Teeth cleaning to be taught in nurseries and schools

I'm struggling to understand which teachers are doing this toothcare work.
We are not discussing the " school nurse" doing this are we ?
If it is the "ordinary" teacher whose job(i;e; the one that they signed up for and are actually paid for) is to........eerrr...... teach,then I'm surprised that we can recruit anyone at all to teach.
As someone else observed , there's the potty training and feeding children..........
Some teachers seem to be unpaid Social Workers as well as the day job.
They probably all do it with a good heart but WTF.

JaneJudge

I honestly don't see a problem with it being part of the days routine

You mean at home or school?

My Infant school school teacher will have a complete meltdown if anymore responsibilities are piled in her and her 2 part time LSA (with 34 children)

Now I come to think of it, we had a school dentist too, who would check your teeth. If there was something wrong, you got a letter to give to your parents. And there was the nit nurse who checked your head for the beasties and gave you a letter for your parents as well. That was in the 60s.

Scottish council schools taught children how to brush their teeth when I started school as a five year old in 1956, and it was taught at the brownies too.

Here in Denmark, all council schools have a dental clinic they attend regularily with ever class of children, and all treatment is free of charge until the age of 18.

Unfortunately, a lot of adults now cannot afford to go regularly to a dentist, but at least we all know how to brush our teeth.

I do understand the argument that parents should teach their children to wash, brush their hair and teeth properly, eat healthy meals and have good manners, but not all parents do, so picking up the slack either at school or through free health care for children does save the state quite a lot of money, one way and another.

LovesBach

My son, aged four, went to a playgroup for a year or so before starting school. From time to time they had a 'special visitor' who would spend half an hour showing the children how to brush their teeth, how to tie their shoelaces, how to wash their hands throughly and properly - not forgetting thumbs! - and similar useful life skills for small people. These interludes always included colourful items - huge 'clown' shoes to practice shoelace tying etc. and often a brightly coloured toothbrush to bring home. DS found this most interesting. Does this happen in nurseries/playgroups today?

Isn’t this a parents role?

I know there’s masses of families in poverty and chaos, but if these parents cannot even manage the absolute basics then frankly I despair!

What would be good would be to re- introduce the “troubled families” (awful name!) and have family support workers working with these families.

I worked, alongside Family Workers, when doing outreach for the DWP, I worked on budgeting and preparing for work and ensuring the right benefits were in payment and the family workers helped with childcare education, ensuring school was attended, worked alongside teachers and health visitors.

It’s not a quick fix and requires time and money.

ayse

I remember when all state primary schools had a nurse and there were school dentists. Health visitors who looked at child welfare, welfare clinics etc. The clinics were not just for people on state benefits.

Whilst costly it certainly looked after the health of UK children.

I’ve no objections to paying towards the health of the younger generation. Reintroduce school milk, orange juice and cod liver oil!

Yes!

My son, aged four, went to a playgroup for a year or so before starting school. From time to time they had a 'special visitor' who would spend half an hour showing the children how to brush their teeth, how to tie their shoelaces, how to wash their hands throughly and properly - not forgetting thumbs! - and similar useful life skills for small people. These interludes always included colourful items - huge 'clown' shoes to practice shoelace tying etc. and often a brightly coloured toothbrush to bring home. DS found this most interesting. Does this happen in nurseries/playgroups today?

If teeth cleaning had been taught in my school at primary level I probably wouldn't have had the pain and discomfort of horrible tooth ache and its associated problems. Especially if we had to have a brush and paste to keep at school and use daily.
By the time I was able to really have the knowledge and get this sorted myself I had a fear of dentists and it was pain that forced me to go.
My parents both had had poor dental health and dentures at an early age and just didn't consider it important.
I was strict about tooth cleaning with my own sons and as adults they have good teeth. I have fillings and crowns that need constant attention.

What about head lice ? Should that be a schools responsibility…Just asking

JaneJudge

I honestly don't see a problem with it being part of the days routine

No, but evidently some parents do see it as a problem.
Increasing the number of children’s dentists is a good idea, but it won’t help if attendance is not obligatory before it is needed to repair damage, and if home dental care isn’t taught and used.

I honestly don't see a problem with it being part of the days routine

We were taught how to brush our teeth back in the 60s, I remember the dentist coming into our school, we were each given a red Colgate mug with brush & paste.
With so much on teeth health today I am surprised there are so many problems with teaching kids how to brush correctly. Mind you we didn’t eat as much rubbish as they do today. I had my first filling in my late 20s

We have to work with how things are, not how we'd like them to be. Ie enough health visitors, school dentists and so on just aren't there. So I welcome an initiative as does SaverSaver9 above.

Of course, it's the parents responsibility, hopefully parent awareness can be linked to it.

I don’t think using breakfast clubs would be teaching the right advice though, because you should wait at least half an hour, preferably an hour, to clean your teeth after eating, as doing it sooner damages the enamel. I found this out because when my daughter was seven she told me she had learned it at school.
A hard hitting advertising campaign on social media would probably have the most effect on parents? Maybe Mumsnet could help promote the messages too.

Actually, this could be part of the government’s free breakfast club time, though the parents would need to supply at least the toothbrushes to avoid the incredible amount of time it would take to hand out individual ones and then ensure no cross contamination.
Looking at the images on TV, it seems the damage has been done before the children even get to school. Encouraging nurseries and preschools to teach the children how to brush their teeth properly, is a good idea.
Sadly, if it became part of the daily preschool or nursery routine, that would just encourage parents who already don’t bother to say “Well they’ll get it done there, so we don’t have to bother.”
Equally sadly they would probably hold nurseries, preschools and schools responsible for the state of their children’s teeth.

Hygienists used to run the PDUs I mentioned above.

Funding would have to be available before you insisted that all dentists took on a reasonable quota of children as NHS patients. It's the funding that is missing.

I appreciate this is a good move , but really !?

I agree with the premise, SaverSaver9 but this is not the job of teachers, or more likely, TAs. How long out of the morning will be spent supervising a class of 30 Infant children in a school cloakroom with possibly 3 washbasins?
Far more appropriate for dental hygienists to conduct sessions, with parents in attendance, and for the government to insist that all dentists have to take a reasonable quota of children as NHS patients .

Does anybody remember the Ivory Castle Club which was started by Gibbs Toothpaste, during the 1960s, in an effort to persuade children to brush regularly and correctly (and to sell more Gibbs Toothpaste).

I remember being given a free, brightly coloured, tooth related comic.

I was born in the early 50’s. My mum, who had poor teeth herself, was not that hot on tooth brushing, but we always went to the dentist and also saw the school dentist, but any fillings were done by our ‘own’ dentist.

As I got a bit older, I started brushing my teeth regularly, but more on my own initiative than mum’s.

Plus we had sugar in our tea as a matter of course.

When I had my own children, I was very particular about their teeth, and supervised teeth cleaning for quite a while. Also fussy about sweets etc.

As for poverty nowadays, well, a toothbrush and a tube of cheap fluoride toothpaste don’t cost much. Tesco’s own brand of the latter is 50p.

Cut down on a can or two of sugary drinks, and they would be paid for.

I don’t agree with teachers parenting it’s not their job
What’s been happening to these children s teeth in the 3/4 or 5 years up to joining school … damage already done in my opinion shutting the stable door and all that
Teach the parents if they need teaching perhaps the nurses at Surgeries should be having regular meetings with new parents beyond the first year of the babies life and these things and others can be observed and acted on during these compulsory appointments (This method could also pick-up child abuse ….another thing poor teachers have been charged with missing)

Hells Bells! Don't teachers have more than enough to do - like actually teaching, for instance? And anyway, the poor buggers are pretty well occupied with changing the nappies and wiping the bums of kiddies whose lazy parents are quite content to adopt the philosophy of "well it's the schools job, innit? It's what we pay taxes for, innit?"

If these Wayne and Waynetta Slobs are capable of producing children but incapable of teaching them the basics then forced adoption is a possible answer. But I suppose that would infringe somebody's Human Rights. Never mind a teacher's Human Rights not to have even more child-rearing responsibilities piled onto them......

Teaching teeth cleaning in nurseries and schools is a great initiative to promote early dental hygiene. It can help instill good habits at a young age, preventing dental issues in the future. By educating children about proper brushing techniques and the importance of oral health, we can contribute to long-term health benefits and raise awareness about the significance of taking care of their teeth.

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I remember when we were told to clean our children's teeth from when they got their first teeth then brush for them for several years (at least 6) at the same time to start teaching them how to brush themselves.

Allira I can remember it being advised for parents to get babies used to a soft brush to massage their gums before they started cutting their teeth.
Also that children needed help up to the age of 8 years, as they don't have the manual dexterity to brush their teeth sufficiently well before that.