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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

Parents expected in primary school during the day - can’t do it!

86 replies

Komersantka · 30/10/2019 16:47

My daughter is in first year of primary school, husband and I work with quite a commute. The school appears to be run by a clique of mums who are around all day - they organise massage afternoons where the kids get to try out massage skills on their parents, and they did a daytime thing for Halloween last week where the kids paraded and parents clapped. I can’t really take time off for things like this. My little girl has been complaining that she and another girl are the only ones who’s mums aren’t there. The other girls mum is in the same boat. I’m not sure why parents need to be constantly at the school. Anyone else in the same boat? I’m thinking all I can do is just say to the class teacher - look, I’ll make these things if I’m off, but by default it’s a no, and just try and build my daughters resilience to it. I’ve literally no choice at all on this.

OP posts:

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57Varieties · 30/10/2019 18:54

I don’t go to sports day. An hour, in the Middle of the day, and often cancelled due to weather. Nah.

ArnoldBee · 30/10/2019 18:59

I know the feeling well. We worked out what events there would in the infants and over the course of those 3 years we have attended 1 of everything between us.

tabbiemoo · 30/10/2019 19:04

I'm a full time teacher and can never make any of my kids' daytime events - concerts, assemblies, parades, awards events, matches, even sports day. Teaching is not a flexible job and my head is not very understanding on this. It has really upset me (and them) a few times but my kids are generally used to it. As they are getting older more events happen after school which helps.

GameSetMatch · 30/10/2019 19:07

My sons school do things like this all the time, I’m fairly friendly with another Mum who works so i go for both our children I clap and cheer for her son and make things with him. Last year I couldn’t make the carol concert but told my son that his friends mum will be watching him and she’s will take pictures for me, he was quite happy with that. Can you team up with another mum and share the ‘duties’

GothMummy · 30/10/2019 19:08

I have always been at work, but made a commitment to attend every school play. Their father attends sports days. That's it!

Cuddlysnowleopard · 30/10/2019 19:09

I also work roughly school hours.

I could never ever get to morning events (assemblies, reserve sports days, shared reading etc). I just told the dcs that work was important, that we were a team as a family, and that I had to go to work, like they went to school.

My 15 year old announced last week that he'd been thinking about families, and that he thinks we got it right. I asked what he thought of me missing some school stuff when they were small, and he said he used to be secretly proud that I was at work.

It's all about how you explain it to them.

EggysMom · 30/10/2019 19:18

I wouldn't mind taking leave to attend these events if the school gave me sufficient notice; but our son's school has a habit of sending the invitations out just three days beforehand. That's no good to me, no good to my employer.

For one year there was a decent KS lead at our son's school who appreciated that I work, organised the dates of all events at the start of each term, and sent me an email with the details. I made it to every invited even that year. Unfortunately for me, but fortunately for her, she was far too good to remain at that school and took promotion to another school the following year. So now I'm back to three days notice and missing everything.

EggysMom · 30/10/2019 19:19

Weirdly though, they've given us six months notice of a residential weekend for our son that'll cost £100 ...

57Varieties · 30/10/2019 19:24

High school is better but then I got less than a week’s notice my son was getting awards at prize giving last session. I suppose they don’t know who is getting the awards til near the end of term though. At least it was on my day off

LittleLongDog · 30/10/2019 19:26

You’re not expected, you're invited.

If you can’t make it then you can’t make it. I get that you don’t want your dc to feel left out though.

DippyAvocado · 30/10/2019 19:33

I'm a primary school teacher in a different school to my DC so I don't go to any of the daytime events
If they ever say anything, I ask if their staff are allowed time off to go to their kids' school events.

Sotiredbutcannotsleep · 30/10/2019 19:34

I'm a new school mum too but a SAHM and I've been wondering how working parents attend all the different activities (normally in the middle of the day so no chance of popping in before/after work). I'm on a WhatsApp group though with plenty of working mums and we just feedback what was said with photos of handouts/slides etc

BingPot99 · 30/10/2019 20:17

I work in a school which does quite a few daytime events throughout the year. We run so many so that more parents are likely to be able to go to at least one. It's not expected though. We could possibly give more notice sometimes but we are human, schedules or staffing levels can change at short notice. We know the parents work and can't necessarily get time off.

CottonSock · 30/10/2019 20:23

I do about one thing a term. Christmas, sports day etc. I missed sports day last year and my 5 yo dd said 'don't worry mummy it's only 3 races anyway'. Bless her maturity.

MirkwoodMiss · 30/10/2019 20:50

Don't do it then! No one should be telling you what to do. It's entirely your decision . Just like it was my decision to cut my hours, turn down promotion and be entirely skint for years so that I could be more involved in DS childhood years. It's a choice and that is yours.

waspfig · 30/10/2019 22:03

Schools can't win though can they? We invite people in and get judged for inviting you in. If we don't have parent events then we can get accused of not having good relationships with parents.

Exactly this.

There are always parents asking for more events or wanting to be more involved. My school run events at different times in the day/different days of the week in the hope that parents can make it to some of them.

As a teacher with young DC I know I would miss all my DCs school events, whilst looking after other people's children (one of many reasons I'm planning my escape).

tashkent · 30/10/2019 22:32

Also agree that schools can't win. At my son's school we have a vocal minority of parents who complain bitterly about the amount of daytime events. There are difficulties in running evening events - teachers can't be directed to attend, and they're already working in the evenings to get their marking, planning etc done. Still, the school had a really good go at doing some evening events over a year or so. Nobody came. Clashed with bedtime, them or partner working late and couldn't/wouldn't get babysitter, or just couldn't be arsed, who knows? But they had about three parents at any given event (often the SAHPs, not the WOHPs who'd complained), plus a load of fed up teachers, so they went back to daytimes when they get a fantastic turnout. It means I can't often go to stuff, but that's life.

Sotiredbutcannotsleep · 30/10/2019 22:43

It's really sad to hear from all the teachers on here about missing all their DC's school events whilst staging events for other DC's parents, I'd never considered this before

amy85 · 30/10/2019 22:49

I work in a school so have missed pretty much every event for the last 4 years....my youngest starts primary school next September and I probably will miss dropping her off for that too (I'll either have to drop her off at 8am at morning club or ask my mum to take her)

64sNewName · 30/10/2019 22:54

It does feel like there are way too many events at our primary; and when I do take time off work to attend, some of them just seem to be slightly half-arsed box-ticking exercises.

It sets up a lot of children for disappointment because both their parents work, and primary children don’t always recognise that parents are “invited, but not expected” - they just notice that you don’t come, and other parents do.

I go to probably 30 per cent of them. The main ones. Fewer, but better-thought-out events for parents would be my wish.

SophieRay · 30/10/2019 23:18

If it makes you feel any better OP I work full time and DD is now 12, I've explained to her that my working enables her to do the dancing classes she wants/the nice clothes she wants etc. It's just me and her. I simply can't do everything a non working mum would do. This weekend I said to her I do the best I can and her response was 'yes and your best is awesome' so even though in my mind it is still not good enough she obviously realises that by working she has a better life.

paddlingwhenIshouldbeworking · 30/10/2019 23:35

Do you have any friends who attend ? I'm not working now but when I did a friend used to take some pictures of my DC1 or DC2 so we could look at them together at home and they would pass a little note to them from me telling them I hope they enjoyed whatever it was and I can't wait to see them when they get home. If they couldn't read it would be a picture and smiley face. Seemed to work fine.
They were never the only children who's parent couldn't make it. The bigger ones like Nativity, class assembly & sports day either DH or I would always go (never both).

Kokeshi123 · 31/10/2019 04:52

What mini pie said. How much actual work are they doing at this school!?

Mummyoflittledragon · 31/10/2019 05:12

Maybe send an email to the teacher talking about inclusion. Schools do not like children to feel excluded. Ie you are unfortunately unable to attend events and it is having an impact on your dd, who feels excluded. Ask the teacher to create events, where children, who are not represented are assigned to a friend’s parent to make her feel more included. When dd was younger, they did this with Father’s Day. Dh went in and was given a couple of dds friends to work with.

OhioOhioOhio · 31/10/2019 05:30

That's a great response from pp up the thread.

'How much time are the teachers allocated to attend their children's school events?'

I'm a teacher and I can't stand the bloody massage, let us meet and discuss everything brigade.

There are plenty of decent things to feel guilty about. Try and feel relieved that you have a decent reason not to go.

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