AIBU to expect schools to teach children about vaping and smoking harms?

[badsmells]

My parents were chatting to my children and asked whether they were taught about the harms of smoking /vaping/nicotine pouches at school . They said (age 12, 14 and 15) that they hadn't had any lessons covering that topic.

According to my son in year 10 over 50% of children in his year vape.

If it was just one child I would have assumed they had snoozed through the lesson but for all three to say the topic has never been covered surprised me.

I do talk to them about it at home (not least because they are all asthmatic), but AIBU to think it helps for them to get these messages reinforced at school ?

Things that are the parent's responsibility to teach their children:
toilet training
good manners
limiting screen time / internet safety
puberty
sex education
respect
financial education
healthy living
being a responsible citizen
having a work ethic

I am sure it will be, I smoked in school at 14 till I left, and we had it drummed into us how terrible smoking was, teenagers don't care they think they are invincible,

Jordan North did a good documentary that we use in schools, talks about the dangers of illegal ones
www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m001xj1p

Of course they will be taught about smoking and vaping and the dangers of doing so. I find it odd you're so certain that these infrequent lessons would be more effective in deterring them from vaping than their own family.

Once again, its in my op that I do teach my children these things.

But public health issues need to be addressed through education and a key part of that is through schools

Health issues are, I’ve already posted the statutory framework that schools have to follow

When it comes to PHSE lessons what a lot of teens actually hear in the lesson is "Blah blah blah.... don't do that. Blah blah blah..... that's dangerous."
They don't listen and pay attention because they believe they know it all already.
Parents think schools aren't teaching certain things because their children say so but 9 times out of 10 it was because teens treat PHSE as a doss lesson and don't pay attention.

Once again, they are addressed in education.

It will have been covered as part of the PSHE curriculum (primary as well as secondary).
One of my Year 11 classes summarised PHSE as 'Sex and Smoking miss" 😁.

The kids weren't listening because it is covered in school.

Vapes should never have been allowed to be sold, apart from on prescription. I can't believe this has been allowed to happen TBH.

Unfortunately teenagers are always going to be more influenced by their peers than by their teachers or parents.

When do we stop expecting schools to be parents and social moral police and undertake these things at our homes. What if schools taught that vaping was safe? Would you agree because the school said so? When I was growing up, I was taught weed was a gateway drug, addictive and dangerous. Then we are taught that it's fine. Now, it's reversing course again. When do we just accept responsibility for ourselves as a society and teach our children things within the home?

I'm not having a go at you, OP. I'm just suggesting that the school isn't the moral authority, isn't correct in all things, can't be the substitute parent etc.

We need to stop relying so much on the state and having any expectation that they should do anything beyond keeping our children safe, whilst in their custody and control, and making sure they can read, write and do maths so they can find gainful employment at the end of it all.

Check the curriculum on the school website. Then discuss again with your DC to see if it was discussed at school. Maybe they were vaping in the toilets and missed the lesson! Impress upon them that PHSE lessons are important

This is a typical mumsnet conversation.

Why isn’t XXX covered in schools
teachers: it is, in PHSE/science/ maths
My kids never learnt it, so it must not be covered

This will go round in a circle now.

Personally I don't rely on schools.
And I teach my children to inform themselves and appropriately question authority

But clearly children whose parents vape aren't going to get that lesson from them so we do need to address it in school

OP - has it occurred to you that your DC may be lying or wasn't paying attention?

Of course the health risks have been explained to them!!

As to your question why then are so many vaping if the risks have been made clear - if something is banned a lot of kids immediately want to do it! The illicitness is very appealing and kids are not as clever as they like to think they are.

When I was at school smoking was banned but that didn't stop any number behind the bike shed.

WE DO ADDRESS IT IN SCHOOLS !!!!!!!!
Are you listening at all op ?

Maybe the problem is the teenagers, much like yourself on this thread refuse to listen. You still seem adamant that schools are not already doing this.

Science teacher here.

Firstly its in the KS3 syllabus so they learn about lungs, alveoli etc... and the effect of smoking. They also learn about pregnancy and smoking and how you are starving your baby of oxygen.

They then study it again at GCSE biology.

And finally its the parents job to explain from a young age why they shouldn't smoke or vape and the effects it has on the lungs.

Vaping isn't in the curriculum yet but we do discuss it.

Also, it is probably around 10% that vape. The only ones that say higher percentages are usually part of that minority group.

Because they're allowed to make a choice. My point was "education" changes and one minute, we're taught something is harmful, the next it changes. So, the parents need to tell the children and maybe they have? We all knew smoking was harmful but how many kids did we know that snuck a fag behind the school at lunch? I just don't agree that the school is the solution.

Good point.

You are not paying attention OP. Just like your DC.

I started smoking in school. I very much knew it was bad from both my parents and school lessons. I still did it. Of course lung cancer didn’t happen to teenagers who only smoked for a short while. But then a short while turned into quite a few years. I stopped smoking when my youthful invincibility disappeared.

I wasn't a huge fan of the education my DS received at his secondary school. But the information and education they were given about smoking and drugs was first class.

He is an adult now and this was before vaping had been invented but I assume that would have been covered if it had been a thing at the time.

He would have been about 12 at the time, at a then highly rated state school in Scotland. He and his pals were actually quite taken aback that, despite the knowledge they were given, a percentage of their peers still sneaked off to buy fags. Generally the children who did this were those who had been placed at his school after being excluded from other schools and so presumably had problems in their lives already.

So yes education in schools about the dangers and effects of smoking, vapes and drugs i thiik is vital but it's inevitable it will fall on some deaf ears.

Yes I mean they let it get wildly out of control and advertised in the way that cigarettes were banned years ago?! They should never have allowed all the colourful packaging and fruit smells etc
They really dropped the ball on it.

It's really very frustrating.
I do suspect that some people believe that schools have to impart the complete lexicon of human knowledge.
School blaming is a sort of default!