Year 7+ - does your child have a coat for school?

[Madmog]

Does anyone else's child have a winter coat/waterproof for school? Most of the local kids don't seem to have a coat here.

My daughter seems happy enough to have one, and I'm happy to get her one that fits over her blazer, especially after her friend arrived at our house having walked 20 mins in heavy rain with her blazer drenched and blouse wet. Other than the dinnerhall/corridors they don't have anywhere to go during bad weather at lunchtimes so are hanging around outside at lunchtime.

Mine do as they have to wait at the bus stop and dd in particular feels the cold.

No, it seems that wearing a coat is social death! hats, gloves and scarves are fine but never a coat even when there is snow on the ground

Yes.
I live in Canada.
They also wear snow pants, although only below about -25. And mittens.

Yes, but she won't wear it! Wears a hoody on the way to school, if cold, and then shoves it in her bag on arrival.

Both DSs do (Y7 and 9). And yes, they wear them.

My DD goes to high school next September and I'm hoping to find her a thing but warm coat which she can fit into her bag. The reason the kids around here don't wear coats is because there is nowhere to keep them once they are in school and carrying a big coat around isn't cool or practical.

I'm amazed so many parents let their dcs not wear coats! Yes they're at secondary school now, yes they're growing up and not babies any more but they are still children!

I bought my dd a plain black coat from Gap. But at the moment it's still warm enough for her blazer.

What are these non coat wearers going to do when it snows? I wish parents would put their foot down, everyone wears a coat so it not so socially unacceptable.

I see the non coat wearers walking past my house in the snow, still not wearing coats. They must be soaked by the time they get to school, then have to sit in damp clothes all day.

We allow them not to wear them because they vanish. DD1 did wear a nice warm sensible fleece in the coldest bit of winter.
Then in Feb it vanished for 3 months and then it reappeared in tutorial.

She'd looked for it and she works in lost property sometimes. It must have gone home with someone.

Understandably she doesn't take her nice waterproof just a cheap brolly.

I have a battle to get a coat on my year 5 never mind year 7. I do insist if it is actually chucking it down. But yesterday he went in without one, and got soaked coming home.

carrying a big coat around isn't cool or practical.

Funny how we all managed to carry a winter coat around school with us. Bless this poor incapable generation of children...

I never carried my coat around school; I had a peg and a locker and a desk with storage .Also the distance I had to walk
between lessons was nothing compared to the size of modern school campuses.

I really worry about what we are doing to young people's backs making them carry all this stuff.

Dancergirl how do you propose parents do that though? You can't walk to school with them and force them to keep a coat on. If they're cold they'll have to learn to put up with it or else succumb to a coat, but short of recommending strongly that they wear one, you can't manhandle a secondary school child into a garment!

When I was at school we had a peg in a cloakroom, and I imagine most of us did, but schools now tend not to have cloakrooms.

I also think there are more important battles...

I provide a coat, they leave home with a coat, they arrive home with a coat. What happens in between is their problem.

DS1 appears to be bright enough to realise he'll have a miserable day if he gets cold and wet at the start of it :o He even wears a wooly hat and gloves [bless]

Having watched the boys coming out when I used to pick him up, the majority were wearing appropriate outer wear.

Having somewhere to keep your coat in the daytime is a major problem along with having to carry heavy bags because you no longer have your own desk to keep them in and schools are so massive now that you wouldn't have time to get from class to desk. So in answer No except when it is so cold or so wet that DC have to.

CAN YOU IMAGINE BEING EXPECTED TO GO TO WORK THE WAY KIDS HAVE TO GO TO SCHOOL?

Ha! no chance, it's not the done thing and if she wants to freeze it's her choice. I think it must be very uncomfortable over a blazer too.

DS wore his yesterday because it was raining heavily and he did come home wearing it too but did comment that he was very hot...(after all it's not really very cold yet is it?). Apparently they do have coatpegs at his school which is good ;-).

So what coat should we buy? DD1 is currently wearing a blazer, but in a couple of months she'll need a coat (long walk to station at both ends). It needs to be big enough to wear over blazer, waterproof, and a plain dark colour (school uniform requirement). It also needs to satisfy a 12 year old's style requirements.

Any suggestions?

I have 2 boys, year 11 and year 13 and they both wear coats. They went through a phase of not wearing them, but soon wised up!

As for "putting my foot down" I am a firm believer in picking my battles, and having a slanging match over a coat at 7.15am is not necessary IMVHO. I can't force them to put one on, they are 6ft3! Anyway, Dancergirl, surely you aren't worried about your DD not wearing her coat? Just put your foot down, and make her do as she is told!

DD1 has never worn a coat in upper school or college. In very cold weather she does wear 2 or 3 tshirts under a hoodie so all is not as it looks on the outside. DD2 asked for a coat for upper school and I spent about £60 on one. I reckon she's worn it about twice. In cold weather she wears a tshirt, a shirt, a jumper and a blazer. Keeps her warm enough.

I didn't wear a coat at secondary. It was just another thing to have to lug around, along with cooking ingredients, bag, lunch, PE kit, art folder etc etc. DS has a locker, and now he knows what the other kids are wearing, we'll be buying him a coat this weekend.

After my post I went into the local factory shop who happened to have a black coat just right to fit over a blazer and reduced to £7. Told her I'd bought a coat and she said she'd wear it if it was black! She now tells me it should fit in her locker.

The kids had to walk back round to school last night for an evening event in a thunderstorm and she asked if she could wear the coat (her fashion one won't fit over the blazer). At £7 even if it's only used during heavy rain and times when it's still below zero outside, it has to be worth it!

Good point upthread, we all used to wear coats to secondary school (massive comp, no lockers/pegs/cloakrooms/desk storage at all). We just wore them between lessons and put them on the back of chairs in lessons. No big deal.

Wondering if the whole thing has changed because of blazers being almost the norm now and making less of a need for coats in the early cold weather and therefore the dcs feel it's uncool to admit to needing them as it gets colder?

Many schools though sin't allow them to be worn between lessons and one poster a while ago said her child was forbidden to have them in the back of chairs

Yes, a lot of schools insist that you must be in full uniform and nothing else when moving between lessons.

Still maintain that a secondary child is old enough to decide for him/herself whether he/she is too cold or not - and to learn to live with it if they guess wrong!