Do you ask them to text you when they've arrived?

[hardboiled]

Do you ask your Year 7 DS/DD to send you a text saying he/she has arrived safely to school? And a text saying he/she is leaving?

Primary school never calls if a child has not turned up, so if anything ever happened to a Y6 on the way to school the parent would never know. What about in secondary?

Or is it too "helicoptery"...

[valiumredhead]

The schools here text or email if children don't register do you know within about 15 mins if they aren't at school. I thought this was standard now!

[MarjorieAntrobus]

No. Too helicoptery. I would assume they had got to where they were going unless I heard to the contrary.

[Charlie01234]

I asked my son to text me when he got on the bus - big change for a parent who has been walking their child to school to suddenly just let them out of the door to walk to the bus imo. Might make me helicoptery but don't care - it only lasted a few weeks by the way until I got my head round it! Do what you feel comfortable with.

[MrsDmitriTippensKrushnic]

DSs text me if they're going to be very late, but they expect me to do the same so that's fair. If they didn't get to school I'd get a call from the office chasing them up - schools tend to be quite hot on attendance.

[xylem8]

No.Weird!

[valiumredhead]

Clearly it's not 'weird' seeing as some schools have this in place ad matter of course

[valiumredhead]

As not ad

[curlew]

Not weird for school to text if the child isn't there. Weird to insist on child texting after the first week or so. Mind you, dd texted me for most of her first term- long after I had got my head round it- I think she needed to reassure herself that she had got there safely!

[Yonihadtoask]

No.

DS has only ever text me if there is a problem getting home and will be late waiting for the next bus (one per hour!) Or wants me to pick him up.

If students do not get a mark at registration then we get a text from school, shortly after 9.00 am.

[2rebecca]

No, sounds like overanxious parenting to me. I never had to phone my mum if I didn't arrive. Mobile phones just seem to create extra anxiety for some people and jobs to do for their kids.

[Clary]

I work in a secondary school and if a student fails to turn up without reason given (eg known medical apt/parent phones to say they are sick) the office calls all available numbers to find out what's wrong.

To answer your question OP, no, never. But then we live 2 mins walk away. But really it sounds like another thing to worry about to me.

[busymummy3]

No please don't ask your child to do this you are thinking of yourself and your feelings of anxiety not your child . Let him or her move into the big world of secondary without you hovering around in the background.
Most schools have strict policies around mobiles anyway eg ours have to be put in locker for the school day so mine don't even bother taking theirs to school.

[mumeeee]

Well my CDs are alI in their 20s now and didn't have mobiles in year 7. But if they did I wouldn't have expected me to text me. The school phoned if they didn't turn up.

[mumeeee]

DEs not CDs

[louisea]

Our secondary school doesn't phone but will send a message a few days later stating that such & such sessions were missed and asking for an explanation.

Primary school calls by 9.30.

[Yonihadtoask]

If DS got his mobile phone out at school to text me he would have it confiscated.

New rules are the phones have to stay in their lockers all day. Not even switched off in their bags/blazer pockets. (DS breaks the rules though and has it in his pocket, rebel!)