This is the totally embarrassing nationwide disaster occurring in our colleges. ‘Busy’ dad and mom will hate me, however I’ve had sufficient. This six-year-old boy’s request was the final straw, writes instructor MARY SAWYER

Standing in front of a classroom of 30 Year One pupils, I’m ready to start teaching when a hand suddenly shoots up.

The six-year-old boy looks at me confidently, before saying as loudly as he can, ‘Miss! My nappy needs to be changed.’ No shame, no embarrassment.

I feel frustrated because taking him off to change him will completely disrupt the 45-minute lesson, but I keep a smile on my face to reassure him.

Still, some of the other children giggle and pull faces.

It can’t be fun for the boy either, who lies there on the carpet in silence while a fresh nappy is put in place.

You might think this is a one-off, but it’s become par for the course in the primary school where I work.

I would be utterly ashamed to send a child of mine into class still in nappies. But parents today? They shirk more and more of their responsibilities.

If I had a pound for every time I’ve heard, ‘We thought you would toilet- train them’, I’d have enough funds to retire to Monaco.

At 36, I have been teaching for 14 years and the situation has been dire for a while. But I can honestly say that, in 2026, we are now at a stage of national crisis.

That’s why last week’s report suggesting children lack the basic skills needed to start school didn’t surprise me or any of my colleagues.

An annual poll of 1,000 primary-school teachers found that one in four children starting reception are not toilet-trained and the same proportion cannot eat independently.

According to the report, teachers are spending an hour and a half every day on average either changing nappies or helping children go to the loo – the equivalent of an entire school day per week.

It went on that teachers said the frequent interruptions led to a ‘stop-start’ day, with 70 per cent saying it had an impact on class progress.

Pastoral care has always featured in school classrooms. We get involved in everything from feisty divorcing parents to the death of a beloved pet.

And of course accidents do happen, but the notion that it’s now the norm to send children to primary school unable to use a loo is utterly wrong on so many levels.

And yet it’s so common that in my school, in a well-to-do town in the south of England, we have a bank of spare clothes and underwear, along with nappies, wipes, gloves, masks and lotions in a fully equipped changing station (all of which comes out of the school budget).

In fact, most of the primary schools I have worked in have needed these amenities. And I’ve dealt with children aged from four to seven who still aren’t toilet-trained almost every day of my career.

We have teaching assistants to support us in the delivery of the class plan, and to help the vulnerable ones or those not so quick to learn.

 

But instead, their job has morphed into behaving as glorified nannies. Most don’t mind – but there are limits. Thankfully they are usually women, because I’d hate to think about the safeguarding issues that come with men performing this role.

I’ve changed hundreds of nappies in the schools I’ve worked in. (The irony that I’m not a mother myself but have likely had more nappy experience than some of the parents I encounter, doesn’t escape me.)

I feel angry and overwhelmed on a daily basis that responsibilities which I see as primarily parental are being transferred to school staff. On more than one occasion, I have had a good cry on the hour-long drive home from work.

Parents are desperately failing our future generation. Yet as much as I would love to unleash my frustration on them, I have to keep my professional head on with a false, supportive smile.

This is not what I envisaged when I became a teacher. After studying for a psychology degree, I knew that I wanted to work with children. First, I spent two years as a teaching assistant and found it so rewarding.

Ready to commit, I did the year-long post-graduate certificate in education (PGCE) to become a teacher. I knew that the hours would be long, and my salary would be far from stellar. 

But for me, teaching a new generation of children was a real privilege. But do I still feel that same passion 15 years later? Some days, I feel as though I don’t have time to teach at all.

In the well-off neighbourhood where I teach, the parents work full-time with good jobs, fancy cars, swanky clothes.

And they are extremely articulate when they try to convince me that they’ve given toilet training ‘a good go’ during the summer holidays.

Initially, I spot the hint of embarrassment, but these types are good at changing the subject and pivot the conversation to how fantastic their month-long summer holiday in Italy was.

Yet their children still arrive at school in a nappy, so it leaves me wondering where their priorities lie.

In one recent lesson, while covering for another teacher, I was utterly dumbfounded when one little boy confidently told me: ‘It’s snack time now, Miss! But first we have to line up for our nappies to be changed!’ A totally normal daily occurrence for him.

This was a class of four- and five-year-olds, and there were at least a dozen children in the queue.

Even more bizarrely, we have to report it in the log book each time the nappy is changed so that (inexplicably) parents know when it occurred.

If you forget, parents will pull you to one side and demand to know when it was done.

I once forgot to inform a parent at the end of the school day and she sent an abusive message on the class app at 10pm.

In fact, there are often parents messaging late at night asking how many times their child has been changed that day. Nothing to do with education, just their child’s nappy behaviour.

On what planet can this be justified? It’s so dispiriting that this is now the environment I’m forced to work in.

I have teaching friends who work at schools where they refuse to admit children if they aren’t nappy-trained, but they are few and far between. As controversial as it sounds, the increase in children labelled as special educational needs (SEN) has only made the situation worse.

 I know that some children have severe needs, but sometimes it comes down to the parents simply not trying.

I may sound cynical, but I get the sense some deliberately stop training because they want the disability label.

If they get a diagnosis of ADHD or autism, they receive Disability Living Allowance and I have seen an uptick in parents pushing (and pushing) for this, as it can be as much as £110.40 a week.

For some teachers, this assumption that they are some sort of au pair is too much.

One friend in her mid-50s was off for most of last year after putting her back out changing a child’s nappy. When she returned, totally disillusioned, she asked to be transferred to an older age group. This hasn’t happened, so she is now seeking early retirement.

As she told me: ‘Nothing matches seeing a child’s face light up when you read a story together. But over the last decade I’ve done less of that and more grunt work, like mopping up accidents or leaving the

classroom with a child so I can change their nappy. It’s hard physical work doing this day in and day out.’

Everyone is feeling it in the school system.

Contrary to the popular perception that teachers have it easy, we’re usually in by 7.30am and, when we get home we’re on our laptops until 9pm planning lessons.

I’m now considering a career change so I can claw back some kind of work/life balance. I recently joined a Facebook group called ‘Life After Teaching: Exit the Classroom and Thrive’.

There are more than 178,000 teachers in the group and the general feeling is of exasperation and depression, with a high percentage of the group keen to quit the profession. Can you blame us?

Mary Sawyer is a pseudonym

As told to Samantha Brick