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Primary education

Join our Primary Education forum to discuss starting school and helping your child get the most out of it.

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Original poster

4 year old told by teacher he has to come to school when he is very tired

73 replies

uzan · 12/05/2011 20:21

I kept my son at home as he had a disturbed night and woke clearly tired and not functioning well.My son came home today and informed me that his teacher has told him that he has to come to school when he is tired. I feel uncomfortable now as I as his mum judged him to be unable to cope with the school day. Has anyone here had related difficulties in managing the demands of primary school on their four year old children, and any advice for how to help young four year olds to manage in the same way as their older classmates?

OP posts:

confuddledDOTcom · 13/05/2011 20:15

Oh and we all spent the day in PJs not getting out of bed.

UnSerpentQuiCourt · 13/05/2011 21:03

I don't think a few days in reception matter tbh

I don't think a few days matter in any year. Schools take themselves far too seriously.

I am a teacher.

mrz · 13/05/2011 21:05

I depends how many you consider a few

mrz · 13/05/2011 21:08

I'm currently working with a child in Y3 who has attended school for the equivalent of 7 terms because his mum doesn't send him if he's tired or she doesn't want to get out of bed

Lonnie · 13/05/2011 21:35

Mrz there are good and bad teachers and good and bad parents. hence we are back to my point that the 2 are part of 1 whole.

dizietsma · 13/05/2011 22:16

Ugh. This whole conversation is simply reassuring me on my decision to home ed tbh.

RoadArt · 14/05/2011 00:23

"I'm currently working with a child in Y3 who has attended school for the equivalent of 7 terms because his mum doesn't send him if he's tired or she doesn't want to get out of bed"

That is so sad for the child - and I bet that the parents complain their their little darling isnt doing so well at school?

WobblyWidgetOnTheScooper · 14/05/2011 00:35

If SHE doesn't want to get out of bed? Shit. Poor kid. :(

I hate the school run sometimes, but wow.

mrz · 14/05/2011 08:43

It's very sad for the child who wants to be in school and has said on a number of occasions that he wants to stay at school when the others leave.
I'm afraid the parents have never attended a single parents evening for any of their 5 children.

mrz · 14/05/2011 08:45

but interestingly she moved the entire family into a one bedroom flat in the same street as the school to win her appeal to get the child a place preventing other children the opportunity.

WobblyWidgetOnTheScooper · 14/05/2011 09:13

"said on a number of occasions that he wants to stay at school when the others leave"

That is so so sad :( it's great when DCs love school of course, but they should look forward to going home to their family, not dread it. My DH felt like that. He was bullied in school, but it was still preferable to being at home where his mum beat him senseless each day.

Sorry, off on a tangent there... Still, it's so sad to think how much worse off this boy might be if he didn't have a caring school to go to at all.

Takver · 14/05/2011 13:11

Mrz, I think you're being a bit unfair, and equating one day off when a child was not functioning with persistently not sending a child to school.

Very fortunately dd's school used to take a very different approach, and were happy for children making the transition from half days to full days to have a term or two of part time attendance. DD spent the summer term (teh term after her fourth birthday) attending three days a week, then went properly full time in the September.

I do think there's a huge difference between keeping an older child off 'because they're tired' and recognising that school is an intense and tiring place for a four year old - very much because (nods to Feenie here) they are learning so many things, and not 'just playing'.

I'm glad that dd's school made that distinction.

mrz · 14/05/2011 13:14

I'm sure the child's mother thinks I'm unfair when I say she should bring her child to school Takver and he has missed approximately a third of each school year since he started school at age 4 so not an older child

AdelaofBlois · 14/05/2011 15:29

I'm now teaching Yr1. Pupils' levels of tiredness fluctuate daily-still significant numbers too tired before or after lunch for it to affect planning, and still at least one or two in a week who choose to nap during choosing time. And, since I've started mixing with parents as my son starts school, am more aware than ever that tiredness at school and home don't equate-there are kids who seem shattered at school whose parents assure me they won't sleep before 9, folk who are full of beans and crash at 4.30 (and both those statements are linked). And, yes, there are occasionally some so tired I really wonder whether a day in bed might not be better for them.

That's what I was hinting at earlier-that neither the OP nor the teacher really has full information to make the 'right' decision because they haven't talked. It's not about the rights of either to enforce their views on what is best for the child, it's about a gulf. Just because a parent has the unchallenged right to keep a child off school doesn't mean it's right to do so. It may be, but who knows.

This case is impossible to judge, and virgin OP may feel attacked but she should talk to the teacher. How would she feel if the teacher acted the other way, and acted in ways she felt detrimental to her DS simply because the teacher could?

sue52 · 14/05/2011 15:39

What valuable lesson is a 4 year old going to miss? It would be better to keep them home and send them in the next day fully alert. The very occasional day is a bit different from the persistent absentee. I fully agree that it is the parents responsibility to make sure the child has adequate sleep but I remember that when my girls started school there was the odd day when they were shattered.

MigratingCoconuts · 14/05/2011 16:03

you are right sue52, as long as it doesn't become habitual and the child is off every time s/he is tired....

mrz · 14/05/2011 16:27

If a child is genuinely under the weather no one is going to argue that they should be anywhere other than at home but sometimes it is very difficult to tell and I've certainly been told more than once by parents (after sending home a child) that they perked up right away and "drove me crazy" ...

AdelaofBlois · 14/05/2011 16:29

@sue52

Who knows what valuable lesson might be missed, since the decision was made without checking (or are we to assume that somehow a day at school is just less important for youngest learners-if it ain't quantum mechanics it don't signify)? And who knows whether the child couldn't take in even the lesson you think less valuable, since there was no effort made to inform the school and ask for accommodation or advice?

I'm not intrinsically against the OP, she may be right, but like mrz I'm beginning to get a sense here of parents assuming they know what goes on in schools without actually asking, of some who seem to think that Reception is just a bit like nursery with bells on, and of 'partnership' being about parents naturally knowing everything and acting in any way they have a right to. It must be nice to be so confident about knowing what is best for your child, I struggle constantly with my two and my own behaviour to them.

Talk to the teacher about DS being tired. Inform yourself about behaviour at school and about how it will be handled. Then decide.

Takver · 14/05/2011 16:36

"Reception is just a bit like nursery with bells on"

Given that in dd's school they're in the same classroom, with the same teacher/TA, and building on the same foundation stage, that isn't necessarily a wholly unreasonable assumption to make.

Of course its important, and of course no-one is saying that it is in any way right for a child to miss a third of every school year - but I don't think that's what is being talked about in the OP, and it is certainly very different from the odd day in the very early stages.

mrz · 14/05/2011 16:41

unless you realise that they have different teacher directed lessons

Takver · 14/05/2011 16:46

Clearly it is different, in the same way that reception is different from year 1, and year 1 from year 2 - but it seems to me that both are important, and that year R builds on the nursery year, as year 1 builds on reception . . .

Anyway, I'm glad that dd's school took the line that they were happy for children to make the transition to full time school at a more gentle pace, it seems that they are not the norm!

bigbumum · 14/05/2011 16:48

are you going to do that every time your child is tired over coming years?

Its probabbly ok if its just very very occasional, but not frequent.

Agree about them bieng very little at 4, my ds was only 4 in the July when he started school, was frequently tired as he didnt sleep through the night till he was 5, but i still sent him every day poor love. It never occurred to me to keep him off for being tired tbh, ill yes, but tired, no.

confuddledDOTcom · 14/05/2011 16:49

My stepson missed most of reception due to his health (several heart ops that year) and now in secondary school he is still having help to catch up, his reading is dyslexic (even though he is not) because the foundation that reception plays to reading is so vital. I am constantly reminding my daughter that she needs to keep practising what she learns in reception and how important it is because her brother is still struggling.

Please don't think reception is just for fun.

My daughter's attendance isn't brilliant, but her health has got in the way. I'd love to send her more often, I have even had to lie to her because I know she's not well enough to go in but she wants to. I have to just keep pushing the homework, words and reading so that she's not falling behind.

Interesting the difference between this thread and the similar one in AIBU.

AdelaofBlois · 14/05/2011 16:51

Whatever you think about what constitutes teaching in Early Years, the point is that the OP should talk to the school. It increasingly strikes me as bizarre that she ends with two questions-the obvious 'expert' to consult on each being not MNers but a Reception teacher who knows her child.

Whether or not this decision was right I cannot say because it's judging an individual circumstance by crude analogies, but the process of making decisions in totally avoidable ignorance is never a good idea. Above all, surely if the OP sends her child to school regularly when she needn't (since he is 4 and she was able to provide childcare), then she wants her DS in school and coping with understandable tiredness, and that is the solution to be aimed for, not having periodically to withdraw him?

mrz · 14/05/2011 17:02

I agree talk to the teacher

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