Are you allowed to enter the classroom?

[Octavia09]

The parents bring the kids to the entrance of the class room (outside) and then also collect them outside. No-one is allowed to come in unless invited to talk about your DK. Not even on Fridays. I was just wondering how other parents manage to see what is going on in the classroom. Is it a common practice or depends on a school?

Now DD is in Yr5 so probably should be capable of handing in notes. However an ed psych did say that she's got a terrible working memory and she does forget stuff 30 seconds after you tell her. She's driving me insane. I'd never go and hang her coat and bag up for her.

Our school say'we have an open door policy and parents are welcome to come into the classrooms...' (and the unspoken) '...but don't!'

I take my ds into the classroom everyday. It is chaos in the corridor and my poor dd (2) gets squashed everyday!

Y1 here with a soft start between 8.30-8.50 eeveryday and totally welcome in the class for as long (up to 8.50) or as short as we like
I love our school

We are in NZ and it has been a bit of a revelation as to how open it is over here. DD is in year 1 and I take her into the classroom most days. Its completely open door policy. I am not sure how her teacher has the patience to deal with all the Mums and Dads he must say morning too as he attempts to prepare for the day - but the man has the patience of a saint.
He knows the names of the all the little sisters and brothers that troop in as well and my youngest daughter adores him!

He also finds the time to write a class blog daily with pictures of the kids doing things in the class room and a description of what they have done during the day. Its amazing!

We have one morning a week where parents are allowed to come into the classroom for half an hour to see what the kids are doing and chat to the teacher is we want. It is a bit crowded with 30 kids, usually at least 10 parents and some extras like my own naughty 20 month old DS3 who is usually very disruptive during the register! This is just in the infants. But in the juniors parents can go in for a bit roughly once a half term after the class assembally.

I wish we could just drop them at the door!

Instead the corridors are packed with parents, children and buggies so we have to fight our way there. Then all the buggies are parked in the cloakroom areas and classroom which makes hanging up coats and getting everyone into the classroom a nightmare.

The thing that really winds me up - bearing in mind these are year 1 kids - is the morning they have P.E all the parents stay to help get their kids dressed and some do so in the corridor sitting on the floor so we all trip over them.

YOUR FUCKING KIDS ARE OLD ENOUGH TO DRESS THEMSELVES PROPERLY YOU TWATS!!

Sorry needed to get that out of my system :)

I love ds's school for many reasons and this is one of them. Ds has now started YR3. Up until the end of Keystage 1 teachers were happy with us dropping children off in classroom and were always available for "a quick word" if necessary. Of course for most this was not a daily need but if something did come up (feeling slightly off colour etc) it was really reassuring to be able to mention before passing children over into their care.

I've heard of schools cutting off the taking into schools thing after a few weeks into reception class and always been a bit I've even heard of schools which have signs up "do not approach the teacher..etc appt..bla bla bla... necessary channels etc ..." and felt more and more appreciative of our school's warm open policy. Of course all entrances to school are manned and once 9 o'clock bell goes all doors locked etc. Only entrance through office. Because of this I have dropped ds off happily.

I did begin to worry as got towards ks2, especially as all other friends' children at other schools had been dropped off at the gate for years and I'd been admitting ... well actually I still take ds into classroom.

However, from day 2 of year 3 he has confidently left me at the door and trotted in happily to hang own coat up etc etc. If needs be however I know I can still pop into classroom with him first thing to have that "quick word"

It works very very well. Happy settled children. Happy settled mummies.

nikki1978

For the first 3 weeks DS used to go for 1/2 a day. Parents could come inside for a few minutes for a quick help. I then noticed that only grannies helped their granchildren to take their shoes off and change them for plimsoles or sleepers. My asked me to help him with his shoes and the teacher said "no". She knows that he can perfectly do it himself.
Because we drop the kids at the door there is only about 5-10 min for the teacher to greet all the parents while letting the kids in. Usually we spend about 3-5 min for the DS to reach the door sometimes even less.

Recepion and preschool parents can drop off in classroom. It's horrible, as there are up to 44 children at a session and the whole thing is crowded and can be traumatic for some preschoolers in particular (shared unit)

Yes