A mother has expressed her shock at two of her children being told they can’t play outside because they breached school rules about haircuts.

Alfiee-Joe, nine, and Declan, eight, were said to have ‘extreme haircuts’ by teachers at Silver End Academy on Monday this week.

Mum Claire Mitchell, 28, received a call to say that her eldest son’s hair went against the rules.

She then pointed out that her younger son had the same haircut so he was also banned from the playground.

Claire said: ‘Literally when she rang me, she said it’s nothing to do with his behaviour, we are going to have to take them off the playground.

‘I said “what about my other son?” and they said, “Oh,we hadn’t noticed”. I kind of dropped him in it.’

The boys moved to the school in May and Claire said Alfiee-Joe suffers from anxiety but after a good week they took him for a treat and a haircut.

She now believes it will take around six weeks for the boys’ hair to grow back to an acceptable length.

She said: ‘If they are going to keep him in that long he’s going to be scaling the walls. It’s just a bit over the top.

‘Alfiee stayed up until 11.30pm last night worrying because he didn’t want to go to school. He sits and worries about things.

‘My other son – he is a model student – is devastated he is now being punished for a hair cut.’

Claire said the boys’ previous schools did not have a problem with the style, but the school’s head teacher, Simon Webb, says they would have been aware of the rules.

He said: ‘Whenever we have new parents come into any one of our academies we take the parents through the home school agreement.

‘It’s a set of statements which we believe are agreed between the home and school in terms of uniform, behaviour and general support the school can offer parents and advise parents. We are open to anyone coming in with any concerns and any worries.

‘That school agreement is signed by parents before children arrive and 99 to 100% of the time we never have to refer to that.

‘I think in this case the parents have chosen to take their boys and have their hairs cut in a way which is not appropriate to the academy and makes the boys stand out more than any normal haircut.

‘This isn’t the first time this has happened. Rather than ask the children to stay off school like most secondary schools would, we take the children off the playground and sit in the library or a classroom with an adult who can supervise them. In this way they are safe and not punished.’

However, Claire is still not happy. She said: ‘The policy doesn’t specify what an extreme haircut is, it says no decorative designs. They asked for designs but I said no – I don’t see the problem with a parting.

‘I do not want to send them to school looking scruffy, I want them to represent the school and look smart.

‘If it was going to distract other children then they are happy with them in the classroom, so they have to stay off the playground?’

Claire has resorted to picking the boys up at lunchtime and taking them home for an hour.

She said: ‘I’m now having to pick them up at lunchtime and break time. I also have a six month old and a house and things to do.

‘Taking them out at lunchtime and break time they feel like they are being punished for their hairstyle.

‘I said I will bring you home and you can have your lunch and have a charge around the garden. I can’t do it every day though, I have a baby.

‘My little girl is autistic and now she wants to come home because her brothers are.’

She added: ‘I have been trying to speak to them they are just passing messages through the office.

‘I said this doesn’t specify the designs in the hair and that’s just the parting in the hair it’s not attention-seeking. I said I didn’t realise, I know about the designs. It’s been a nightmare.’

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