School toilets

[Sweetheart1990]

School toilets!
Son text me to say he had walked out of lesson after being refused permission to go to the toilet, he had finished all his work. I have always told him to do this if he is desperate but he never actually has before.
He has been put in isolation.
I'm angry as I really believe that students should be allowed to go when they need to and he had completed all tasks so was just say in the classroom anyway.
What does everyone else think?

See in my kids primary school the toilets were at the end of every classroom by the coat hooks before the corridor door that was shut.

So they could go to the toilet but nowhere else and only one toilet so no messing around

Too many variables here to be able to answer the question. How old is your son, and how desperate was he? If it was seriously urgent, then I think it was right for him to go. No child should ever be put in a situation where they have to choose between compliance with the rules or having an accident.

If he could have hung on until a break or lesson changeover, I think you should have encouraged him to do so.

However, unless it was a last-straw situation re his behaviour, isolation seems a grossly disproportionate response by the school.

Do you really not understand why children at school are not exactly the same as adults who are employed to work there?

The children do not have the responsibility to supervise the rest of the class.

People need to learn bladder management.

It sounds so simple, doesn't it? In the same way, wheelchair-users can learn leg management; people with asthma can learn lung management; people with diabetes can learn pancreas management.

You hardly wonder why we even have an NHS in the first place...

I understand the point about staffing, but the outcome is still the same, children are being punished for something that is not their fault, the outcome is that children are effectively penalised for normal biological needs.

Schools are breaking Dfe policy’s in forcing children to adhere to this “rule” - but that doesn’t matter and is justifiable because they can’t find a better solution to support the minority of children who disrupt.

If toilets are only open when staff are available, then the system is effectively restricting access as a behavioural control measure, even if that isn’t the stated intention. Lack of staffing isn’t a child’s responsibility.

Yet they’re the ones experiencing the consequences — being denied basic access, being told to “hold it”, or being reprimanded for needing the toilet at the “wrong” time.

Whether or not it’s meant as collective punishment, is the pupils who bear the impact, being denied timely access to facilities, being instructed to wait, or being reprimanded for needing the toilet at times that fall outside the limited supervised windows.

If the school can’t staff toilets safely throughout the day, that’s a resourcing issue, not a behaviour issue and it shouldn’t be children who pay the price for that.

Not everyone can wait.And to be honest, most people have waited as long as they can before asking to leave for the loo.

When I was about 7, at school, I asked to use the loo and as refused. I wet myself all over the chair.

Tbh, there are exceptions to any rule.

I imagine anyone would break a rule instead of soiling themselves in front of peers.

But, that does not mean that the consequences of breaking the rule should be dismissed or wiped out. That's a totally different argument.

So, I took would tell my child break the rule, but be aware there are consequences and you'll have to deal with those. But I wouldn't tell my child off for breaking the rule.

I would feel very differently if this was related to periods or medical issues.

My daughter has 2 x 1hr lessons before a break, there's no way she could wait 30mins let alone 2hrs for a wee. It is a basic human right to be able to go when you need to.

Actually if I absolutely needed to go I would excuse myself and go. I wouldn't soil or wet myself just because someone didn't like it.

It's ridiculous to police toilet use especially for girls, but obviously in some cases for boys too.

Sorry, but I would not support anybody who was trying to deny my child the ability to fulfil a basic necessary human function.

Any policy ruling that they prefer to promote the sheer embarrassment and gross indignity of children soiling or wetting themselves in class, or having period-related accidents that everybody will see and bully them for, for years into the future, rather than let children who need the toilet use the toilet... that isn't a policy I would ever support.

I used to teach and I'd never ever refuse a request for the loo.
As a teacher you know which students are trying it on and wanting to get out of a lesson.
You also learnt to manage multiple requests for the loo- one is allowed and then 3 others suddenly want to go too.
My 'rule' was they would wait till one came back to the room before going.

These draconian rules are disgraceful and can lead to health issues too.

But if they don’t have a medical condition, they should be able to wait 2 hrs for a wee.

Who says?

Where is your magical 2 hours coming from?

If they have had a drink at break or lunchtime, they can need the loo sooner.

And I suppose you think people should hold their poo and suffer from constipation as a result?

Or bowel cancer- another long term risk of not pooing when needed as the toxins held in the bowel increase risk.

If you could come up with a cheap and effective way to solve the problem, schools would be elated. The trouble is, as you say, we are understaffed and resourced in so many ways (and some where, frankly, more children suffer than this example) that without a different idea, what do schools do?

Follow this through. If leaving without permission does not result in any form of consequence, then no one ever has to ask permission to leave the room. They can all walk in and out as they please.
I can see that working really well.

Imagine : You have finally got the class quiet so good kids like your son can get on with their work and then someone, usually someone well behaved, wants to go to the loo, so you let them go, then another asks, probably also genuine, then you get two more chancing it, then the worst behaved girl in the class asks really rudely, and as a teacher you know she probably does not want to but if you say no she will say something inappropriate about her periods and cause uproar, and if you pull her up on how she has spoken to you she will increase the rudeness so it turns into standing theatre, and so it goes on. You now have kids using the loo as an excuse and behaviour deteriorating because the situation has given the worst behaved kid in the room the chance to grandstand. So even kids not wanting the loo start answering back and being rude and disruptive. Then you get an earful from the head of year about the numebr of kids leaving your lessons for the loo. Then a parent complains their kid can't work in your class because of the behaviour. Seriously, teachers cannot win.

The problem is, though, that everybody (except for the perfect posters on here) can sometimes be caught short and urgently need to use a toilet for a variety of reasons, whether they have an ongoing medical condition or not.

It's not even like you can use common sense anymore and keep unwell kids of school for a day or two, as the attendance officers will be right on your back, assuming that they're skiving.

Seriously, you expect people to risk UTI's and constipation from waiting 2hrs to use the loo, that's ridiculous. Also the risk of extreme embarrassment from a girl who is on her period and needs to go and is stopped.

And once again! Teachers let one child go and the whole class wants to go!!

Where on earth do you work? It's completely normal to leave a meeting to go to the toilet.

You have said several times that the teacher should have used their discretion. Perhaps they did and still decided not to give permission for your DS to leave the classroom. Does your DS frequently ask to go to the toilet? Was the teacher about to give out homework/address the whole class? Are you happy for all the students at his school to decide for themselves which school rules they will follow and which they will ignore?

Nobody is denying that classroom discipline is a significant challenge; but it isn't resolved by forcing kids to wet or poo themselves in class.

Plus, if you have a child who is desperately trying not to soil themselves, they may be too frightened to speak up about it and have to suffer in silence, but they will be far from happy or in any position to learn anything. You haven't actually solved the issue of promoting classroom harmony and a good, safe, healthy learning environment at all; it's just bliss ignorance to think otherwise.

All these kids that cannot go a maximum double lesson without a wee, how do they seriously get through their normal day to day? It's now 17:01, I had my last wee at around 14:00, I have no urge to go, I have given birth twice and am 60. If I was about to go into a double lesson, I may try to go quickly before the start of it.

PP talking about queuing for a ride at Alton Towers without an issue or sitting in a meeting are absolutely correct. Unless you have a medical issue affecting your bladder, I cannot get on board with urgently needing the loo in the middle of a lesson. It is highly unusual to suddenly urgently need to urinate and have to have that need met immediately.

Do you say no to him about anything else? I bet he could sit through a favourite film, sports match or computer game without having to nip out.

And if you don't, you get a child who may wet or soil themselves in class, or make a horrendous embarrassing period mess... so that's not actually any kind of solution either, is it?

There is an shocking lack of respect in schools these days on all sides - pupils to teachers, teachers to pupils and parents to the school.

When I was at school, there were no rules about not going to the loo in lesson times and there wasn't a issue with 30 kids trying to go, so this idea that if schools relaxed the rules, suddenly every child would want to leave class is ridiculous.

If we needed to go we asked, sometimes the teacher would ask us to wait five minutes or just finish something but I don't remember anyone every being stopped.

Kids in school have a lack of respect for teachers because they are not respected themselves - respectful behaviour is not modelled to them, so they are not learning it.

Instead of respect, so many schools rely more and more on draconian rules, whereas school that fosters respect and inclusion, don't need as many rules.

My DDs school has the "No taking your blazer off without permission" rule - not all teachers think it is a sensible rule - one in particular that I know of tells the students in his class that they can take their blazers off, or go to the classroom sink and fill their water bottle as long as they do it quickly and quietly and don't disrupt the lesson.

He finds it incredibly frustrating that half of them still put their hands up to ask as that disrupts the lesson more than them just taking the blazer off! He treats the kids like people, no seating plans, will chat to them, joke with them etc, but makes it clear he expects the work to be done. I know this because he has told me first hand. He is an amazing teacher and always asks after my eldest, even though she left the school two years ago (having achieved her best GCSE grade in his subject even though it was her worst subject at the start of year 10)

Other teachers spend half their time trying, and failing to control the class, enforce every draconian rule going, treat the students like little automatons, have a seating plan which they change all the time in a desperate attempt to try and improve behaviour, without really understanding why kids misbehave for them while behaving perfectly for others.

There was one teacher the other day supervising phone pick up at the end of the day - literally the last five minutes, kids queuing in 25 degree heat, spending her whole time screaming at them to put on their blazers or they wouldn't be allowed their phones - she is universally disliked amongst the pupils.

Guess which teacher has the lowest number of bad behaviour incidents recorded in his class and who also gets the some of the best test and exam results in the school?

School is a place for learning - they need to start teaching children respect by modelling it, not trying to compel it. There will always be young people who misbehave, who push the boundaries and who will seek ways to get into trouble - they will do that no matter how draconian the rules.

However, most young people just want to get on with learning - we need to stop treating them like every single one of them wants to go to the loo in lesson so that they can smash up the sinks, smoke a vape and bully a year 7 - the vast vast majority of them don't want to do that - they just need the loo.

Perhaps if schools stopped trying to police everyone for potential bad behaviour, they would be able to focus on actual bad behaviour.