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?!

No, it would be unconscious bias, which is not racism.

Racism would be an active decision to call all white children Jane and all black children Alice.

So just so im clear

Confusing two similarly looking white girls (same height, eye colour, hair colour) is a simple mistake but confusing two non white girls (same height, eye colour, hair colour) is checks notes...underlying racism.

Is it any wonder teachers are utterly fucking fed up.

It's not a job though, it's a school and you're a few weeks in.
Nothing major depends on using a wrong name at parents evening.

All this hyperbole.

In a job you would likely be one of a few new starters, unlikely to be all wearing the same outfit, unlikely to be all the same age, unlikely to be getting a payrise six weeks in.

I worked in a school and often got two kids mixed up!

It happens. I get my own kids mixed up!

I have twins boy/girl and a teacher once told me how much girl enjoyed gardening club - she didn’t do gardening club boy did!

She was more surprised than I was!!

We often had school reports mixed up as well.

Will it matter in a years time? Probably not!

WTF is a racism card? Either explain yourself in a way that is not racist, or save yourself the time concocting a mealy-mouthed response and stop using this term

The only concern if have in terms of OP is how the teacher doubled down and showed photos! I'd be worried the wrong child might end up marked present/absent. You'd know about that though OP, because tone of you would get a call to explain the absence.

I'm a teacher and I'm terrible at faces. It's particularly bad when looking at photos. I could tell you who was who when they were in front of me, but with a photo I would regularly get it wrong.

Im a teacher and I’m afraid I still don’t quite feel confident with all the pupils’ names yet. Mind you, there are a lot more of them to learn in secondary. It’s very usual to end up with a couple of similar looking children that you find tricky to distinguish. Even trickier if they’re together a lot.

I didn’t say go straight to the head, did I? Please read before commenting. I was a Nursery Nurse for 10 years, this wouldn’t be acceptable and parents would complain.

The irony in all of these posts is that most posters are assuming that they're white, presumably due to their names.

Which is also unconscious bias (again, different to racism).

Try having identical twins like I did - the teachers were still getting them wrong at 16!

What did irritate me though was on leaving their junior school they were put together in the leavers montage rather than given an individual "slot". Don't get me started on the rest of it - teachers favouritism at its finest as well as unkind comments about some in the name of comedy - very uncomfortable viewing and I still haven't been able to watch it back after 14 years. The guy never made "head" for a reason.

What a ridiculous comment. Looking for racism where none exists

Is this a state school?
Seating on ability tables six weeks into reception is ridiculous (it's not best practice in any year group) and I'm pretty sure adverbs are introduced in KS1, not EYFS.

I understand not wanting conflict, but you do need feedback on your own child.

I have no idea on your work arrangements but is there a way you can email and ask for a chat at the end of the school day, when your child is with you.

You dont really need to say 'because I have zero confidence you knew who you were talking about' you can just say 'you'd like more onfo about phonics and maths because it was unclear at parents eve and you have further questions'

I guess you need to ask yourself what exactly you want to achieve by complaining?

Do you want the teacher to feel bad? She already does.

Do you want her to not make the same mistake again. That's already her plan.

As a teacher of 20 odd years, I've definitely done this more than once. In the year 4 class I teach regularly, there are 2 similar looking boys who I regularly mix up. I find myself double-checking every time and am annoyed with myself every time I do it!

I can promise you that this teacher will be kicking herself with embarrassment over this mistake and will be very aware of it going forwards! Give her a chance to redeem herself.

Exactly, it’s worrying the teacher can’t tell them apart. It’s important for parents to understand their child’s progress and mixing them up can obviously cause all sorts of problems.

At primary school my daughter was one of 2 mixed Asian/caucasian girls in a class full of Caucasian kids, and was often called by the other girls name by the TA, though don't recall the teacher herself ever getting it wrong. It definitely happens, but agree you need to know that the feedback on the academic tasks is for the right child.

But what would you expect this head to do? I know what you mean I'm a nursery nurse too but IME that's slightly different because I never had 30 new starters every September and parents are paying for nursery and there's are more staff in a nursery room. It's not quite the same.
Yes some parents would complain but not all of them. As a nursery nurse I thought you'd have more sympathy for me teacher

Im not talking about alice and jane, im asking that poster to unpack her post further, would confusing two white girls also be underlying racism?

Also, i dont think you know what irony means

Sometimes kids really do look similar, pair of boys looked like twins in year 7 - not related at all. Looked totally different by year 11.

I'm not a teacher, but was a regular classroom helper when our younger DC were in primary school. In one class, there were two boys whom I could only reliably tell apart by looking at them from behind, as I had noticed that 'A' had a clockwise 'whorl' to his hair, 'B' anticlockwise. It was much easier when one of them broke his leg and was in a cast for a few weeks.

DS1 had friends (girls) in his drama group who were identical twins. They moved to a new school for sixth form, with some classes in common, and to be helpful, styled their hair differently from each other. Only sometimes they would swap...

OP people on this thread are pretending to be dim, you obviously wouldn’t mind a slip up but this is not what happened. You got given the wrong feedback for your child. It’s important you nip this in the bud now. Could you ask the teacher at the next pick up and say what you’ve said here basically and that you are not annoyed, mistakes happen etc but that you just want to make sure you got the right feedback. It’s also unfair that the other girl probably didn’t get the feedback she deserved regarding forest school.

I seemed to always find a couple of children in classes I taught who I confused, I'd tell them 'I confuse a couple in every class, this year, you're that lucky pair!'. They've only been in school a few weeks, give it time.

Ditto.
I teach in an inner city primary. A wide range of ethnicities, skin colours, languages and abilities.
3 blond boys one year - always got names mixed up. I am same ethnicity. Now I wonder if I was racist?

This year I have 2 girls I keep swapping names for: one mixed race, one white. Look very different, names very similar. I apologise, they laugh, they know I know who they are. It’s a mix up. Never realised it might be perceived as racist.

Sometimes they call me Mr DarrellStClares rather than Miss. Or Mum.

It’s just a mix up. A mistake. An error.

To err is human, to forgive, divine. Choose divine.

Maybe you and others can stop squeezing 'racism' into every situation.

Jesus F#ck... Is it any wonder teachers are leaving in droves?

No, it's not racism. It's something psychologists called 'cross-race effect' where people of all races find it easier to recognize people of their own racial or ethnic groups.