Very upset at teacher! Am I wrong??

[stay at home mom]

My son who is 4 goes to pre-school two mornings a week. They are strict about not sending your child to school if he/she is ill. Well this morning there was a note in his file folder saying that their is one confirmed case of pink eye, and one confirmed case of strep throat. The teacher says she felt ill so she went to doctor and has strep throat as well. Says doctor gave her penicillan. My concern was she was there teaching while sick! Our children are not allowed if they are obviously not well, but she is there with a very sore sounding throat. My son comes home and says Ms. so and so lost her voice. She did say she cleaned class room with bleach. I am still concerned. I almost didn't let him enter the classroom, but knew how dissapointed he would be if I didn't let him go. Am I over reacting?

[~member~]

No, I don't think you are over reacting. That is why there is sick pay and substitute teachers. Even if there wasn't, i would happily keep my child home until the teacher was well again. What if something were to happen? Would her senses be up to par to deal with an emergency? i also can't believe she didn't think anything of possibly infecting small children. Strep throat is not something to play around with.

[stay at home mom]

My thoughts exactly. I thought she could at least call us and inform us of this BEFORE we brought our child to school.

[gurumama]

my dr told us a long time ago that if you have strep, once you've been on the antibiotics for 24 hours you're no longer contagious.

maybe this is why she continued to teach? she took the drugs?

then again, why woulod you want to be in charge of a class full of 4 yo with strep--wouldn't you be exhausted?

I think they should have just gotten a sub...

[Foobar]

Our daycare will allow any sick child for an infectous disease after 24 hours of antibiotics.

I think this is kinda standard, but I wonder if she didn't have enough sick days to take off?

[chellemarie]

You're contagious with strep before you're diagnosed, so if there was one confirmed case and then the teacher found out she had it to, your child was probably already exposed.

Also, if she was on antibiotics 24 hours before class, she was no longer contagious. I send my kid to school 24 hours after he's had the antibiotic, so I suppose I don't mind if the teacher does the same.

Almost every time my son has a sore throat and we get him checked, the first test comes back negative. So we give him some tylenol and send him off to school. Two days later the doctor's office calls and says "The long test came back positive for strep. We've called in the antibiotic for you."

Argh! I always feel bad when that happens because I know we exposed other kids, but we can't keep him home every time the throat is scratchy waiting for the long test to come back, you know?

It's great they let you know there's stuff going around, though so you know what you've been exposed to if you start getting symptoms.

[teachma]

As a teacher who OFTEN teaches while sick (strep, flu and other) I will say that there are several factors that contribute to my decision. First, though there are theoretically substitute teachers to sub in my class, it is frequently difficult to find one when I need one. Particularly because illnesses tend to creep up on us, it is sometimes too "last minte" to get a sub. Second, it is usually more difficult to create lessons and sub plans while I am ill than it is to come in and teach myself. Third, if I use up my sick days when I'm sick, what will I do when my 2 year old is sick and there's no one to take care of him? I agree that your child's teacher probably should have been at home recuperating from strep throat. In an ideal world, we could all stay home when ill, but in reality other factors interfere, sometimes rendering it not possible.

[stay at home mom]

Okay I guess I overreacted. Not as informed about strep as I should be. On one hand I hate sending him to school with sick kids, but on the other he loves it so much he would be unhappy if he didn't get to go. I am trying to be more tolerant of others who are sick more often than my family.

[3boys4us]

Okay I guess I overreacted. Not as informed about strep as I should be. On one hand I hate sending him to school with sick kids, but on the other he loves it so much he would be unhappy if he didn't get to go. I am trying to be more tolerant of others who are sick more often than my family

Don;t beat yourself up, it's natural to be upset. OTH once your son starts school he will get every disease that he can at first and eventually even out. My kids were all really sick when they first started school with everything. But eventually they build up immunity.

[Liz]

My doctor told me strep throat is only contagious through swapping spit (I don't know the technical term) so kids might pass it around but adults don't in normal work circumstances