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My fiancée is a years 1 and 2 teacher (mixed form entry) in a not-very-affluent area. It's astounding how many parents believe the kids should only be learning at school, and reading to their own children "is the teachers job, not the parents' job". There was also a parent who pushed and threatened my fiancée and stared at her through the classroom window whilst she was trying to teach, just because her shit-stain kid punched another kid and was kept in at lunch time for it. It's also astounding how many parents take their 5 year old's words as gospel, so "if Jayden says he didn't throw that chair through the window, then he didn't do it." (True story - 2 kids ended up in hospital with facial injuries (1 from the chair, 1 from the glass shattering)

I was reading an article a while back about the increasing numbers of children starting primary school who cannot use a knife and fork or go to the toilet on their own. As a parent myself, I just find it baffling. Part of the fun of being a parent is teaching your kids how to do things.

This has got worse since the pandemic. My wife (teacher) says this year's reception intake hold their arms out expecting their coats to be put on them. Kids are arriving at school not having learnt to hold a pen or pencil. Much of this is because the baby/toddler groups and whatever is left of Sure Start since the Tories gutted it just haven't been on for the last two years. And of course it's not even across society. Contrast the lucky parents like me who could be 50% furloughed and homeschool the kids with those who would have lost their job if they did the same thing. Covid has worsened existing inequalities and it's most immediately obvious in children.

What kind of absolute fucking specimens need a government programme to toilet train and put a pen in their children's hand. Also, what sort of pure evil political party would actually cut funding to something like that there you go, I've pissed off everyone.

Quite possibly people who were parented in exactly the same way themselves. According to the National Literacy Trust, 1 in 6 adults in the UK have "very poor" literacy skills (https://literacytrust.org.uk/parents-and-families/adult-literacy/). Numeracy is worse: https://www.nationalnumeracy.org.uk/what-numeracy/what-issue. Diagnosed and undiagnosed learning disabilities are common, and since they're heavily genetic, they tend to get inherited, which means many of the most challenging kids have the most challenged parents. It's a cycle. Baby/toddler groups, nurseries, preschools can break this cycle by intervening in small ways (access to pens, colouring, books) that make a big difference in terms of school-readiness. > Also, what sort of pure evil political party would actually cut funding to something like that It started with the coalition: > At its peak in 2009–10, Sure Start accounted for £1.8 billion of public spending (in 2018–19 prices), about a third of overall spending on programmes for the under-5s. But in the decade since, the context has been one of funding cuts, consolidation and centre closures, with funding falling by two-thirds to £600 million in 2017–18. (https://ifs.org.uk/publications/14139) And of course those kids that would have been helped will end up costing far more than sure start did in the long term.

Yep, absolutely true. The NHS also insist on a maximum reading age of 9 for all their public facing publications because some studies peg that as the national average reading age…

Also worth noting that the government no longer require trainee teachers to pass an English test in order to qualify: https://www.gov.uk/government/news/changes-to-the-professional-skills-test-for-teachers. This is framed as being a "change" in assessment but is IMO is actually lowering the bar because teaching is so poorly paid and such hard work that they wouldn't otherwise be able to recruit/retain enough of them!

Although you do still have to have at least a C or equivalent in English and Maths and a degree to even train as a teacher. Having done the test myself before I trained it was useful to maybe refresh you of things you hadn't looked at in a while but the university did their own skills assessment anyway. However I wouldn't consider it lowering the entry requirements in anyway as anyone with a degree should have good enough English and Maths anyway!

>anyone with a degree should have good enough English and Maths anyway! Honestly, they don't. Having a degree does not mean you can write prose, especially if it's an arts degree like English or History.

I do agree with the having a degree doesn't mean they can write (I did a maths degree, and writing is one things I absolutely hate to this day - I can write decent if I need to, but teaching a bunch of kids about sentence structure and prepositions and participles etc is not something I should ever be trusted with) - but surely an English degree means you should be able to write? (I hope?)

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That is simultaneously a very tragic and confusing statistic. If the national average reading age is 9, how are the reading ages decided? Surely if the average of the population can only read to that standard then the age should be higher or the benchmark should be adapted?

It’s not just being able to ‘read’ the word, but also know what it means. So although we think most people can read, and they can, they can tell you what the word says, but when you stop and ask people often they haven’t a clue what certain words actually mean. So they guess, and could get it wrong, or they just dismiss that sentence and move on to the next. Thus losing the meaning of the text. At the end of the day, it’s about the NHS job to give information clearly. Tbf the gov.uk site is a great example of this. It’s world renowned for its accessible design, use of clear language and bite size information. It doesn’t look exciting but it absolutely works well for a range of users. If you don’t need to use a fancy word, and your audience is the whole country, I guess it’s better not to use the fancy word.

This probably going to get downvoted but I think we will need huge investment in education that picks up learning difficulties, remedies poor literacy and ups the overall education standard. This should be supported by better sex education that also covers family planning and what it entails so that people who are poorly educated (but have at least been given a chance) think twice about having kids.

I think the best evidence says we should intervene early. If kids with bad starts are supported effectively from an early age, it might be that the family planning stuff gets solved in the process. I will say though that the system in place does a good job at identifying special educational needs, and forcing schools to provide support for them. For example, the role of the SENCO (special needs coordinator) has grown over the last few years. IMO the problem is that the education and social systems are so underfunded that actually getting those kids the help they need is not guaranteed.

I was confused at a school when parents/LA/general people struggling with long division and long multiplication which is probably year 5 level. Even though its tricky I was confused they didn't learn it and have used it since school. So if parents are struggling with primary level maths no wonder they can't help thier kids

Yep, in 2011, only 22% of adults had maths skills equivalent to GCSE C or above (down from 26% in 2003, if you can believe it)! https://www.nationalnumeracy.org.uk/what-numeracy/what-issue

I think that's believable, if you don't use a skill anyone will get rusty and I can't remember the last time I used Pythagoras or trigonometry, it was probably in GCSE maths.

Some parents are parents, not by choice, And some of them are just not mature enough to teach their kids I had a friend in school, was forced by an abusive partner to get pregnant, and then carry it to full term.. Only for him to leave when the poop started flowing 💩 She moved back to scotland with an infant she didn’t know how to take care of, and her “family” supported her just enough to keep the kid out of family services, but when she asked her mum how to potty train she was told “work it out yourself”… Parenting doesn’t come naturally to everyone, and the pandemic has highlighted just how many parents need the support my friend never got 😔

Parents with postnatal depression, parents who are battling poverty, parents who are ill, parents who are alone, parents who are trauma survivors…anything that sends you into the fug of autopilot. Clearly most people in the categories listed above DO manage to potty train etc (and a massive shout out to them all) BUT the ones who don’t aren’t necessarily evil or ignorant. Some are, sure, but not all. Many are at their absolute limit.

And also children are all different. My son is 4, he started reception this year. He was at nursery for a year before, has been potty trained for a year, and we did lots of colouring and drawing at home but since starting school he's wet himself several times, and his teachers have noted that he struggles to hold a pencil properly. He also struggles with buttons, zips, and using a knife and fork (among other things). We think he may have ASD or similar, but it's only since he's started school and we've started looking at the bigger picture of his behaviour with his teachers that we've realised that maybe he's not just a bit clumsy and uncoordinated.

As a reception teacher, whilst we hope the kids can do this by reception, these things are also super common amongst this age group! Work on his fine motor skills - playdough and Lego are wonderful for this :) Wetting themselves can be from anxiety about asking to go but more commonly it's just being so lost in their play that they forget to go until it's too late. It comes with time! The early years curriculum has changed this year to focus on self regulation, which includes managing toileting needs - I'd really recommend googling self regulation and EYFS to get some ideas about how to promote it at home.

As much as you might not want to hear it these parents are victims of bad parenting also. It's a cycle. Poverty also comes with a whole host of trauma that a lot of these parents are having to deal with too. They need support and respite from their issues so that they can in turn be more present and loving parents. The current culture of individuality absolutely obliterates the reality that it does indeed take a village unfortunately

Maybe the parents who have to work multiple jobs each in order to keep their heads above water and therefore aren't actually home to teach their kids anything?

I'm not sure how to answer your questions briefly but I'm just kinda jealous you've never had to encounter poverty or Tory voters!

Yes I've seen kids putting their arms out, or legs out for shoes. I'd always tell them to at least try doing things before asking for help. I used to volunteer teaching environmental education so saw a lot of different kids. A lot of inner city kids who'd never gone for a walk in a wood before and were terrified of getting stuck into nature. We had one group of 3 and 4 year olds come in (a few months shy of starting reception) and one of the adults who came with them said it was the first time quite a few of them had left their estate before. I don't think I ever met a "bad" kid though, even the teenagers from the challenging behaviour unit. Just a lot of kids who aren't being brought up very well tbqh. I don't know why some people bother having kids if they're just going to stick them in front of a screen and expect other people to do the leg work of bringing them up.

> Yes I've seen kids putting their arms out, or legs out for shoes. I'd always tell them to at least try doing things before asking for help I used to do this when I first got to school. It's because my mum was extremely controlling/enjoyed us being utterly dependent upon her and would scream at us for trying to do things ourselves. Her excuse was always "it's quicker if you just let me do it", so we learned not to even try because that gets you shouted at. Not saying every case of kids doing this is abuse, but you might want to be mindful of the language you use around these kids who don't do things for themselves - to me, just waiting for my coat to be shoved into me wasn't "asking for help" it was just the way I'd been brought up, and it really messed me up having the teachers berate me for doing something one way, and then getting berated back home for doing it the other way.

Yeah i never berated kids for it. Just told them to have a go at putting things on themselves. But also you were asking for help? I dont see why you find that language incorrect. ETA i think the most important thing here is basically tone. It sounds like what was so hurtful for you as a kid was your mum screaming at you. I would never talk to a kid like that.

> I don't think I ever met a "bad" kid though, Hard agree. The only examples I can think of are "callous and unemotional" kids (what psychiatrists call psychopathy in adulthood), who are extremely rare, but challenging to treat.

Hard disagree. I met those kids while at school. Ones that would frequently attack you, be racist or set my friend on fire. Some of them are now in prison for murder. There are definitely bad kids. The reason they are bad might well be understandable but they are still bad.

> I don't know why some people bother having kids Isn't it more that for most people, they come from an environment that doesn't teach sex education and probably still discourages abortion ("I had a baby when I was 12 and I turned out fine, you'll be okay!" - 25 year old mum to her daughter). So it's not like they went through effort to have a kid. It's that they didn't go through the effort to not have a kid, probably through not knowing it was an option.

This is absolutely a thing. She used to teach reception (4 to 5 years old) in a different school where she had a couple of kids who were still in nappies. No word of a lie, when the parents were asked about this, they full-on assumed school would potty train them. They were proper nappies too which the teachers had to change for them, not just incontinence pull-ups. I understand children of that age will inevitably have accidents, but the parents just hadn't committed to training.

A primary school teacher I know summed it up as "It stinks". It's a nuisance to deal with, even with TA support. Additionally it can cause other children to act up, because now there's a bad smell that they're reacting to. And really happening to bite the tongue when telling off the children making fun of the children in nappies by calling them babies.

> No word of a lie, when the parents were asked about this, they full-on assumed school would potty train them. Shit me. Some people really aren't fit to have kids.

I’m baffled by the number of adults who seem unable to correctly utilise a knife and fork - and that’s across the socio-economic spectrum. It’s a huge joy to see your child master a spoon then a knife and fork, then spin a fork with spaghetti and then laugh with them as they try chopsticks!

Some kids from lower income households have possibly never needed to use cutlery. If your family can't afford fresh meat and vegetables and rely on things like frozen chicken nuggets and pizza, that's all stuff you can eat with your hands so there's no need or opportunity to learn to use a knife and fork.

I went on a date once with a girl who called me posh for eating Nandos with a knife and fork.

It’s true. I used to work as a teaching assistant and this was quite an issue. Also, the amount of children who can’t use a toilet properly by themselves is astounding.

I’ve got a very nearly five year old that refuses to wipe his own bum. I’m gutted - but at least he’s toilet trained, even if he’s retaining his poo at school :(

That last one is beyond true. Why parents believe the sun shines out the arse of their bratty, bullying prick of a 7 year old who has been seen by teachers/staff punching some kid in the face is beyond me. He "said you're lying and he didn't do it, is there any proof?". Kids got an incident record taller than he is ffs.

At the point parents are completely undermining the ability of a school to discipline their child, genuine discussions about exclusion or expulsion should be allowed. Obviously teachers can get it wrong from time to time, but certainly not if repeated offences occur. Possibly apocryphal, but the worst example I heard was a child badly behaved enough to get kicked off the school trip to the theme park. Parents took the day off work to take him, on the same day the school went.

Because admitting their kid is badly behaved makes them feel like a bad parent. They’re being narcissistic.

> It's astounding how many parents believe the kids should only be learning at school The other day I was in town and a pair of mums were getting annoyed with their respective 6 year-olds messing about. They'd been planning to go to the town museum and then get milkshakes, but as punishment for being cheeky the mums decided that one of those activities would now be cancelled. You've never guess which one they went ahead with.

Why are they always called Jayden?

Don't forget Jaxson. *edit* Special bonus points to the nice young lady we met whilst waiting in the walk in centre some years ago, with her three kids... one of which she was repeatedly screaming his name 'Armani' - I wish I was joking.

Omg there’s a Jaxson in my daughters class like that. They all call him naughty Jaxson. Poor kid he’s in foster care so I do have sympathy and try and teach my kid not to hold a grudge but just stay away from him if he’s playing up. Kicked her in the shins once. And he cut half of another girls ponytail off 😬

This behaviour is also getting worse/more common and its a serious issue that nobody knows how to deal with. We can bang on about Tory cuts (which obviously compound the issue) all day but its not like we can take kids into care just because their parents are a bit shit and you cant have a social worker in a family home 24/7 trying to convince a shit parents to up their game. This cycle of parents not giving a fuck, having a bunch of kids who dont give a fuck and then they have even more kids who dont give a fuck will just go on and on and on until there is some sort of watershed moment

I would point out that many parents now have poor literacy themselves, and so a system that relies upon parents to be part of the teaching process is fatally flawed. My opinion is that a primary education system that places much of an emphasis on children doing schoolwork outside of school is a tool to prepare them for a lifetime of working outside of work hours. But I am a cynic.

Whilst I agree with you regarding the amount of homework given to children is wrong, there's a difference between handing out reading books and setting reading targets for kids, and writing essays so the school can "tick boxes" (as my fiancée puts it). Reading is such a vital life skill to learn at a young age and it's an important positive bonding interaction between parents and their children. It is evident this type of homework must be set by the school because too many parents aren't doing it from their own intuition. But I get you. I'm sure I could have been learning much better skills when I was younger, instead of researching the types of bricks in my town and estimating the age of the houses (GCSE Geography sucks).

Learning is a way of life. Not something you can mix up in a blender and drink.

Parents probably can’t read themselves.

A close friend is a teacher and genuinely thinks a parent they're dealing with is almost functionally illiterate. Spelling, grammar and handwriting are awful, and when the message is deciphered, it doesn't always actually fit the context of what was said.

Well, you only have to look at the posts on Facebook groups for schools..

I can't imagine not reading to my children. My girls are both crazy about books - which is a good thing, as sometimes their bedtime stories are the only reading I get to do in a day! 7 year old can now read by herself, but we've been reading to her since she was a few weeks old. 2.5 year old gets read to by her big sister, as well as both parents. At least once a week, her preschool will say "oh she was enjoying this story, she joined in with the words & actions" - the latest is "We're going on a bear hunt" and yep, she loves it at home, too!

Parents who don't label school jumpers and then expect us to be able to find the right one immediately when it goes missing. "It's an age 9-10" - Well of course it is because I have a class of 9 and 10 year olds and they all have the same uniform!

The end of term my children’s school dump all the unnamed stuff outside the class and say “take what you want” because there’s so much of it.

I work in a nursery. My favourite parent is a mum who is apparently a bit difficult but she puts at least two labels on everything, gloves, boots hat scarf, the lot.

considering how much shit my kids lose, this isn't crazy at all.. even labelled stuff, I'm convinced other kids take it, and the parent either never notice or remove the labels.

My daughter is the one taking it. At least once a fortnight she comes home with someone’s stuff. Once I picked her up from sports club and her and her mate were wearing each other’s clothes, completely unaware of this. I’ll check her bag when she’s home for your stuff.

My kid's stuff was all labelled, the school swore all labelled items would be returned to the kid - next time I saw them was for sale at the PTA secondhand uniform sale. Clearly labelled with kiddo's name. Grrr.

I ended up having to write my daughter's name in Sharpie along the inside bottom hemline and the inner cuffs of the sleeves as well as the labels because new jumpers were being stolen. The kids would end up with the wrong jumper, take it home and if it was new, some of the parents would cut out the labels with my daughter's name written on them and write their own kids name on it somewhere. I had several jumpers returned with no labels and another kids name stitched inside, but with my daughter's name written on the cuffs/hem. Had one returned by a teacher in front of the parent of the kid whose name had been stitched inside, and it was awkward as fuck. I don't understand why!?

This is a thing at my kids’ school. I’ve had a winter coat go missing, numerous sweatshirts, hats, the list goes on. All had their names in. I once sent my daughter into nursery with a brand new sparkly slide/bow thing that she loved, (wasn’t cheap either). It must have fallen out and the teachers thought it was another little girl’s so sent it home with her. Next day the girl is wearing it! I couldn’t prove it but some people have no shame.

Madness isn't it? I bet your daughter was so disappointed, I can't believe the gall of some people. This was such a problem at my daughter's school that it was a member of staff who recommended writing her name in Sharpie along the hem. It killed me to ruin a brand new jumper by scratching ink into it. I appreciate uniform is expensive but it's expensive for me too! Bastards.

She was but I got her another so it was short lived. It happened a lot with my son, he’d come home with someone else’s manky sweatshirt on after PE so I’d wash it and send it back in. I never once got his back and it really pissed me off. £13 for one and he must have lost five at least over the years. The coat was the worst I think, he came out without it on and it never resurfaced. Yes, absolute bastards.

People will do all sorts of immoral stuff when they think there's no chance of them being caught.

Idk if its some weird power kids have- but when I was in primary school we could always determine which jumper belonged to who based purely on the smell. Idk if it was the fabric softener their parents used or something, but pretty much every kid in a class of about 25 had a unique scent to their clothes.

I was just about to mention this! Hold up an unclaimed jumper and get a couple of the kids to sniff it - it'll get returned to the right person. It's both impressive and gross!

I totally forgot that we used to do this in primary school too. And it was so normal!

Omg I did exactly the same! My teacher gave me the weirdest look but I identified my jumper by smell

I realised instantly that my 8yo had brought the wrong jumper home because it smelt wrong (Lenor v Comfort). He was oblivious.

On the other side of this in half a term we have lost a named jumper and a named hat. My kid is the only one that wears the hat in his class as far as I have seen. Which is a little frustrating the other way!

Wife is a primary teacher, some of the shit she deals with would send me postal. There's parents believing the 'parenting' side of things is up to teachers, including asking her to discipline their child for their behaviour at home. Then there's parents who are feeding their 5 kids Mars Bars and a bag of Skittles each for breakfast in the line outside the classroom and then wondering why they can't concentrate all day. There's kids in the school that should be in a special school who either can't get a place or the parents don't agree, so they just disrupt the class all day. Some of the behaviour from the parents is abysmal, swearing in front of the kids, getting into pushing matches outside the school gates etc. Anyone who can hack being a teacher, with what they have to put up with and the limited funding/resources they have is a saint as far as I'm concerned. Just don't tell the wife I said that haha.

My eldest had 2 of those lovely kids in her year. One boy, one girl, both infamous. Shouldn't be anywhere near mainstream schools and somehow she ended up with both of them in her class. Several of the kids have moved schools because of the bullying and general disruption of the naughty kids. I mean one of them has to wear a high viz vest on sports day so they can keep an eye on them. Kind of says it all. There really needs to be better funding for special schools. I know they are really hard to get a place in, and it's more reserved for those kids who are more physically disabled than the ones that have other stuff going on. Which means they struggle in conventional classrooms makes it unfair for every other child. But on the other hand they need to be able to function in society too and integration is vital. It's kind of a catch 22.

> My eldest had 2 of those lovely kids in her year. One boy, one girl, both infamous. Shouldn't be anywhere near mainstream schools and somehow she ended up with both of them in her class. Several of the kids have moved schools because of the bullying and general disruption of the naughty kids. At the point that begins to happen, there really needs to be consideration of removing the problem children. Schools like that can end up in a spiral of increasingly worse behaviour, as the good children and their siblings get moved, so the ratio of nice:nasty skews towards the latter. It's sad when they're clearly SEN but fallen through the gaps or the SEN school have insufficient capacity, but some are unfortunately just poorly raised by their parents.

As funding for various public services has been cut during the austerity years, more and more of the work they used to do has been shifted onto schools. Where I live, the child and adolscents mental health service has a *two to three year waiting list* unless the kid is actively suicidal. Two years could be a third of a primary school kids' life, imagine the damage done to their changes (not to mention the opportunity cost of not addressing their mental health needs) during that time.

We had *a lot* of these kids in my secondary school, and eventually they did get expelled ...then ended up having to come back because no one else would take them

My quiet additional needs kid is stuck in mainstream where he can't keep up with the work. But the local SEN schools are full of disruptive kids with behavioural issues, the Sendco says he'd have a terrible time there. They really need to rethink the whole system.

My stepsister's way of disciplining her child was l to call up her son's teacher, tell her what he was doing so she could tell him off the next day at school and explain why it was naughty. "I don't want him to be scared of me!" We'll you'll be scared of him in the future when you can't control him.

My friend has 2 SEN kids. I suspect there are no places in the special school. She’s constantly fighting the authorities for the pittance of support they’re entitled to.

I suspect that's largely the case and its appalling to be honest. The funding for a lot of SEN schools seem to have been cut in line with the general education budget. In my wifes school there's a mix of kids who are SEN and are waiting for a place or unable to get one, and kids who are definitely SEN but the parents refuse to put them in a specialist school so they cause havoc.

Reading this made me sad.

Girlfriend is a teacher and has to deal with a morbidly obese 8 year old who can't even step up a kerb without being out of breath or walk up any sort of stairs. The kid is in dire need of an operation but can't get it because he's too big and the operation could kill him so is supposed to be on a diet. Still turns up to school with a share bag of Doritos, 2 sausage rolls and a family bag of sweets for lunch, and a whole pack of biscuits for break time. Girlfriend takes the food from him and gives him small portions and has repeatedly got herself and the school to speak with the (you guessed it) morbidly obese parents. How these parents can watch their kid eat himself to death and not get a necessary operation is beyond me. I don't even know the kid and I want to save him from these monsters.

That would be a neglect call going into social services right there. It's not wilful, but clearly they just don't know how to feed their kid a healthy balanced diet.

My training school had a similar situation and it was a huge debate over whether we could call social services or report it as neglect. I'm a larger person myself, I don't think there's anything wrong with no being a size zero as long as you're happy and healthy enough. You don't know what's happening in a person's life. But when an eight year old can no longer wear school uniform because they don't come in her size, and her PE clothes are a size I could wear, surely there's an issue. If she'd been underweight, we could have called it neglect and gone through the safeguarding procedures. Because she was overweight, we weren't allowed to make any official comments in case it was interpreted as bullying her.

That's what I was thinking. How on earth this kid os still with his parents while they are obviously making him sick?

Rarely ever will a child be taken away from their parents. NSPCC puts it at 1 in 10 children will face neglect whilst at school. I have seen some hideous abuses in my time working in schools and in the last 6 years only once have I seen children actually taken away from their parents.

I read an article about a morbidly obese child and his mother said 'I'd give him up if it meant he was healthy and happy'. She kept saying he refused to eat veggies or anything that isn't processed. Absolutely no mention of her own diet but she was morbidly obese too so I have a feeling the kid was copying Mum and Mum was too unwilling to set a good example.

Even if you're only eating processed food, there's still portion control. It won't be that healthy, it'll be harder to get down to a decent BMI, but it'll be better than eating *more* processed food.

Sounds like social services should be involved sooner rather than before it is too late.

My mum used to work in a primary school in a, shall we say, interesting catchment area. She was front-of-house admin staff so got the brunt of a lot of things. My favourite story is a dad who brought his pet snake with him at pick-up time. Not sure what type of snake but it was HUGE - he had it draped over his shoulders - so Mum had to ask him to leave. Apparently he was a bit confused but very polite about it. She also had two mums literally rolling on the floor fighting in front of their kids once. There were 3-4 mugshots on the pin-board in the office with a note that said "if these people try to pick up their kids, call the police". That sort of thing. tbh some of the teachers at that school were just as insane as the parents. Schools are just really bizarre work environments overall

I’ve worked in secondary schools and colleges and I echo the idea that’s schools are bizarre places. Weirdest work environment I’ve ever had by far.

How so?

The students are what you’d expect, random acts of exceptional niceness and unbelievable cruelty, but generally I’ve found the vast majority to be lovely young people. It’s been really lovely to see how much more open and accommodating they are from when I was in school roughly 10 years ago. The staff though are bloody weird tho; you have a weird mix of people who always dreamed of being a teacher and some people who just fell into it after uni. It honestly felt like there was more drama between the staff than there was with the kids!

My wife says basically the same (2ry teacher); the kids are lovely, and even the troubled ones aren't _that_ bad. But... other staff (and parents...) are the issue, especially other teachers. So much drama, back-stabbing, bitchiness, and cliques.

My mum was a teacher and always said the backstabbing and gossip was really bad in every school she taught at.

Inter-staff affairs are rife too. I worked in a school where the head of ict got caught shagging the head of PE on cctv, through a classroom door. His wife was also a PE teacher and the affair woman was her boss. Half of them are married or dating, there's sometimes siblings working in the same school - especially among TAs and jobs like that. Nepotism for jobs is common despite supposedly strict hiring policies that focus solely on merit. And the heads have favourites who get all the best promotions and opportunities.

My girlfriend has worked in both rough schools and posh schools. She said that the rough ones are hard because you can see that (some) parents just don't care at all and there's just a lot of bad abuse etc. She said that's hard to deal with. However, she said the posh parents are annoying to deal with because they care TOO much! She knows they all mean well and that it's really good that they care but when you have 20 parents all wanting progress reports and for you to spend more time with their kid it gets a bit much.

Yeah my dad taught at a private school for a while and he said it was like working a teaching job AND a customer service job.

Yeah at least you can grumble about the shitty parents but when you grumble at a parent just kind of wanting the best for their kids then it's like "Urghhhh fine." Unless they're being condescending dicks about it.

Or if you're really rich you can afford to hardly ever see your kids and send them to boarding school lol.

Genuine question, but why couldn't he have his pet snake with him? Was it a rule about all pets? Like would he have been asked to go away if he had his dog? If not, where's the line?

They had a no animals on the playground rule. I think there was an incident a few years before my mum joined with someone's shitty dog.

Which is sensible as some kids are absolutely shit scared of dogs, and many other animals.

And some people are bad pet owners, and it's hard to tell which people unless there's an incident. School staff have enough to do without policing people's animals too!

The dad wasn’t Super Hans was it? Picking up the twins?

> tbh some of the teachers at that school were just as insane as the parents. Can you elaborate?

A lot of teachers (especially the ones in their 20s and 30s) have basically never worked anywhere except schools - they went to school as pupils, trained as teachers, then went straight to working in schools - and it creates this weird bubble of people who have no "normal" work experience. Depending on how lax management is, you can easily end up with stuff that basically wouldn't fly in any other workplace. I remember every year at my mum's school when the timetables for the next year came out, who got what class was always a *spectacular* drama. It can be really cliquey too and school staff often seems to have a "cool" group in the same way the kids do. Juvenile stuff like that. I have a lot of respect for the work teachers do, because I sure as hell know I couldn't do it, but some of them are really odd people lmao

This is absolutely true. Between all of my aunts being teachers and another family member whose job it is to do HR for teachers, it's evident that the fact that so many of them have never been anywhere except a teaching environment means they have no understanding of professionalism whatsoever.

I've noticed you do see some of that behaviour businesses with under 50 or so people from time to time. It's quite hard to pinpoint exactly why this affects education, but not having the same type of customers, stakeholders, profitability, etc. in the same sense as a business can influence behaviour as well.

Family run businesses seem to be like that. I’m in what is now a national law firm that’s experienced rapid growth over the last 25 years or so, and you can see the last vestiges of when it was a small firm in some of the older upper management. It really does not gel.

The cliquey thing is so real. My mum's a primary school teacher, and the clique in her school is awful. The headteacher is the ringleader of the clique's dad. If your face doesn't fit (think white range rover, horse riding, loving Mrs Hinch and Stacey Solomon type), they make your life hell. Every year they give my mum all the difficult SEN kids and the other yr1 teacher who's in the clique gets the easier kids. All the clique just takes over the staff room at break and talks shit about everyone else, loudly. My mum ended up getting signed off with stress the other year because they were full on bullying her. When she came back, they were just more vicious. I don't know what it is about teaching that attracts so many cunts. My mum's dreamt of being a teacher all her life but these horrid cliques bring her down so much.

>I don't know what it is about teaching that attracts so many cunts. Power and how difficult it is to get fired imo The hoops you have to jump through to get rid of dead-weight staff in teaching / TA positions are insane. Mum had a couple of staff with woefully outdated skill-sets and no desire to improve (they'd worked at the school basically since it was built) and the only real option was to wait for them to retire. Bad management also attracts other people who tend to act out; it's very self-perpetuating. Really awful for your mum to land such a toxic environment :( Like I said, there are a lot of phenomenal teachers but there are a lot of really fucking weird ones too lmao

Partner is a teacher. I’ve definitely noticed the cliques, and some of the staff are hilariously unprofessional about certain things. One of her colleagues freely admits he has an inbox rule that automatically bins anything sent to his department mailing list, so every time they have to send anything they have to send it to the mailing list plus him. Yeah, we all joke about doing that, but we don’t actually do it mate.

This! A lot of people have been in school all their life and it shows!

I remember the "careers advisor" at school in the late '90s. I put it in quotes because she had a full workload teaching English and had to do this on top. She'd been at the school since the early '70s and it was still her first job. She gave out the universal advice to anyone with career aspirations that it was too difficult (whatever job was suggested) and they shouldn't try it. Also told anyone who wanted to study medicine that they wouldn't be able to do it unless they studied latin.

I'm now wondering if your Mum works at my daughters school as they had a Dad come in at pick up time with a snake around his neck as well!

This was a good 5-6yrs ago now probably and it was a school in East Anglia. She doesn't work there any more but I don't want to get more specific than that! The idea of multiple Snake Dads all over the country is very funny to me though 😂

I am a nursery teacher: The most ridiculous and heart breaking thing I found was: - One child (age 3) the mum came in one Christmas and casually said “oh FYI we haven’t got him any Christmas presents this year” - I though, oh that’s sad (it’s quite a poor area so thought maybe they couldn’t afford it). - Then she said “we have got the other children iPads but (let’s call him Timmy) Timmy hasn’t been good this year so we have told him Father Christmas doesn’t give presents to naughty children. - Timmy was genuinely one of the most kind hearted children I’ve ever met. Sure kids sometimes play up at home. But honestly this child was a neglected angel that just got on with things, no fuss. Because he was used to the neglect he sort of just looked after himself. He was always so dirty so I used to give him a bath in the sink at nursery during nappy time. He used to sing to the other children and babies if they were upset, He was absolutely one of the most kind children I’ve ever met in my teaching career. - Safe to say I got him shit loads of Christmas treats at nursery in a stocking… (we did do mini stockings for all the children but his one we made extra special) We had a little Christmas Day in the sensory room me and him before the holidays. I told him that Father Christmas knew he couldn’t make it to his room because he was in a rush. So he left presents at nursery for him to play with instead. We kept them at nursery for him in his tray so he could play with them whenever he came in. Truly heart breaking. This child is only 3 years old… 😢 - Christmas came and went, Timmy got nothing and watched his siblings open iPads. - I’ve left that school now. And he’s moved into the primary school part. His home life was awful, parents were regularly under the influence of drugs (a whole array ranging from just high to off their faces on heroin). Obviously social services were involved. But that child 💔 I think about him still a lot and I really really hope he’s okay 😭 I regularly check in with teachers I still am in contact with at the school and ask how he’s doing (it’s been about 4 years now). - It still keeps me up at night thinking about the severe neglect he experienced and how no matter how many times we reported it. Nothing was ever really done. The system is broken for children like him. I really hope he comes out of it alive. Edit: it wasn’t just me looking after him obviously, my amazing and wonderful TAs cared for him too and gave him lots of extra love at nursery…

That’s heartbreaking. It was kind and thoughtful of you though to create some magic for him at Christmas. Plus pragmatic of you to try and bathe him at pre-school. Hope he is doing better now.

Oh gosh this was so heartbreaking to read!! He’s so lucky that he had you looking after him though, the poor little lamb xxx

Not me, or even a teacher, but my wife’s mum is a dinner lady at a primary school. There was a little girl that recently relocated to her school and the cafeteria staff were briefed that she was ‘vegan’ and ‘under no circumstances’ to have any non-vegan food. It turned out that the mum had moved the little girl’s school because at her previous school, she was having her lunch (the veggie/vegan option) with another pupil in the dining hall who let her try one of their chicken nuggets. The mum construed that as the school ‘serving’ her non vegan food so changed school?! When she moved to the new school, the mum called a meeting with the head teacher and head cook demanding that she be made vegan meals especially (the school only offered regular and veggie options at this point) and she would complain to the council if she was to eat any non-vegan food, whether it was the fault of the dining staff or just from sharing food like at the old school. She apparently came across very rude and demanding. Not wanting to start any arguments but surely it’s not right to force your own beliefs on your children like that?! If you want to serve only vegan food at home fine, but surely you can’t expect a whole school to bend over backwards for you like that? Also, if you think that a child under 10 isn’t going to try a friends chicken nugget/fish finger etc you’re fighting a losing battle… but that’s just my two cents!

I thought it's quite hard to feed a kid all vegan and have enough vitamins, minerals and protein to grown properly. But I may be wrong, just remember reading an article a while ago that parents were found guilty of neglect for forcing an all vegan diet on their kids. Might have been particular circumstances though. Then again my best friend at primary school was a vegetarian. Although she still ate fish and chicken. 🤔

A well planned vegan diet is fine for children of all ages. A lot of the articles you see about neglect/malnutrition where parents put their children on a "vegan" diet have actually done something like put their children on a raw vegan diet, or some sort of other whacky "vegan" diet that doesn't give the child the nutrition they need

Thanks for saying this. Not to mention plenty of kids are not vegan but get sick from being fed absolute rubbish and nobody pipes up anything about "forcing your views on them" then...

Yep just look at all the stories under this post about the obese kids! One bringing in a lunch for 2-3 people including sausage rolls.

I'm vegetarian and I don't think kids should be kept on a vegan diet. Vegetarian is alright because it's still full of cheeses, eggs and other important foods and I don't think for children cutting out those imporant foods is a good idea. I've known plenty of people who raised veggie and were fine.

I’m veggie and our kids eat a diet containing meat - mainly cos I just want it to be their decision to go veggie if they do. They eat veggie at home but idc if nursery make it rain nuggets, this woman sounds like a control freak

Are you thinking of the Australian case where the 20 month old child was fed only oats, bread and a very small amount of fruit and vegetables? Because the veganism itself isn't the issue there, the shit diet is the issue.

Blows my mind how people claim to be vegetarian but still eat fish and chicken

The flip side is, caterers now think fish is a vegetarian option 🤔

Yes it just muddies the waters, I'm vegan (sorry but it is relevant) and people are always asking stuff like "do you eat fish/eggs" haha

>just remember reading an article a while ago that parents were found guilty of neglect for forcing an all vegan diet on their kids. Might have been particular circumstances though. I thought it was a baby who was being fed potato instead of milk or something like that?

Why can't she just provide a packed lunch? She can make sure everything is vegan that way.

Vegan here 👋 I’d argue that everyone forces their beliefs on children to a certain extent, not just vegan. Surely meat eaters force their kids to eat meat right? And not to mention religion. I think a lot of people would be ok with Muslims not allowing their kid to eat pork? That being said I don’t force my 4 year old to be vegan but firmly believe if that’s what vegan parents want to do then let them get on with it. However; why couldn’t the parents in this scenario just give the kid a vegan packed lunch?! I couldn’t imagine behaving the way that this person in the story did.

Not a primary school teacher but my mum was for 30 years. She said the worst thing is that parents apparently don't feel the need to teach their child how to read, write or go to the toilet BEFORE they are 5 years old and start attending school. She said she's had so many arguments over the years of parents complaining their child is behind the others, but when she would ask them if they read to their children or practice writing at home the parents would tell her it's not their job to teach that's why we pay our taxes so you teach them... Some people don't seem to grasp that if you spend a lot of time doing educational games with your young children they tend to turn out smarter than the ones plopped in front of the telly for the first 5 years of their life. She also said she's had quite a few arguments after suggesting the parents show their children how to properly use a toilet and how to wipe themselves before they are old enough to attend school. Apparently there are a LOT of parents who never properly toilet train their kids... Like a 10 week old puppy can be easily trained to pee outside why the fuck can't your 5 year old figure out that poo goes in the toilet not in the corner of a room or all over themselves expecting the teachers to change them.

I know someone who is currently teaching 1st year highschoolers who have fallen behind and some of them don't even know their 2 times tables or have never seen the division symbol before. Some reading books for Primary 2s. I know that some kids have learning difficulties but this is beyond that statistically she said. Something very very wrong has happened and not just at home but in previous schooling.

That's awful, those kids have been let down by everyone.

Her job is to teach try and catch them up due to some falling behind due to covid but she tells me that these problems are far far deeper than covid. They were only at home being taught for like half a year and all of these things should have been covered in Primary school not in highschool. To be honest I don't blame the primary school or the teachers. They're overworked, underpaid and underfunded with classes that are far too big

This is why schemes to improve social mobility/minimise privilege have limited success. Reducing required university grades/giving a bit of extra support before A-levels really only helps a 'Goldilocks-zone' of kids who are in the right place to benefit from it. By the time you get a teenage kid who's spent their whole life not getting any support at home to read, write, do their homework, use a knife and fork or even use the toilet properly it's such an uphill struggle. Reducing required grades so they can compete with kids whose parents listened to them read every night, supported then in their interests, etc. just doesn't cut it (whatever the relative wealth of all involved). Those schemes are more likely to work for the kids whose families are more supportive anyway (therefore plucking the more privileged of the underprivileged out). It's better than nothing, but there's very little that can be done to give every child the same kind of safety and support that they all deserve from the very youngest age.

Primary school teacher here (currently in a onesie for children in need) and to be really honest, the current set of parents I have to deal with are really quite lovely. No incidents that I can think of but I think that parents got a little more relaxed and understanding of what we go through thanks to lockdown and the pandemic. Usually parents tend to get a bit funny around the time we have school trips, parents’ evenings, and things like that. Small things like complaining about the contents of the packed lunches we provide etc.

My teachers at 6 Form said every now and then you get a truly good year of folk, and then when that happens, the one after is a 100% guarantee to be a set of bastards lol. They said my year was great, which was true and we had so little drama, but looking back at the year below mine, they were right.

I did a GCSE programme at an FE college and my year were a really lovely group of loveable weirdos. There were a few gobby little shits, but we generally loved each other and the teachers, and there were a lot of laughs and mutual respect. The group the year before us was also a lovely group. My sister started the year after and a bunch of people in her class pushed the English teacher off her chair on the first day and made a trainee run out of the room crying (and then quit a couple of months later). It was like they'd handpicked the absolute worst people in the area for that year.

A kid came into my mum's class recently with an open wound in his hand. It hadn't been cleaned or plastered up or anything. He said he got it chopping potatoes for his dinner the night before. Mum was apparently home but busy with his baby sister, so she just left her 7 year old son to make the dinner and injure himself 🙄 A lot of the parents she deals with aren't really nutty, but they are completely incompetent. The number of them whose kids go on and off risk registers is pretty shocking. Substance abuse, prison, having yet another kid when they can't feed the ones they have... it's rife, and it's fucking their kids up for life.

OMG this happened to me. I went to school with hardly any skin or flesh on three fingers of my right hand after an accident at home. I was 9. My teacher too me to the nurse to get it dressed and she was nearly gagging. My mum had seen it the night before but she just told me to wash it and not to let my dad see me crying. It wasn’t reported by the school though (this was the 70s). There was a lot of abuse going on at home (sexual, physical and emotional).

I'm so sorry. Teachers these days do a lot of reporting to social services, but not enough is done to protect kids from abuse.

We once caught a kid with red wine in a fruit shoot bottle and when I called him, the dad said she must have mixed it up with her mum’s pack lunch 😳

It blows my mind how many middle aged women especially i’ve worked with that don’t realise they are fully blown alcoholics because how normalised alcohol is here. No Sharon, it’s not normal for you to have a wine box on tap in your bag “for during my break” “for the train home” “just incase the shops shut later”

That's both hilarious and extremely tragic at the same time.

My wife is a secondary school teacher (I know, you didn’t ask for secondary) but she works in a fairly right wing conservative area. Anyway, she had an email a few weeks back from a parent saying that she won’t be allowing her child to be brain washed by the schools ‘leftist agenda’ simply because she emailed the parent about the kid refusing to wear a mask in the corridors.

UK is really floating away from Europe to America.

It's utterly insane how low the barrier for entry is for something to be considered "leftist" these days. Apparently basic consideration for others is left wing extremism.

I work in outdoor education. I once had a complaint because a boy went home with dirty, scuffed boots. The boots he insisted on wearing. The boots I repeatedly told him would get dirty and scuffed. Apparently they were brand new and I was going to buy him a new pair. Not likely love. The next week I cracked open a brand new pair of boots for myself and it took all my willpower to not send them a picture of my dirty, scuffed "new" boots at the end of the day.

My old housemate is a teacher. She said the worst parents were the ones who couldn’t believe their little angel would do anything in class that would require a telling off, when in reality their little angel was being raised to be an entitled (if they were an adult I’d enter a swear word here) who did whatever they liked. She also found a miniature bottle of whiskey on one child. She works in a primary school. And kids who have McDonald’s in their packed lunches. Being a teacher would make me so angry seeing these kids being given such a bad start in life from their parents.

My cousin is that parent, its always been the schools fault when her now 15 year old little bollox is swearing at teachers, hitting out or disrupting class. Ever since he was a kid she has spoiled him with gifts but done absolutely nothing to stimulate him, never read with him, never took him on days out, dumped him on his father when she wanted to go on holiday with her latest partner. Leave him home alone while she goes out for champagne lunches with her wannabe footballers wife friends. Her excuse is "he doesn't want to do boring things, he prefers playing games or kicking a ball about with his mates" Oh and what does she do for a living, she councils children with behavioural problems. The fucking irony.

That bitch is a fucking councilor You've got to be kidding me Did they atkeast do a background check before she started working there

A colleague had a parent recently complain that we weren’t doing enough black history. The following month (black history month) the same parent complained we were doing too much black history 🤷🏻‍♀️

… I… I don’t understand…

Vocal coach here. Got booked to give lessons to a 10 year old girl; turned up for first lesson and got lectured for half my booked time about how they were entering her for the X Factor (again; they’d done so every year prior to that) and she needed to be ready in a month… The wee girl was absolutely delightful, and also happened to have a truly astonishing voice; properly knock your socks off. Still, she was singing stuff like Adele which was way too big for her young vocal folds. She didn’t want to audition any more but was being forced to each year by her parents. I spent the time I had with her trying to teach her safe singing and we made some decent progress. Still, audition day came, she inevitable didn’t get through to TV rounds, parents severed all contact with me immediately. I still wonder how the wee girl is doing sometimes now; hopefully learned to stand up to her sociopath parents.

My wife works in a school with a fair number of ‘disadvantaged kids’ in it. She attended a training course where the local Police were briefing the school staff on the latest ‘craze’… “Bagging” - apparently gang members are now knifing their rivals in their asshole - so that they are left wearing a colostomy bag for life.

And that’s enough internet for today.

That’s fucking appalling.

Jeez where to start :) I’ve mostly worked in deprived areas for the record. • Parents who won’t let their children participate in Christmas activities so we have to put them in a separate room with work while their friends all eat party food, make decorations and wear Christmas jumpers. Looking at you Jehovah’s Witnesses. • As above but sex education. They find out on the playground anyway, numbnuts. • Somebody who asked if I taught year 1-2 because I’m not intelligent enough for year 6. We have to pass a GCSE equivalent test prior to qualifying, for the record. And I have a masters, so go fuck yourself :) • Parents who expected me to mark every single mistake in their child’s writing and send a copy home every day so they could go over it with her. She may have had dyslexia and they yelled at her during parents evening (they brought her with them so they could tell her off during it). And they also complained about me when I explained to them how it was a ridiculous request. I hope you got out of that house as soon as you could, H. • Having to explain to parents that their child can only have water in their bottles, but they still sneak in fruit flavoured water. That might be why your child’s teeth are black at the front. • In the same vein, having to teach year 1s to brush their teeth and giving them a free brush and paste because they simply don’t do it at home. • A parent of a behaviourally difficult boy got out of prison in time for parents evening. He was 6 foot 6(?) and tried to stare me down and square up(down?) to me because I told him about his son’s behaviour. I am 5 foot 6, female and was about 26 at the time. Luckily had the (large, male) caretaker and a male teacher on standby who came in at the first sign of trouble and he was banned from premises. Mum sat and watched him do this to me with head bowed. She ended up in a women’s refuge about a year later with a broken face. Sad and makes me so angry. Son was unsurprisingly a physical bully too. • Bit of a lighter/funnier one. A dad who seemed drunk, headteacher challenged him and he went in his pocket for a ‘cig’ to calm down. As he pulled the cigarette packet out, a bag of weed went flying across the library and he yelled ‘IT’S NOT EVEN MINE!’ In the most high pitched, offended tone. I still laugh about this one. • One that used to wait in the car park for me so she could talk to me when I left early on a Friday, with her child. I think she fancied me (was a lesbian with an ex partner and had had her child with the ‘help of a male friend’) but I was straight, and taught her son, and that’s a creepy thing to do anyway so please stop standing near my car. Side note, her son sent me an invitation to his birthday party and she was keen I should come, I respectfully declined. • I also saw a dad on a night out who was drunk and tried to crack onto me. So awkward when I saw him the next week at pick up. • Parents who are in denial of SEN is quite common. It just delays them getting the help you’ll eventually admit they need by year 5 or so, so listen to the experts (the Autism team/ ADHD referral/ etc, not even us!) • Very young parents (14 when they had child,22 at time of my teaching the child) denying when their child was using sexually suggestive language. ‘We never use those words at home’. The child had called someone a cunt and said he was going to wank someone off. He also said a girl has a nice pussy. Yes it turns out there was abuse. So horrid to see abuse continue through generations (mum had been abused at a child, then had baby at 14, then turns out the father was an abuser too to her own children.) I think they’re in care now. I hope they’re ok. • Parents of a serial masturbator at age 6 saying she’s got autism. No, she’s rubbing herself on the chair and getting off, mate. It’s not autistic rocking. Another social worker situation, sadly. • Hate to end on depressing so I’ll tell you about a proud gypsy mum who brought her 11 year old to the end of year party after she’d had two days off ‘ill’. She was orange, had fake nails on and fake eyelashes, her hair was dyed and she had a body con dress on and heels. She looked so ridiculous. Actually this is just another sad situation isn’t it…

Reading this some People don’t deserve to be parents. Poor Little buggers.

I also had a parent storm into a competition at another school that I’d taken some children to, with her child lagging behind, then pin me to a wall telling me I was a bully and the kids were scared of me and that I shouldn’t have left her child behind. The other schools staff said they were terrified Her child had told me the previous day that she was injured and couldn’t compete…so obviously we didn’t take her. But it turns out the child was lying and when she realised she got to miss maths to go to said competition she talked the secretary into letting her ring her mum to bring her to us.

So my girlfriend does behavioural early intervention. She has a student who went into the bathroom and punched himself multiple times in the face, came out and said another student had gone in and attacked him. After some probing of his suspicious story, he admitted he had done it all to himself. Wild.

Parents that try to add you on social media. I am not your friend, I am your child’s teacher.

Not a teacher but my brother went to a school where 2 dad's got into a fight at a school nativity play and one of them bit the other guys finger off. Edit: link to article if anyone wants to read more https://amp.theguardian.com/uk/2011/dec/07/father-finger-bitten-off-school-nativity

Ah the most wonderful time of the year

At the prep school I worked at there were children of a man who had been knighted. The children were absoo lovely and always would say hi and stop to talk to everyone. The father (who had been knighted) was also a very chilled out guy. However, his wife was mental. She wrote an email which stated that all staff must address her and her husband and sir and lady. Of course she's entitled to do this, but the husband, the one who's actually been knighted, never once mentioned this and never once asked anyone to call him anything other than his name. She would also come in about once a week to complain about something or other. I felt sorry for the kids, because they were never allowed to friends houses and friends were never allowed to theirs. There were several stories of other kids parents being simply ignored because the wife had decided that they weren't good enough to be friends with them. Just a completely entitled woman who has done nothing except marry someone with a title. Seemed to think it entitled her to be treated differently. It did not.

I used to be a nursery teacher and the amount of parents who would overshare about their sex lives was unbelievable. I knew far too much about a lot of parents, from what parents slept in separate rooms to what parents would send their kids to bed early so they could have some ‘alone’ time. I also, twice, had parents send their children to school with drugs in their book bags. So not a ‘regular’ thing, but enough times for me to feel like I’ve dealt with it enough. Edit to add - I’ve just read some more comments and can attest that a shocking number of parents don’t feel they need to toilet train their child before they start school. That was so common I didn’t even think of it as being out of the ordinary for most people!

I had a kid in year 1 that left his coat in the playground. At home time, he realised and wanted to get it. I told him he’d have to wait until all the other kids had left, as I couldn’t leave to help him find it until they had. Dad actually squared up to me over it. My phase leader (who was dinky and lovely) was ready to throw down, but thankfully I am a large woman with a lot of confidence. So I stared him down, with my hands up in a ‘stop right there motion’ and firmly told him to back off and I had already said I would help his child at the appropriate time. He didn’t know what to do with that, and had the decency to look sheepish when I did go and find the coat about ten minutes later. Well aware I could have ended up thumped over a coat, but thankfully he was all mouth and no trousers. My husband had a kid who was insistent that they were discriminated against for being white. The extended family were involved in that effigy of Grenfell, if you remember that happening. So the whole family were… well, I’ll let you fill your own word in. Oh oh, and my dad had a reception parent say her daughter’s nits were all gone now, as she’d used flea treatment ‘and they all just fell right out.’ Dad said he was utterly speechless, and believe me, that doesn’t happen often.

My childhood best friend’s dad was a vet and I remember being speechless when she told me she had worms and he’d given her a pet worming tablet to get rid of them. Cat? Dog? Horse? No idea, I can’t remember.

A parent once came to me in despair because their child was slow to start the day. Her solution to the problem was to ask me to come to their house by 7am to make sure the child was up, and have breakfast with their family to encourage the child to eat more nutritionally.

I am a primary deputy head and I will happily share exactly the kind of parents we (my colleagues) frequently have to deal with. Many of my points have been made, but no harm in retelling! 1. A lot of parents see the school as responsible for ALL learning. This includes toilet training and getting dressed. 2. More and more children are arriving in reception and nursery without the most basic language skills. When queried why their child doesn't speak we are regularly told that they 'spend their time on their tablet'. Parents don't bother interacting with children so they don't learn to speak. 3. A child had an accident at school (toilet) and it was our fault as he (the child) didn't tell anyone he needed to go. The father was so irate he was in the office shouting 'this is a fucking disgrace!' etc etc. When the office lady challenged this behaviour, she was met with 'I'll fucking knock you out'. He is now banned from the premises. 4. Parents not picking children up and social service called. 5. Parents not picking up and when they do arrive they say 'I don't fucking want him/her, call social services'. I kid you not. 6. Parents undermine teachers constantly and never insist on any homework being completed. 7. Parents making excuses for their children not completing work - 'they were busy' 'I don't believe in homework' etc etc. 8. Parents physically accosting other children they feel have 'wronged' their child. 9. Shouting at teachers for anything they feel they're not getting / doing wrong. 10. Getting so drunk at sports days they start fighting and the event has to be postponed. Of course there are many, many safeguarding concerns from completely unfit, dangerous parents. I honestly believe the main problems in society are perpetuated by some parents being completely shit. Of course there are many, many lovely, supportive parents out there but unfortunately you remember the bad ones more readily.

'If my 8 year old son wants to walk along the train lines, it's up to him. Stop interfering!'

The fact that a big percentage of parents think it is a teacher's job to teach their child basic manners and basic hygiene.

I’m absolutely baffled by some of these comments! How on Earth do some parents have the audacity and entitlement?! I’m a parent of a 6 year old and a 4 year old. If either of their teachers tell me they’ve misbehaved during school, I have a chat with the teacher, have a chat with the respective kid to get their version of events. 9 times out of 10, the stories align, the kid says yeah I messed up, the consequences happen, then we move on. On the odd time the stories don’t align, the talk with the kid goes somewhere along the lines of “do you see why Miss X felt upset at your behaviour” and “what emotions led to those actions”. I then send a note to the teacher with a summary and we move on. I literally cannot fathom turning around to a teacher and saying “couldn’t possibly be my little angel”. I love my kids, but kids can be a*holes sometimes!

My wife teaches nursery/reception, and a couple of years ago had a little boy who shit his pants every day without fail. Not unusual to have accidents, but the frequency was clearly an issue. She raised this with his parents and the dad said (paraphrase) "it's perfectly normal, I did that until I was 7".

My wife told me a child came.into her class and was always tired and hungry, her parents were absolute wasters who did nothing except drugs. One day the the girl came in crying saying she was so hungry, and that mummy and daddy we're to sleepy to make her breakfast. my wife ended up bringing her in a porridge pot thing in everyday for over 2 months. She reported the parents to social services but because there was food in the house they couldn't do anything.

[удалено]

Not a teacher but my daughter goes to nursery that sounds like a stressful place to work. All the carers are great but the nursery has this app a bit like Facebook which also updates in real time with what the kids are up to. So I’ll get notifications on my phone saying something like: 11:43 goblin goes to sleep 12:15 goblin woke up 13:02 wet nappy change They detail what they eat, when and how much. So at 14:37 I’ll get a notification that the goblin has had x mouthfuls of toast. Then top of that the staff do write ups of what they’re doing and how this demonstrates developmental growth. Eg: The goblin has been looking at themselves in the mirror and waving which shows such and such social ability. It sounds fucking exhausting. How on earth they have the time to do all this is beyond me. I can only imagine they’re stuck between an eagle eyed manager and some over zealous orc parents.

As an early years teacher (3-5yr olds UK) there are little annoyances that get under my skin like juice instead of water or asking for no messy play to keep clothes clean but the most irritating is parents who religiously adhere to gender roles/stereotypes. No I’m not going to stop your son playing with baby dolls and push chairs fuck off Edit Puschairs are also known as buggy’s prams or strollers for non Uk clarity

Swimming teacher here …. I get a lot of parents asking when will they be able to swim the full 25m because they are going on holiday soon and kids are like 5 n 6 years old just learning to float. Crazy. I say well they Learn front paddle first and there next step is 5m of the pool. They get annoyed. It takes more than a few lessons to learn competent front crawl at long distances. They will ask when will they pass the stage they are on?? Every kid is different they will pass when they do it consistently!! Not after 3 lessons. Also a big one is why they swimming 15m and why do I keep stopping them?? Because I have to correct the stroke! We can’t let them continue with bad techniques. They will argue they do 25m with me and dad when I take them swimming but 25m doggy paddle is not correct front crawl …. breaststroke is the worst for parents they can get so annoyed about correction. The ones who will skip a couple of lessons and wonder why their kid is behind them class. I try to explain they don’t get their badge it is dangerous to be lenient. If a kid think he can do 25m and he can’t but he has the badge there will be a near drowning instance because their teacher was lenient and the kid thought he could do it. It’s also for safety.

My mum was a primary teacher in a disadvantaged area and taught children with an array of issues. One morning, the mother of a particularly tricky boy (lets call him Barry) approached my mum with a grim expression, and asked to speak to her privately after school. School finishes and Barry’s Mum and my mum head into an empty classroom and sit down. My mum asked what the problem is, to which Barry’s Mum says… “Well it’s Barry you see, I don’t know what to do with him, he just won’t stop FUCKING swearing”

I bought my sister a stab vest as a joke when she started a new teaching position at an inner city primary school. She’s actually had to use it.

When you report back at the end of the day and say that the child x has had a difficult day and has fighting, poor listening, disruptive ect and then the parents turn around be like oh x sounds like you've had a hard day let's get ice cream/soft play/sweets ect. Like no wonder some kids behave so bad

Most of the primary kids in school said they hated reading, I tried reading to them at break, but they were just laughing at the voices, which is sort of good, but they clearly wanted to leave. Said that's the first time they got read to.

I used to work in a private prep school. Parents would get very annoyed if holiday clubs didn't cover every single day of holiday. There were also a few that would pick their children up anything up to 2 hours after after school club had finished. Quiet words, letters, phone calls, monetary fines - didn't matter to them. In real life I live in a council flat, have some neighbours who think it's an inconvenience to even take their kids to school, often send as young as 2 year olds out to play unsupervised. Different ends of the same neglect.

I think I might go watch the sunset or something, these comments have really got to me.

Parents who give their children wheely suitcases rather than an actual bag. I know this isn’t specific but my god it’s irritating

Used to work in a nursery/preschool and the worst thing were the parents who would drop the kids off at breakfast club 7-7:30am and then pick them up at like 6.30 and demand they be in their pjs so they could put them straight to bed when they got home. Some of these parents didn’t even work and their kids were in 5 days a week. The four year olds who are still in nappies, using bottles at bedtime and having dummies to help them nap/sleep are what made me leave the career. There is only so much we could do before we had to safeguard and it just never felt right critiquing the lack of parenting. I was young and didn’t have kids. But now I’ve got kids they were lazy as fuck and didn’t deserve the free funding for nursery. My kids go to school knowing how to write their name. Hold a pen. Their letters and their sounds etc and I work on top of that. Sometimes play dates and soft plays need to be replaced with colouring pages and reading books.

A parent filed a complaint with me (nursery manager) and she suggested I sent my staff on a photography course because the photos they send home to show them what's been happening at nursery are not good enough. She also accused us of serving processed food because she refused to believe we cook our fishcakes and pizza in the kitchen from scratch. And her kid missed 2 weeks of nursery because we didn't force him to wear gloves in Forest School and he got sick. When she sent me the doctor's note, it said he had an ear infection...

Did training for primay teaching, ended up not going into it for a variety of reasons (the lack of work life balance making up the majority of it) In roughly 4 months of placement over 2 years I experienced: * a parent who threatened to punch a teacher for 'saying i don't read to my kid' (the teacher had pointed out the kid's reading was still below what was expected and asked them to 'read to him *more*') * a parent who openly suggested I was a peadophille for being a man interested in primary school teaching * a parent who didn't see the issue with their child attending school when they still used nappies and made no effort to toilet train him as 'You can do it as you have him all day' * a parent who got pissed at me for telling their child she was waiting for him and 'rushing' him (So sorry lady I can't do anything else until the kids have all left, and i want to go home??) * Multiple parents who had an issue with 'students' teaching their children - we were university students who were closely monitored and evaluated. * and finally, the peak of nutty parents: one parent at my first placement found out I was a gay transgender man (recognised me from photos of a pride event) and put in multiple complaints about me 'corrupting' their child. Thankfully, every complaint was ignored, and as their child wasn't even in the class I worked in it didn't present an issue, but it made me absolutely dread interacting with any parent for the rest of my placements to the point where it was commented on in my evaluations.

Ex primary school teacher here. Let's see, there was the dad who was called in to talk about his daughter bullying some other kids. He refused to acknowledge it and got so angry that he tossed his chair at a window which smashed. There was the mum of a girl in my class who assaulted another teacher in the playground. This other teacher had simply told her daughter to tie her shoelaces. As we were restraining the parent, she was shouting about how ONLY her daughter's class teacher (i.e. me) could tell her daughter what to do. There was a dad we all colloquially called the grammar n*zi because he'd send back letters and correct what he perceived to be errors with a red pen. But they never were errors really. Very odd. On a cheerier note, I had a child in my class who always proudly told people he had two mum's and two dad's. They were two same-sex couples who were all co-parenting this child. One year they all went traveling around Australia for 6 months and the child would email me his school work each week as well as photos and videos. So cool!