Water bottles available in school...?

[Anonymousbird]

A common complaint at our school is that the children come out at 3 absolutely gasping. I know they have access to water at various points through the day, but not sure they are "made" to drink IYSWIM. there are also fountains in the playground.

A parent has suggested water bottles being available all day in their classrooms. Her idea is that these would need to be allocated/filled/taken back to the kitchen each day for filling by teachers in the infants (juniors should be able to do this themselves on a rota basis). I think we would need to name the bottles or somehow differentiate them to avoid too much cross contamination.

I am in a position to bring some influence to bear on the subject and am in agreement that some solution to them not drinking enough needs to be found.

What arguments am I going to come up against from the school (because I know I will!) Clearly there is the cost of the bottles (one off), then the cost of loading, washing and drying for the following day by one of the kitchen staff (presumably).

Does anyone else have experience, good or bad, of such a scheme in their school and how it worked/what objections there might have been?

Thanks

We keep the children's own water bottles in a box in class for use (usually) at playtime. I have two in the box at the moment, growing mouldier by the day. These will be thrown in the bin very soon, and then there will be none.
Personally, I think a drink before school, at break, at lunch and possibly during the afternoon is ample for any growing brain.

I have a theory that the human body can survive a maximum of one hour and 40 minutes without a drink.

My two take their own bottle most days - sometimes they tell me not to bother, and sometimes we take the bottles and they come back just as full as they were when they went in.

Like others, it's water only, and they stay in a tray in the classroom. Not sure if the chidlren are encouraged to drink, or if it's left up to them (Yr R, so getting a sensible answer out of them is impossible at the end of the school day)

I do not think, OP, that you should even suggest to the school that water bottles should be the teacher's responsibility. I certainly know what my response would be if it were to be suggested that I might like to add washing, drying and re-filling 30 water bottles to my list of jobs.

Me too, eviltwins! Anyway, I'm much too busy hoovering the classroom and dusting the whiteboard to have time to clean and fill water bottles.

When I was in reception (so, 1989/90 - that sounds longer ago than it seems!) we each had a washed out yogurt pot in our drawer, and we could help ourselves to water to drink from that - we had to drink by the sink, wash out our pot, dry it and put it away back in our drawer.

Could something like that work? Maybe not a yogurt pot, but something that can't be used to store water as it gradually goes manky, and cheap enough to chuck out if need be, and just grab a new one.

Ok, there is a lot in here for me to work into a short argument in favour.

But thanks to all for your contributions.

It sounds like we are in the minority NOT having water bottles (whether bring from home or provided by school) available.

Here goes....

We have melamine cups. Some year 6s go round and collect them at the end of the day, and load the dishwasher. The cleaner switches it on. The monitors hand them out at the beginning of the day. Each classroom has a sink and there are some cold water fountains dotted around as well.

I really don't think bottles are the most hygienic things. I like our cup system.

These schools that put them in the dishwasher at the end of the day - how many pupils do you have? 20? Or does each class have a dishwasher?

lol at kitchen staff dealing with the bottles, it will be the TAs job - you can count on it!

Give the parents the responsibility of buying the bottles, filling them and making sure their dcs bring them home at night. Just specify a spill-proof lid.

We have school provided bottles and it has been an organisational nightmare. 2 years into the project we have some sort of order. It involves year 5/6 children arriving at school by 8.30am to fill them all. They are sterilised (no space in dishwasher to do 500 water bottles, kitchen staff would have nothing to do with this!) by the school housekeeper once a week. I think the children are drinking more water and they like having their own bottles, previously we had jugs and cups in each class. However for any scheme to work you are going to need school on side and at least one adult, probably more than one, to organise some kind of system.

My year 2 children bring their own drinks each day; I would like to have a water-only policy but the school doesn't specify. The bottles are taken home every night and are a mixture of bought flasks and disposable plastic.

Personally, I agree with the posters who wonder whether a child can really be that dehydrated between breakfast and break (max 2 hours), break and lunch (1.5 hours), lunch and afternoon break (1.5 hours) and afternoon break and home (an hour). The bottles drive me mad as they are frequently spilled, even though they have caps, and the wet tables makes the work wet. There is also an awful lot of fussing over refilling and taking an age to have a drink during the lessons.

Any disposable bottles which don't go home at the end of the day go in the bin, as I get sick of looking at them.

If I was asked to take any kind of responsibility at all for these bl**dy bottles I would refuse point blank - I am paid to educate.

There are also related issues with the children being on the loo all day too....

teachers don't have time to do that - why don't the parents do it and send their kids with it every day

how odd that you think a teacher should clean and fill 30 bottles of water is this before or after teaching and every other duty?

It all stemmed from some pseudo-scientific nonsense at the beginning of the 2000s about brain hydration and academic performance. Funny that it coincided with the meteoric rise in sales of bottled water.

I have stopped providing water bottles for my DCs and asked them to use the water fountains or jug. I don't think that it is possible to get a sports cap clean - I mean properly clean, after a couple of weeks of light use. I am a bit OTT but I have dissected the (inside of the inside of the) cap on occasions to find a tiny sliver of that spotty slimy stuff which has been impossible to remove without scratching the plastic (also a problem in itself). I have seen that DDs friends water bottles are often filthy by my standards. I have a glass bottle with a metal screw top and I am toying with the idea of trying it out given that we are now almost in Spring.. However it is likely to be vetoed as glass is probably considered unsafe (by the infants' school at least). I have used the BPA free bottles but the caps are usually plastic in every case. I am also considering stocking up on mineral water in small plastic bottles so that I can chuck them away every day (wasteful, unhealthy and expensive)

Parents send in their own water bottle, filled that morning. Kids take them home.

The big 2 have always taken in their own water bottles that they can fill up from the tap or cups have been left by a tap for anyone to use.

I know in dd2's nursery class, they have recently stopped using water bottles and have a stack of tumblers that the children use at snack time and can use throughout the session too. I assume the change is because tumblers are easier to clean?

I remember getting really thirsty at primary school. We used to fold paper towels into makeshift cups - had to drink really fast before it soaked through.

At our school the kids can take squash or water.The drinks bottles are kept on atray by the sink and the kids can drink whenever they want (within reason) but only in that area which is well away from books etc.
I think some schools are ridiculously petty and treat parents in a condescending way wrt drinks .By the way pouring away kids drinks is technically illegal

At DC's school, children get given a water bottle in Reception (although DS joined in year 1 so never got one). Water bottles live in the classroom and are taken in on Mondays and come back on Fridays. DD's generally full and DS's empty. Not sure when they get filled during the week or if they are encouraged to drink. Will ask them tomorrow.

Oh err princess party "By the way pouring away kids drinks is technically illegal". I?ll remember that next time I empty and rinse out all the left behind lunch bottles and boxes on a Friday evening so they don?t go mouldy over the weekend!
The water bottles I throw out are unnamed and unclaimed. I find it amazing how many parents send in brand new bottles of water every day, without a name. If I don?t throw them out we?d end up with a mountain of them on every work surface possible! Reminders to the children, notices on doors, reminders in newsletters and loud reminders to the children so parents hear when they are leaving don't seem to solve the problem. But then I do seem to have a class that struggle to organise themselves and parents that don't mind if water bottles get lost.

pouring away kids drinks is technically illegal?

not if it's school policy that no drinks other than water crisps or sweets are to be brought into school it's not

Illegal?
Well, would you rather we confiscated the drink breaking school rules and phoned you to bring in an alternative bottle of water?
The parent is the one breaking the rules, but if that's the road you want to travel...

Post them back without a stamp.
Have a sad face Fruit shoot bottle poster at the school gate to name and shame the juvenile delinquents with their illegal substances.
Ban bottles and stick with water fountains and lunchtime drinks?
The possibilities are endless, as they say.

Report parents for child neglect when their Beloved Child catches a vile disease from swigging water or squash that is three months old and green.

..'By the way pouring away kids drinks is technically illegal'...

?? Who's been pouring away kids' drinks?

Some of these posts sound like people are living somewhere without running water. Most, if not all schools in the UK, have water fountains, and all children have a drink at lunchtime. The children are not suffering.

IMO it is impossible to run a class where children have free access to drink bottles. It creates disturbance and impedes the learning of the whole class. Children who need a drink in the middle of maths are just wanting a bit of diversion and a few minutes timewasting - there is no rhyme or reason to get up in the middle of a lesson. I don't mind them having their own bottles to drink from at breaktimes, although personally I think it is unnecessary as we have water fountains.

In fact, the children leave their bottles in a tray all week - by Friday the water is stagnant. I throw away the stagnant water after a few days.