaching respect for your belongings starts at home.

The missing items, my SEN kids always lose their things. I label them all and send the kids back to have a look in lost property, otherwise its gone in the wind😂
The toilet, i've had this with my daughter and I ask for the teacher to 'remind' her to go at break times and before leaving school.

If you send your son with a spare pair of pants in his bag, could he change them himself if he has any accidents OP?

Happens all the time so I'm not sure why you are being so dramatic. Staff aren't monitoring jumpers and bottles ffs. If the stuff has his name on, you should get it back.

Kids losing stuff is normal. Just make sure you label everything and have some spares. My DD started reception with seven school cardigans (I bought three, then was given another four as hand me downs). I don’t think she ever came home in the same cardigan she’d worn on the way to school that morning. We were down to one cardigan at one point, but they all came back to us in the end.

I don’t think you can expect staff to notice that he’s wet himself unless it’s soaked through and is visible from the outside. Rather than blaming anyone I think you just need to talk to him about what to do next time. Message his teacher to tell them about it and agree who he should tell in future, and maybe ask them to remind him about going to the loo while he’s settling back into the school routine.

As a Reception teacher- I didn’t have time to monitor these things. I reminded parents to label everything and I reminded the children constantly to hang jumpers/cardigans/coats on their pegs. I had a box outside my classroom my TA would pop unnamed items in for parents to sift through. I often held up items to ask the class, children often had no idea, especially as items look so similar. Toileting- I would remind them all to go at key points in the day and reassure them that they could go anytime. It was very common for children to not tell anyone they’d had an accident or to forget to go as they were so busy and happy playing. This will all improve with time I promise!

As a Mum of 2- I do now understand more fully how annoying it is when an expensive school uniform jumper which is labelled goes missing within the first week. This still happens with my DS in Year 2. I ask him to pop into the cloakroom first thing to find it, or after school to look himself. If no luck I go round to the main office and it is in the lost property, I’ve always got things back which are named. I never bother my children’s teachers- I have told them they need to look after their stuff and I expect them to hunt for it.

Label everything. If it's labelled you will most likely get it back. It might take a few days.

Work on him being able to ask to go to the toilet or to know where the toilet is if they are allowed to just go there themselves. How was he in nursery going to the toilet? If he was OK it's probably just settling in nerves.

There's probably 30 kids in the class. It's a big adjustment but generally most kids get the hang of things.

Belongings will go missing though throughout his entire school journey. That's why everyone needs name labels - even in secondary school!

Aibu to be really annoyed and concerned about the attention teachers are taking in him?

Yes, YAB VERY U

it's not up to a teacher in charge of a class of 30 to check jumpers, and his drink bottle.

The Lost and Found should be buried under lost jumpers by the end of the week - as long as they are labeled, you should be able to find them, unless another child accidentally took them.

that's school I am afraid. That's why we have spare

He’s finding this really upsetting as he’s thinking he’s done something wrong.
If he lost his stuff, then yes, it's not a big deal ,but he did something wrong.

Him being wet.. call the school and arrange to have a chat with the teacher, don't bother them when they are trying to settle the class, and ask to keep an eye, but it's easier said than done.

Yes, YABU. I agree with everyone else.

If you've sewn his name labels in to his clothes, and labelled his water bottle(s) they will come back, but the first thing is to ask him as he comes out of school to go and look for it. That is his job, not the teacher's. He might be one of those dc that needs more nagging reminders from you what he needs to do with his jumper when he takes it off.

Re the wetting - teaching staff can't pat everyone down / sniff them throughout the day. He needs to be reminded what he needs to do a) if he needs to go and b) if he does have an accident. Someone will help him if they know, they can't if they don't.

If you have one of those dc that is forever losing things (one of mine was like that) it will save you a LOT of stress over the next 11 years, if you pick up spare uniform at the 2nd hand sales / free giving sites / uniform giveaway charities / etc and have more pieces of uniform than you think you need, so there will always be spares whilst waiting for the lost ones to come back.
Another thing to do is volunteer to sort the lost property once a fortnight so all the named stuff gets returned to the owners (borrowing a couple of KS2 children who will know who is who and return it to the right classroom). TAs and teachers do not have the capacity to do that.

At 5, I found you need a minimum of 5 sets of uniform and that is already cutting it a bit short 😂

Parents don't always remember or have time to check labels every single day, sometimes another child took the clothes, and parents won't notice until they do the laundry or something

Label label label.

get second hand uniform if possible.
all kids lose stuff in infants.
buy a water bottle with his name engraved or similar on it.

he needs to tell the teacher if he has wet himself.

Label everything. The teachers have enough to do without keeping eyes on 25-30 jumpers everyday give them a break.

It’s an absurdity of modern life, how if this is how much attention and care he got when at home it would be neglect, but it’s fine if it’s at another setting where you’re expected to leave him everyday for six hours at only five years old.

Are all his belongings named? If so they will very likely return themselves to you over the next few days.
Does his class have more than one adult? Why did he not tell an adult that he was wet? If he’s wearing dark trousers and the initial incident happened outside during lunchtime then it can be surprisingly hard to notice that they are wet if they don’t say anything. Often the puddle is the only clue and if it’s happened outside no one is going to know.

I hope you are ok OP? You are going to find life very difficult if you are stressed about this stuff. Everything you mentioned is totally normal for school!

I blame the other parents way more than the teachers. Kids misplace things, and pick up the wrong uniform, bags etc. Teachers don’t have time to prevent this happening. But other parents have no excuses. Every single item of clothing my kids had at school was labelled, so if it ever ended up in someone else’s laundry basket, the parents would have seen it didn’t belong to their child. But they usually either can’t be bothered to return it, or they decide they’d like a free blazer, PE top etc. It drives me mad.

Guys this isn’t my first rodeo, I have another older child in the school so I know what school can be like with lost property . I also have nieces and nephews which I’m very involved in and friends with children the same aNd it’s funny how nobody else, including me with my eldest, has ever lost this much uniform alongside the toilet situation in one week at school… but of course MN thinks that’s perfectly normal And I just need to get over it! 🙄

And my “concern” I first noted was because school specifically told me he was going to have a TA alongside him to help him with his struggles. It feels to me this can’t be happening if this much is going wrong!

Yes I bet this is what has happened! Everything is labelled but they could be unpicked I guess. I am going to get his initial embroidered in the rest of his stuff this weekend 🙈

Yet at home, there aren't 29 other children to keep an eye on, nor are you trying to actually teach 30 small children at the same time.
It's not really comparable, is it.

What struggles does he have to warrant a 1:1? All reception classes have a teaching assistant. Who is there to support the children. So looking at it like that, it’s 1 adult to 15 children. Unless your child has an ehcp and it has been agreed that he needs an adult with him all the time, then he won’t have that support. Some kids lose stuff. If it’s labeled then not a problem, you’ll get everything back. Was it noticeable that he had wet himself when he came out of school?

oh please
has ever lost this much uniform
that's 1 jumper and a book bag, you are being completely ridiculous.

im also told that 2 others children’s jumpers have gone missing and one school coat in the same year.
is that all? 😂 a few jumpers and a coat! No, you are right, that is unusual to have so little missing.😂

That sounds like a good year, things go missing all the time.

Meanwhile, the school and/or the PTA are crying for parents to CHECK the bloody lost and found that is overflowing with tens and tens of jumpers, coats that no one ever claims.

Parents missing uniform vs school flooded with unwanted lost and found.. could there be a link there?

School has never been set up to teach children life skills, learning to mind your belonging is a parents job, nothing to do with "modern life".

What's absurd is how many parents refuse to teach any independence at home, and are shocked the teacher is not their little darling's private PA.

Reception teachers are not there to toilet train, teach basic manners, teach children how to put on a coat or a jumper, how to use a knife and fork, how to remember your belonging - a reminder to the whole class is enough, not an individual discussion with each child.

At the very least with the most lazy parents, it's skills learnt while at pre-school.

Has anyone actually looked on the child's peg? Once had a new parent (Y3s starting at junior school) yelling at me that his son had had 3 jumpers 'stolen' that week. I returned all 3 jumpers that pick up and informed the dad parent they had been on the child's peg all along. No apology.

You don't know the book bag is lost yet. They just thought he hadn't brought it in so probably didn't look extensively for it. It'll no doubt turn up.

Has your child actually got a 1:1 TA (vanishingly rare now without funding in place, or indeed even with) or are they just getting extra support in core subjects? Unfortunately water bottles and jumpers tend to go missing during breaks when children take them out of the classroom and don't bring them back.