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

My children's teachers seem to cope just fine with children drinking in lessons, so I'm curious why you feel this is impossible.

Make clear bottles available for sale - we have really good ones that are £1.20 each. They are the responsibility of the parents. Our children are allowed to take any drink that isn't fizzy, but if you aren't keen on this, any bottle with juice in can be confiscated, returned at the end of the day and meanwhile replaced with a very babyish tellytubbies 'school bottle' to fill with water. I guarantee you the children will only try this once ...

Why do they have to have water bottles at their DESKS though? In my day such a thing would have been completely unheard of.

By all means have them in the classroom, but why can't they have a break every half hour or hour where they are allowed to swig from the bottles, then replace them in a box and get on with the lesson?

If water bottles are allowed, then they should be at their desks. Much more of a logistical nightmare to stop every hour and let groups of children find their bottle in a box.

Sorry Oldbatteryhen. I know that you are envisaging that this would be a problem. What I'm saying is that in fact, in practice, it isn't. And maybe that's because when the water bottles are always there, they just become, well, normal ordinary things. Children don't become over excited at having access all day to pens and paper and books and colouring pencils...or water bottles.

I'm allowed to have a glass of water on my desk that I can drink from when I like. Heck, how would you feel if you switched the kettle on and a little voice said 'sorry, coffee time was 5 minutes ago. Come back in 25 minutes'.

Yes, you could make the children wait. But why bother?

Well - I guess it depends whether they are proving to be a distraction while on the desks or not. If the children are messing around with their bottles rather than getting on with the lesson, then they shouldn't be allowed to have them on their desks, surely?

ROFL at bosch. That is what happens to me! I am a science teacher, I cannot drink in my room, and by the time I make a coffee at break the bell has gone and I get a couple of gulps. Or, like today, I am on duty and go from 8.20 to 1.00 with nothing to drink. The students are better off than me

I thought it was standard practice everywhere for children to take their own water bottles in. DD takes in a bottle of fresh water every day and brings it home every evening to be washed.

As Zettle box says:

at our school the parents send the kids in with a water bottle each day. Water bottle kept in classroom, sent home, rinsed sent in again. No overhead for teaching staff who have better things to do with their time than wash 30 water bottles.

But I did have a problem with DD (yr 1) as she thought she wasn't allowed to get her water bottle out of her lunch box (where I'd put it as one less thing to carry). She got sent home from school one afternoon with a tummy ache and was miraculous better when she got home and had a drink.

So I had a word with her teacher and teacher explained to the whole class that they could get there water from there lunch boxes and have a drink at any time.

That seems to have solved our problems.

Could the teachers be involved in this way?

In the class roon they have a square plastic box thing or the drinks to be kept in to minise spilling, in reception they had a tray on the side.

Ok, I have a very clear view on this as my daughter HAS to drink water at school because of a kidney condition.

Can't really see what the problem is re parents providing bottles filled with WATER only, so their kids can drink from them during the day (parents who want their kids to drink juice can always add a juice carton to their lunch bag/school bag for drinking at lunch/break).

But I agree that is the parent's responsibility to get their kids to bring the bottles back home at the end of the day as water left for a few days will start to attract bacteria and it is not a teacher's responsibility!

Why water? WHO studies have proven hydrating children with this throughout the school day DOES help think and learn better. Also water is best in a practical, as well as a health, sense as it is far easier to mop up water than sticky juice.

However, this staying hydrated rule only works though if teachers remind the kids to drink at regular intervals... before breaks, and before and after lunch is my suggestion. Unfortunately this doesn't happen in my youngest daughter's case, and if she was the one with the kidney condition she would be very ill indeed (she drinks like a sparrow at trhe best of times...). [hmmm]

when my son was in first school he kept getting urine infections and ended up having to have an op because of it, he hardly drinks but the teachers even when told he had an infection would never let him use the loo or remind him to drink he used to come home with water bottle full and his juice from lunch full , wasnt happy had to pay for the operation or stay on a 6 month waiting list he was in agony and unable to pee at all in the end still he was told had to wait on the list he would have been in A&E if id just left it, he lost half a year of school as he was ill all the time and when he had the op the HT kept complaining whens he comming back every time i saw her he was only off three weeks considering he couldnt walk after it poor things willy was black like a over ripe banana

MADDABOUTTHEBOY2000 you have my utmost sympathy because that's exactly what happened to my daughter. She was off for half a term with repeated urinary infections in her first year because of a generally unsupportive teacher who, despite being given letters from the GP/Consultant explaining why she needed to drink/visit the loo regularly, just didn't "get it".

This was despite me and hubby going in to see the head twice after repeated bouts of her being sick (seeing your child fighting a fever and lying on the sofa screaming in pain isn't nice...) to stress just how important it was that she be allowed to go to the toilet whenever she needed to (even if it was "inconvenient" to the teacher or two minutes before a break) and being encouraged to drink her water was (she was only 5 at the time, so she really needed the teacher's help and encoragement!).

What really effed me off though re: this teacher was the fact we provided clean water cups every day so she didn't even have to fill them up herself! And, as a result the specialist was threatening to put her back onto a daily prophylactic does of antibiotics and get her to have more nuclear imaging scans (not a good prospect either way).