AIBU to think school are too risk happy with older kids in Forest School?

[LizzieLookAtTheFlowers]

10yo was taking part in organised forest school activity and broke her collarbone. Am all for inherent risk of adventurous play, this is not the issue - had she simply fallen, I wouldn't be here. But, the hammock she was in collapsed and she was tipped out backwards about 110-120cm and landed on exposed tree root causing a displaced clavicle fracture. 2 weeks off school, aside from that healing ok, will need physio as has reduced range of motion.

However, circumstances surrounding the incident concern me.

1. The hammock had also collapsed on the previous go - child thankfully not injured.
2. Teacher was not there, they got him, he re-rigged it and tugged it, told them not to swing then went back to campfire.
3. There were 2 adults to 14 kids overall, but across 2 stations quite far apart, so hammock area couldn't be seen or heard when he was at campfire with the TA and other kids.
4. The big exposed tree root is what broke her collarbone

On first occasion, kids were swinging friends in hammock quite vigorously which is what caused it to fall down. On second occasion, one girl didn't listen and swung my daughter in it, but as she was one small girl it wasn't crazy swinging and it collapsed more dramatically than before.

School have essentially said Y6 are old enough to get on with things themselves and don't need babysitting, they should have been able to trust them (presume this means they blame the girl who swung it but they haven't explicitly said this). they have lowered the hammock a bit to 86cm and that H&S assessor said the knots were fine. But didn't explain why then the hammock repeatedly collapsed if the knots are fine.

They didn't report to RIDDOR as said it wasn't related to a work activity even though it was in lesson time, the equipment failed, had previously failed and teacher decided to keep going with it and leave the kids unsupervised.

No adult witnessed her fall or was there to provide assistance - she had to get up and be helped over to the campfire quite a way away to tell an adult what had happened, and they couldn't even hear her crying.

I feel uneasy. I don't feel the school are learning lessons from this that Y6 kids are still kids. Surely if something changes and a risk becomes KNOWN rather than theoretical they need to change safety plans. I probably wouldn't have left them to it at that point, or would have taken the hammock out of action for the lesson until I could look into why it was falling repeatedly. But their investigation showed "no evidence of unsafe management" not even the hazards in the fall zone or the height or anything (despite them making some changes).

It's not the first time. In last 12 months I know of 4 other kids hospitalised due to forest school. One of them I know the school were really defensive and blasé about. Despite their risk assessment stating "no running", they organised a manhunt activity which resulted in a boy running full pelt into suspended ropes and rebounding off them with his face/neck. He got severe facial/eye rope burns that scarred, whiplash and concussion. They said no safety issues found.

I just... I'm uneasy. I know accidents happen, and these kids will be fine, but both of those incidents plus the other two could have been so much worse and there's just a pattern of ignoring risk assessments and generally saying "oh well the whole point of Forest School is they get a bit roughed up and they're almost at secondary school!" It's always Year 6 that get hurt!

Am I oversensitive? Or should the school be a bit less risky happy?

It's not a residential; it's a part of the school. It was a formal lesson during the normal school day not anyone giving up their free unpaid time.

Would you actually report it though? I really don't think I want to. I would be happy if they just said "yeah ok we could have done better and we definitely should have followed the risk assessment, we promise we will in future." But they won't.

I was ready to say YABU @LizzieLookAtTheFlowers but actually I don’t think you are. I hope your DD is OK, sounds quite nasty.

It's a sad world when a 10/11 year old cant realise for themselves that if a swing broke on the previous child then you know it is probably not safe to go on it the next time. That is simple basic, pure common sense.

The child is lacking basic instincts of safety and it is the society that they are growing up that is causing this.

Just look at playgrounds there is no tarmac just that spongy stuff to break falls. Kids accompanied everywhere until the age of 13/14. No wonder they cant learn these skills.

I hope your daughter feeling better soon

I can see both sides. From your perspective I think the biggest point is the hammock had failed with a previous child who was fortunate not to be hurt. This should have rang alarm bells and made the teachers think twice about using it again until absolutely 100% certain it was secure- which it clearly wasn’t.

From their side they are right to let year 6 pupils largely roam independently, unless any have SEN needs they are old enough to do this. They also likely thought with the hammock being so close to the ground even if a child did fall, it wouldn’t be serious. I think your DD was enormously unlucky to break a bone.

So tell school?

Even so.
I am done with parents' attitude these days.

The kids were told not to swing.
They swung.
Important factor here.

And you're complaining over and over about the "lack of supervision" . The teachers WERE supervising. What they cannot do is keep a set of eyes on every single year 6 constantly. It's impossible. You don't have your eyes on your kid 24 hours in your own home. How you think schools can do that?

You will never, ever EVER eliminate 100% risk in any activity or situation where there are kids present. But predictably this thread is full of calls to report, report, report.

No one is wanting it reported to be spiteful or to be some sort of busybody.

You probably don’t need me to point out that over the course of your 34 years there have been tragedies and things tightened up as a result of those tragedies (or near tragedies) - Hastings; Soham; the Drayton manor incident, Cumbria and others.

Obviously this isn’t one of those really tragic cases. But it is painful and inconvenient and could have been prevented. You can’t prevent everything but just ‘don’t put a hammock near an exposed tree root’ is reasonable enough. (I broke my collar bone once and MAN it hurts!)

This, on any form of equipment if it’s misused I’d think?
so if on a standard swing they stood on it while swinging then jumped off at top arc of swing and fell an broke something should the swing park close?

They don't have to share their risk assessment with you. You could put in a DSAR for reports that mention your child by name but I'm not sure what you are hoping to gain by asking for any of this information.

So the teacher told them not to swing. Your child got in it and was swung by another child

yes they should be able to listen and obey instructions

why did teacher rehook it up and not leave down if not meant to be on it

the teacher and ta if only 2 adults shouldn’t be together and should be able to see/supervise half the group

yes it should be reported as an accident - the equipment did fail but equally told not to swing on it and your child /pusher disobeyed

hope she is ok

This isn’t the case that the child fell off a swing but that piece of equipment broke again after being previously ‘repaired’.

In your shoes, I’d report to HSE and speak to a solicitor.

You said your daughter is fine and has been treated so all good. What do you need a risk assessment or incident report for?

Clearly I get that accidents happen anywhere and I said I wouldn't be here if she'd just lost her balance. But HOW accidents happen does matter. The difference is foreseeability and control.

Even as parents. If your kid is injured, and you've left them alone knowing they were doing something unsafe, you're going to be in trouble. When I put up a play frame in the garden, I made sure the fall zone was clear so falling would be less likely to result in catastrophic injury. That is just common sense and something we would all do without realising we're doing it. And when the cargo net came down i didn't just whack it back up, give it a quick tug and say "on you go" and piss off back inside to leave them to it; I stopped them playing and fixed it properly. These are sensible, normal controls we would do as parents without thinking and we aren't H&S "trained". It's also the law that school have to think about these things - they can't just do risk assessments, put them in a filing cabinet and forget they exist.

To understand what the school think actually happened and make sure they're doing the right thing to keep other kids safe, including my younger daughter.

If the hammock is only tied on, and isn’t meant to be swung about, it’s highly likely the swinging it about like they had been told not to is the main factor here.
did the hammock fall when it wasn’t being misused?

When you said forest school it was actually a bit of an adventure playground within the school for a few hours during the school day, where the children were allowed to run a bit wild and have a campfire. I was assuming an over night camp at least. Did the hammock mounting actually fail or did they just turn it over by swinging it too high or mucking about? I can imagine a bit of squabbling over it or more than one girl climbing in perhaps (that's what would happen if I had several girls that age playing with a hammock in the garden). I don't see how the knots would fail (twice) if they were done properly. And it really wasn't very high off the ground any lower and it would hardly be a hammock. Just an unfortunate accident really, as others have said it could have happened anywhere.

Hmm. You expect a couple of 10/11yr olds to exercise common sense when using a repaired swing, so what’s the excuse for the Teacher? 🤔

She's looking for someone to blame.
People are calling for her to escalate.
Solicitors have been mentioned.

AIBU is " to think schools are too risk happy" ?
Yes I say YABVU.
What teacher or school is " risk happy" ?????
FFS.

The OP hasn’t mentioned solicitors.

Its frustrating when your profession is perceived to be under attack but that’s not what’s happening here.

How is it not obvious? Would you not want to understand how/why something happened and what can be done to make it safer in future?

I do now actually have the risk assessment (from another parent) and it's clear they did not follow it. It states there is risk of strangulation, entrapment, head and spinal injury and fractures. The controls are check the fall zone before each use for tree roots, rocks and debris that may cause injury and hammocks and ropes not to be used without adult supervision. Sensible controls, not followed, and if they had followed them the injury wouldn't have happened. Since I know this is the second injury to arise from them ignoring their own risk assessments I can push them to stop BSing me that there was no unsafe management and accept that they have to stop ignoring their own safety advice and blaming kids for it. i.e hopefully make it a bit less dangerous for kids and make sure they don't end up getting forest school closed down because of too many hospitalisations.

If they close it down, it won't be because of too many hospitalisations.

I'm defo not contacting a solicitor! Who mentioned solicitors?! All I want to figure out is, is it worth pushing for them to understand the difference between inherent risk and engineered risk and accepting that having risk assessments and not following them is crap of them and they should do better. To make things a bit safer with some sensible controls. That's it. Because there have been too many hospitalisations now.

No what's happening here?????

Social Media is FULL of parents piling on to schools and looking to complain , escalate, report......etc etc etc

What does that mean? If school close it down because it's too much hassle? Well, that's their prerogative. But what I meant was if HSE close it down/prohibit the forest school - which is possible if they are investigated and all the injuries and non-reporting and covering up and not learning from mistakes is revealed.