Staff's children & childcare

[maybank]

How usual is it for staff to bring their children to school to join classes for the day/a few days when they can't get childcare eg inset days/different school holidays?

And how would people feel about being told that you have an extra child joining you in an already full classroom?

Whenever I bring my children in for that reason they come to my class and I am responsible for them at all times.

Thanks for your response. Yes that seems entirely fair.

The extra child should never be in someone else's classroom - I've never heard of that happening. They either stay with the parent in their class, or help out in the office if the office staff agree. It's not ideal though, and not sure how insurance would work if something happened...

Yes this.

And we only tend to do it with older children who can ‘help out’, so don’t really need childcare as such. So actually I have had a colleague’s child in my class but they were early secondary age & therefore came as a helper.

Thank you - I've worked in many schools and have never heard of this happening before and confirmed my feeling that it isn't right.

I don’t have children but I’ve seen this happen several times at my school:

Staff children on INSET day - no one bats an eyelid. Very much “child is responsibility of parent as long as they’re not doing anything dangerous do as you wish” and they are normally left together in a classroom or in their parent’s classroom with an iPad or toys or whatever. Happens after school / before school on a daily basis I think in every school in the country too.
Very young children / babies have been known to crawl and toddle round during InSET sessions before and SLT have always been fine (I have a nice and understanding SLT) and know it’s generally a last resort and better to have the staff member there than not. This isn’t a case of every single time though I should point out - I’ve been at my school 6 years I think and have only seen this happen 2 or 3 times.

I have never seen a teacher’s child be put in with another class when holidays don’t line up.
I have seen a child be sat in the staff room before for the day. About 9 years old, holidays didn’t line up and no other option. All staff were fine - said child was actually invited to join reception (which the children loved) and was a known, sensible child who ended up being sent on multiple errands throughout the day, but it was never expected that they sit in with a class of their year group and be taught.

Thank you for this - again really helpful to know.