Teacher mistake - how annoyed would you be?

[GruntGrunt]

DD "Alice" has just started reception. Her best friend "Jane" has the same skin, hair and eye colour as her, and is a similar height. The also sit on the same table (tables are determined by skill level).

During parents evening the teacher slipped up and referred to her as Jane. We pointed this out and the teacher apologised and corrected herself. Later in the conversation the teacher mentioned that Alice had been really good at chopping vegetables when making soup in forest school. We said we thought she'd been off sick that week but the teacher said it must have been the week before and insisted that the photos were on the ap they use.

We just checked the photos and they're of Jane!!

Am I unreasonable to be annoyed? Shall I email the teacher and if so what shall I say? She seems like a great teacher otherwise and is really lovely so I don't want to have a go at her, but this has really upset me! And who knows whether any of the other feedback she gave related to Jane instead of Alice?!

In my first year teaching I mixed up 2 children with the same name. I still cringe. One parent specifically asked about handwriting and I assured them all was fine. The next day when handing out the books I realised what a mix up is made. Still remember it 18 years on!

On the other hand my son looks so similar to his classmate both DH and I have confused them when looking out for them in pics or in assembly. Apparently the other boys parents have too. It's just life. Move on.

No it wouldn't. The Cambridge dictionary definition of racism is "harmful or unfair things that people say, do, or think based on the belief that their own race makes them more intelligent, good, moral, etc. than people of other races." Mixing up the two black kids in a class (or indeed the two blonde kids, or the two kids who are the same height, or the two kids whose names start with the letter M) is not racism.

Oh fgs. Of course she's not racist.

And I'm a teacher too. I called a boy the wrong name yesterday TWICE. I've taught him for 3 years in a row. I know his name, but sometimes I just get mixed up. He laughed. I laughed and apologised. I did it again later that lesson and we both laughed and I apologised again. We've moved on. You should too.

Some children though have taken me AGES to get to know their names. It's genuinely hard sometimes. I'd advise you to help the teacher out by sending your daughter in in something that more obviously differentiates her from the other girl - maybe a big red bow in her hair every day.

Of course it wouldn’t! 🙄 Assuming they had similar features it would be no different to two similar looking white blonde children being confused with each other. The fact that you’ve automatically jumped to that conclusion is ridiculous!

Totally agree. Utterly ridiculous.

Please don't ever be a parent at my school 🙄

As an aside, acting like "they all look the same to me, why does it matter anyway" is pretty fucking offensive.

Either way, I'd suggest you correct the teacher, and teach dc to point out the incorrect name politely.

I don't want to seem mean as I can see you are genuinely upset by this because you love your child and want her to get the best education possible. BUT, has any harm actually been done?

As a (clearly) involved and vigilant parent, I don't suppose you actively rely on feedback from the teacher to know how capable your daughter is at hand eye coordination tasks etc - I am sure you know yourself! So getting the wrong feedback about vegetable chopping has actually done no harm - and any similar slips, same applies.

It would be different if she had, say, spoken to you about a very serious and concerning incidents and it had turned out she got the wrong child. That could be worrying.

But looked at in the calm light of day, no harm has been done.

And after all, it wasn't malice or negligence, just a mistake because she reviewed photo evidence to make her verbal report, and the girls look similar. So if you complain, what can she do? Be less human and fallible? Develop better eyesight? You would probably just upset and discourage someone you say yourself is a nice teacher, and to no real ends.

It's normal to be protective when they are so small, so nobody is judging you. But if you look at the bigger picture, it's not a huge deal, and best left, I would argue.

I would be more concerned with children being seated in ability tables mere weeks into reception! Wtf?

I can understand OP, I think this really would have annoyed me when my DD was that age. But at the same time I would let it go at this stage, it's early on and there are loads of kids, just be ready to correct it if it happens again.

I look back and laugh at my husband and I both taking time off work to go to our DD preschool parent teacher.

In reception my son was easy enough to confuse with another child, similar height, build, both mixed race with curly hair, fortunately they had the same name… the teacher got lucky. More seriously, they’re only a few weeks in, if not be worried.

It could be the fact that they’re always together OP so the names sort of come as a pair in the teacher’s mind and get muddled up. I was a primary teacher for years and this was my Achilles heel with names- never mixed up kids who necessarily looked alike but if they were best friends and went everywhere together, I’d mix up the names. Sometimes, with children who bore absolutely no physical resemblance, different sexes, dramatic difference in height etc. It’s like word association, if Bob and Sue are besties then I see Bob and immediately think ‘Sue!’ just like you’d see Ant and think Dec.

Then again, I absolutely knew who was who, it was just the names that I’d occasionally get muddled (usually when trying to juggle lots of different demands in a big class). So I can’t picture telling Bob’s parents that he did something Sue actually did. I think you should gently make the teacher aware of it, she needs to be aware she’s doing it so she can make a conscious effort to make sure she knows which kid is which.

@tragichero no harm done re the veg chopping, but I'd like to be confident that the feedback she gave about phonics and maths actually relates to my child. And I'm not.

It's not the end of the world of course, but what's the point of parents evening if you don't even know whether the teacher is talking about the right child?

Am sure there wasn’t any malice behind the confusion. We are all human and make mistakes. I am rubbish with names and worked with 3 females recently who all looked the same….they were not offended that I called them the wrong names ! All white ,female but looking alike. Absolutely no wrong intentions from me at all.
Yes teacher maybe should be more careful but even teachers have a brain fart occasionally!!

That’s a big jump.
Im a teacher and I’ve had the issue of children looking similar several times: mostly it’s with fair haired blue eyed children, but I have also muddled up children with dark skin and black hair. It can be hard telling some children apart, but there are strategies you can use to make it easier. Hopefully the teacher will take steps to be able to differentiate between them now she knows it’s an issue, in the same way one would do when dealing with identical twins.

As you were worried if the rest of feedback was relevant to Alice I would ask teacher for 5 minutes chat and ask exactly this. I would say that you saw the photo and it wasn’t Alice it was her friend Jane who did vegetables. Yeah I know, they are always together. So how is our Alice? Is she settled all right?
IMO presenting it as you wanted to be sure that Alice was ok and there was no problem would be your best approach.
I would be very annoyed by the way that it’s an extra thing which needed to be addressed.
However I wouldn’t be annoyed with the teacher if Alice felt happy at school.

Thanks @undercovermarsupial , yeah I think gently making her aware of it is the right approach.

If anyone is good at writing tactful emails and can suggest wording I would be grateful!

Thanks @pizzaHeart that's helpful

It isn’t great if you don’t know how your child is getting on! I’d arrange a short chat maybe? Just to find out!

When my DS was in nursery (he's 14 now!) they had a nativity play at a different venue. DS got very upset and ended up staying behind with some other children while me and my mum went to watch the nativity at the venue, only finding out after the performance he wasn't in it.
My mum and I had been watching and taking pictures of a boy we believed to be DS dressed as a sheppard and saying how brave he was being 🤣
Don't take it to heart, we all make mistakes!

While I take your point, as a clearly involved parent you are no doubt doing lots of reading, maths etc with your child yourself, so can have confidence in yourself that you know her abilities.

I am seriously not saying this to be unkind in any way - I just think that when our children are small, we must expect to know their abilities ourselves better than their teacher, who works with a large class and has his or her attention very divided.

A lot of feedback I received about my daughter, both at nursery and in the early years of school, didn't necessarily reflect my view of her abilities. But that didn't really matter - I knew who she was and what she could do.

I realise my perspective may be an unusual one (and I am a teacher too!). Bur I am trying to say, it doesn't matter very much what the teacher thinks your child can do, at that age. All that matters is what they can do.

If you are concerned the feedback about her reading may not have been accurate, just read with her for a bit (as I don't doubt you already do) and you will very quickly get a sense of her reading capabilities.

Only someone who has never experienced racism could respond like this . . .

Did the feedback tally with your view of your DD? Feedback should never be surprising at parents evening. So if you got good feedback and you thought your DD was doing well, then it's likely accurate. If you thought she was really struggling and you were told she was doing well, it might be worth clarifying.

My grandsons have very common hairstyles. One has blond hair and the other has brown hair - I find it difficult to spot them at hometime because there are lots of other boys with the same hairstyles and dark coats with similar height and build. I often wave to let the boys know I'm waiting for them when they file out at the end of the day - but I'm often waving at the wrong child. And I should know my grandsons! Even their rucksacks are the same as other children's. It's easier to pick them out when it's colder weather as they wear hats which I've knitted.

My older granddaughter is more individual, has purple glasses, is very tall and thin and usually has a French plait - I can pick her out immediately from the rest of the class when they leave the building. She is immediately identifiable.

I think it would be unreasonable to mention this at this stage of the year. Every year I always had a class which had very similar looking pairs of children - hairstyles and the uniform really don't help.

I once had a class which had two children both called Kim. They couldn't look more similar. Same height, similar build, similar freckles, similar voice, same hairstyle - shaved with longer bleached, gelled up fringe and a long thin plait at the back. They even had indistinguishable coats. It was almost the end of the first week when I realised that one was a girl and the other a boy.

And "what's the point of parents evening" is a good question, at that age!

Personally I don't think the point of it can ever be to gain an understanding of your own child's abilities. You will always have a better understanding of that than their teacher, however good he or she is.

I think the point is to ask any questions you have about the pedagogy in the school, to get a feel for whether their teacher is a nice, sane person fit to be in charge of your child (sounds like this one is, despite her mistakes). Maybe get a few ideas for activities you can do at home to compliment the curriculum, that type of thing.

Personally I wouldn't look to it to gain an understanding of how good my child was at core skills like reading and maths. You are best placed to gain that yourself, by doing those activities with her and trusting your own judgement.

I’d hope parents understand that mixing up names (especially when I’m trying my best) is not as important as all the other stuff I know about their kids.

Well, it is if you talk and write about ‘Harry’, when you actually mean ‘Jack’!