4 year old freezing cold at school

[Owlsoutsidethewindow]

Just wondering if anyone would say something to school.
Temperatures are currently around -2c on average where I live. Yesterday DS (4, reception) came out of school looking upset. I asked what was wrong and she said she was cold. She had literally just walked out of a heated classroom.

As the hour went on, what had transpired is that she asked to go indoors or home at lunch time because she was freezing. She was wearing a vest, uniform, jumper, thick parka, earmuffs and gloves. The teacher was dismissive.
She doesn't generally run around when it is that cold because she knows the ground will be icy.

She then said she was cold all afternoon. She was physically cold to the touch when I felt her. No fever etc.
She didn't warm up until she had a bath, then she went to bed with fleecy PJs and a hot water bottle because she felt miserable.

Should I ask the school to make a warm area available for her to go to in these sorts of temperatures? It wouldn't surprise me at all if she was ill today when she woke up.
She probably also has the onset of a cold because 4 people in her class have been off this week, so playing out in freezing temperatures probably isn't ideal.

OP, I put boots with fluffy socks on my kids when it's below freezing. They aren't uniform but one has pulled me up on it yet. A lot of school shoes just aren't warm enough. Maybe try that?

But *no one has pulled me up on it yet

Your question is should they have access to warm spaces - the answer is likely to be that they don't have enough staff to supervise. Also I worked in a school and know that you'd have children who would never go out, children who would never be in (and would be the ones running round outside flinging off their coats and jumpers with a lunchtime assistant chasing after them yelling, "Put your coat ON!") and a multitude of children who would be in, then want to go out, then want to be back in, then want to go out again but waah they can't find one of their gloves and actually they need the toilet but oh they can't get their tights back up and now they can't find their hat and in the meantime another two children in the warm space are squabbling over the red felt tip and someone else has gone back outside without their coat on at all and another child comes in with Mrs Bloggs because they've fallen on the yard so can you do first aid in here because there's now not enough adults outside so Mrs Bloggs needs to go back out... and so on. So pleased I don't work in that field anymore!

My child was one of them. His sensory needs meant they made reasonable adjustments. You wouldn't have known he had any SEND needs if you didn't know him personally, just that he was wearing slightly different clothes to school. Stop judging children!

So a lace up sturdy shoe is permitted then

So you did lie.

I doubt many 4 year olds can tie laces but I'd assume from that policy that an enclosed black leather velcro shoe would be fine too.

What sort of shoes have you bought for her, @Owlsoutsidethewindow ?

Something like this would be warm and grippy

https://www.clarks.com/en-gb/lune-flex-kid/26176659-p

It says boys but came up when I filtered girls shoes. I presume you don’t need to have a penis to be able to wear them.

My littlest is a really skinny, not a pick of fat on her to keep her warm and feels the cold very badly. I have thermals under her uniform - a ski base layer I think it is called. I also have thermal hiking socks and waterproof hiking shoes on her. If she is always cold I think it’s fine to ask a teacher if she can be sat beside a radiator. Mine is allowed to wear a fleece in the classroom because she would be shaking like a leaf coming in from the playground.

I'm bailing on this thread because I'm now being told I've lied about shoes. When the discussion was around if she can wear boots.

4 year olds can't really tie laces.

Thanks for everyone who has made helpful suggestions.

Shinyandnew a friend had these for their daughter and was told they're trainers.

Shinyandnew a friend had these for their daughter and was told they're trainers.

What are the boys wearing? What's the school going to do about a 4 year old child wearing black leather shoes from the school shoe range? Put them in isolation? Send your child in warm sensible shoes and write a strongly worded email if anything is said to the child.

Well I was using short hand for enclosed, not open, not strappy sarah jane type shoes which are low at the sides. An all enclosed, sturdy shoe with whatever fastenings the specific child can manage

OP specifically said that only the boys are allowed to have enclosed shoes.

OP specifically said that only the boys are allowed to have enclosed shoes.

I would ask for a meeting with the head to discuss that-there is no reason why girls can’t also wear enclosed shoes; particularly if they are getting cold feet.

My friend broached a similar issue recently at a school where they were told her son couldn’t wear a stud earring. Girls were allowed and the policy states a single stud earring was permitted. The head said that nobody had actually challenged the policy before with a boy, but they were completely right to do so and backed down.

The OP has backtracked though and said the policy says no trainers or boots, not no enclosed shoes.

The OP has backtracked though and said the policy says no trainers or boots, not no enclosed shoes.

If the school is saying that Clarkes enclosed black school shoes are trainers, then I’d be asking them to clarify exactly what they were allowed to wear in winter.

It says in the description that they are trainers.

This may seem a silly question but is the classroom actually warm? I teach primary and the school that I worked in last year was so broke that we no longer turned the heating on during the day.

The caretaker came in at 7am and switched it on for an hour, then it was turned off and the room with the controls was locked and we had no way of switching it back on. Despite being told not to, I did let parents of my children know. I was wearing fingerless gloves in the classroom and sitting with a heated blanket when working after school.

This is exactly the state of affairs in my classroom and school currently. We are not allowed the heating on. I am very cold after school and have bought ‘Claudia style’ arm warmers for working after hours!

I have moved to a school that’s still maintained by the Local Authority. We have heating… and glue sticks. When I was in an academy school, we had nothing - not even loo roll in staff toilets.

I can't think what the boys are wearing then. Almost all velcro shoes to fit a four year old are 'trainer' style.