Coatless kids

My boys school I I incredibly strict on uniform.
Ridiculously so, so i don't blame the pupils for pushing back, where they can.

I expect at school they are not ad hoc but are only wearing the bottom layers!

By that I mean just the shirt and skirt or maybe the sweatshirt but no coat etc..

Where’s the school rules,then? Don’t they have any there ? I find it incredible that they would even be allowed to do this. I guess it must be a bit of a police state where I live because they would simply not be allowed to dress in an ad hoc way like that.

They are trying to show how tough they are...only wimps need coats! It's the same as not wearing wellingtons when it's pouring with rain. Idiots!

Children are not human. Even in snowy weather I had to send children back in to get their coats when I was on playground duty.

It's the young girls who go for a night out that worry me. I'm sure some of them must get frostbite.

But then I was as bad....well not so much skin showing but the same principle. It was a sort of unwritten code known to all young people in this area. If you were single (male or female) you didn't wear a coat. Once in a relationship you wore a coat or jacket. I was so glad when the time came that I could wear a coat lol.

Kids look on it as being uncool to be wrapped up. My gran kids are all in their teens and they have lovely jackets but no big overcoats. The sign of the times.

NanaTuesday you can't fit the car seat correctly over a coat. They have to be pretty tight - much tighter than you'd think was enough.
I expect that was why.

My sons were the same. I think not only they follow their 'gang' but also they follow what the popular media say is suitable clothing. Popular media includes celebrity 'stars'.
My elder son in his 60s is still underclad.

Imarocker

Schools would have to have a lockable locker for each child - and room for the lockers. When I went to school we hung our coats on our named pegs and they stayed there. No one ever had their coat taken. I don’t think that would happen today.

No one ever had their coat taken. I don’t think that would happen today.

You do have to wonder why it was once possible for children to hang their outdoor wear on pegs and it not get stolen.

What happened?

It appears that the solution to the problem of stealing coats is to remove the cloakrooms and pegs - rather than deal with the fact of theft?

IMO they just don’t feel the cold the way many older people do. I well remember in teens and 20s wearing very skimpy clothing for nights out in the depths of a snowy winter, and thinking nothing of it.

I’m very different now!
My Gds (7) will hardly ever wear a coat however cold it is. He’s skinny as a rake, but a human hurricane, and eats like a pair of 🐷🐷.

They have to go on a waiting list for a locker at my boy's school, and have nowhere to sit at lunchtime, as the younger children are served first.

So, not sure where they are supposed to put puffer jackets.

watermeadow
I totally agree with you as I see Secondary children the same in this awful weather , it’s like a badge of honour 🤔 But weren’t we the same ? As I remember never wanting to do up my buttons !
Another thing another reply mentioned was the way babies are dressed nowadays . We had a visit from younger family members with a 3month old just after Christmas- straight into the house ( albeit from car ) No jacket, cardi or hat ! The same a few weeks ago !
Do they think babies aren’t susceptible to cold weather or are they just plain stupid .?
As for the carrying of all school paraphernalia it’s ludicrous nowadays , my GC have school lockers but they are in another part of the school which makes it nigh on impossible to get back there throughout the day .
It’s a big enough jump from Junior School without the added stress of the huge amount to be carried around all day every school day .

There’s nowhere to put coats at my daughter’s school. We always struggle to find her a suitable coat for outside of school as it is. And she’d struggle having to deal with a coat over the top of her already uncomfortable and restrictive uniform due to her own peculiar needs. Fortunately it’s only five minutes to the stop for the school bus. So she doesn’t get cold and I walk with her and can take her brolly home if she’s needed to take that.

As my grandmother always used to say 'Where there's no sense there's no feeling'

It isn't cool to wear a coat. However, you'll be pleased to know that school blazers and trousers are often coated to keep the rain out!

When I was at school (40-odd years ago), we didn't have lockers or cloakrooms either. We also had to carry everything around with us all day, the only difference was that we had half a dozen heavy textbooks instead of a laptop or tablet, so we were carrying more weight than the kids do now.
As for coats, I'd say it's a case of personal choice/laziness to not bother with a coat in this weather, back in our day, we wouldn't be caught dead without a coat when it was this cold!

Chestnut

I agree that lockers are absolutely essential for secondary schools and parents should do everything possible to make the school provide them. There are so many things children need, it's just not right to make them carry everything around. If things are stolen then the school needs to find a way to deal with this and prevent it happening, but lockers would at least ensure the items are not available to steal.

Lockers take up corridor space. Pupils accessing lockers take up even more corridor space. Imagine the amount if corridor space that 1000+ lockers would require.
I started teaching secondary ago, and I'm fairly certain I've never taught in a school with cloakroom with pegs. Only very old (pre-WW2?) school buildings had cloakrooms imo.

Kids at school only have a small locker, the coat’s won’t fit in so they would have to cart it around all day along with all their other stuff, just a question of logistics.
Coat pegs went out many years ago there were too many thefts.
My girls used to just wear a fleece then tie it around their waists in school.

I was once staying overnight in Newcastle with my late husband. It was late December and snowing. Girl waiting at a bus stop had a short skirt and sleeveless top on! They must have thermal skin in the NE. Mind you, late husband happily wore shorts in the winter and said sleeping in a dormitory at boarding school toughened him up!

Primrose53

Kids around here are the same but they are teenagers and I guess they don’t think they look cool.

What I don’t understand is how parents can take tiny babies and toddlers out in hardly any clothes. I’ve seen tiny babies with no hats, no gloves and just a little cardigan and socks while the parents are wearing great big puffa coats and furry parkas!

We have had icy cold winds here the last few days and seeing little cold fingers and ears sticking out makes me shiver. Teenagers have a choice but babies don’t.

I once questioned this, I knew the baby's mother quite well.
I was told to mind my own business, as she liked to show her baby off outside!
Her poor baby had no say in the matter.

I don’t think young people feel the cold as much as older folk. I didn’t however, I think the rule about the school not having lockers should be addressed.

I was at school in the 60/70s and no one used the cloakrooms, they were open plan and leaving anything there was open open invitation to everyone to help themselves. No one wore a coat and as girls we had to wear skirts and socks until we were in the 3rd year (year 9). I remember red, chapped legs stinging from the rain & soaking wet shoes that never dried in winter. Thank the Lord for central heating & more than one pair of shoes.

Same over here. I wasted quite a bit of money buying winter boots for teens; they never wore them. Mind you, it was minus 10 c here this morning, so hopefully some of the kids actually put on winter clothes.

Juliet27

I think maybe it’s more a case of no common sense in the pupils. I noticed, in freezing weather, a couple of girls yesterday with bare legs and skirts that just skirted their bottoms. The last think they’d want is clothing to cover themselves.

I saw a secondary school girl today wearing a skirt (and thin tights) which did not cover bottom …

Walking into my secondary school, where I work, wrapped up for the arctic passed many students in their school polo shirts. On the other hand been in many a hot classroom and they won’t take coats off !