Primary School Procedures Re Incident

[waveawand]

Hiya, its me again and I truely wish I wasnt back too im posting this to get a idea of how to approach a difficult head ( nice speak for one I dont see eye to eye with at all).

Two weeks ago my son was assaulted ( his bits grabbed) by a year two boy. I was informed at pickup despite being told that my son was very distraught. His teacher had consoled him and said that he had kicked the other child. I was in shock and because presumably of my facial expression, the teacher said she thought the other parent had been told. I thanked her and left.

All weekend I was worrying about what had actually occured. Due to previous incidents with another child (previous post re advice please) my son is know completely without confidence in retelling anything. Cowed. He was once a happy confident boy. Anyway I couldnt ascertain much from him at all except that when he tried to get the boy to let go by kicking that he just squeezed harder.

 

Monday I ring the school office. Explain the lack of confidence in telling me full event and ask them to investigate for me. I recieved a call to say a letter was in my sons bag. The letter bascially said that both boys had sustained some injury and were upset. That they didnt know how it started but that they had been playing a game. The other child was "strongly chastised" by his teacher and his parent told.

It was hoped that I felt the matter had been dealt with swiftly and appropriately.

 

 

 

Since reading the letter I havent been happy. My son was fretful all weekend and into the next. Thankfully now he is back to a normal sleeping pattern. I have spoken with him again and have gleened a bit more about the events before the assault. Not good. this is what I have started to write in a letter back to the head:-

 

In the course of a game involving several children, the object being to procure a hat held by a child in the centre of the group my child was assaulted. Christopher was the child in the cnetre and said that the first time they encircled him it was 'okay'. The second time they surrounded him it “wasn’t very nice Mummy”. He was punched in the face, pulled down from behind and assaulted (his private parts were grabbed). He kicked out in an attempt to make some room to escape and his assailant squeezed tighter whilst he was still on the floor. The boys were up close to him so that “he didn’t know how to get out”. This was all in an attempt to make him let go of the hat.

 

My first question ( one of many) to you informed ladies/gents is this. Is it normal procedure to act the way they have done? As a childminder I would have to fill in an incident report and if a child was so destressed phone the parent. I was told at the end of the day despite this happening at last break. My son did try to speak to his teacher but was interrupted by teh other child. Wouldnt you normally separate the children to gain a full understading of events ? Also wouldnt you speak with all that were involved Wouldnt the head be informed as it was a physical attack ?

 

It seems apparant to me that they dont know the full detail and certainly not what my son demonstrated to me. He wasnt able to speak to me about it but showed me by drawing on the table a circle and a dot in the middle. The dot being him. and putting his fist to his face and pulling his sweater at the neck. I asked him where he was when the assault happened and he said on the floor. I am awaiting to speak with his teacher as she is in only from tomorrow as I wanted to be sure of the details before approaching the head. I have been hesitant because he has already been disbelieving of my son previously and I know how unempathetic he is. I am currently appealing to the borough re moving my son out of the school as I have had enough.

Not sure at all that this has been dealt with at all correctly. Before I see him could you let me know the protocol for dealing with this type of incident in primary schools with a year one child, three other Y1s and a Y2 child.

 

thanks in advance

[sunnyday]

oh waveawand - I don't really have any advice - I'm not a teacher........but I couldn't just 'read and run' ....what a horrible situation for your little boy.....just sending a hug x (sorry nothing more useful)

[Fredbear]

Sorry waveawand how dreadful for you and your son.

I am unable to advise as to correct protocol as not in a school setting, but i'm sure someone more knowledgeable will be along soon.

Big hugs x

[Rea]

I cant help either but I have to add my sympathy for you and your son. Bullying is an awful, awful thing, I hope you manage to get things sorted for him.

[garrison]

I am a newly appointed school governor and just getting to grips with it all but surely if you aren't happy with the way the issues are being dealt with (and I wouldn't be too) you can go to the local authority, the governing body or maybe even OFSTED?

[Guest]

I am a newly appointed school governor and just getting to grips with it all but surely if you aren't happy with the way the issues are being dealt with (and I wouldn't be too) you can go to the local authority, the governing body or maybe even OFSTED?

 

You can do these things of course, but I really would suggest that working with the school is the best chance to sort things out as both you and the school want the same thing - your son to be happy at school. Your son's experience sounds horrible and it must be hard for you both so I hope I can give you bit of my point of view from working in a school.

 

My thoughts initially would be that it would be unusual to phone the parent in the course of the day unless the child was hurt. Speaking to parents at the end of the school day would be normal procedure. Children often will put on a brave face at school and be more distressed than they show in class.

 

I would agree with you that it would be usual to separate the children and hear the stories separately, and certainly involve the head in such an incident. It seems from your description that at the time the school didn't manage to find out all the details for whatever reason, and therefore perhaps aren't aware of the severity of the event.

 

If a parent approached me with such concerns I would refer to the head to investigate who I would expect to talk to the children individually and then phone parents to discuss. Sending a letter home when a parent has phoned I would see as an inadequate follow up.

 

Hope this helps give some kind of school perspective. Also hope you don't mind me saying but you might want to consider avoiding using the word 'assault' when approaching the school (although I don't disagree thats what it sounds like), as it is a very strong word and has certain emotions attached to it. Do tell the school about your concerns about how the incident was handled and then say you want to look at ways to ensure it doesn't happen again. I really hope the school takes the time to look into this properly and it gets sorted as no child deserves to put up with that behaviour.

Edited November 22, 2011 by Guest

[Guest]

I'm really sorry you are feeling as you are and hope I can offer some light in to how any non specific incident would be dealt with in my class/school. I'm sorry but haven't yet read any other of your posts re: confidence so am responding to what I have read re this incident.

 

If there is an incident in school, we would talk to parents after school about the incident, explaining how the incident came to our attention, what we did to find out what happened, what we know/have been told had happened, how we resolved it and what we would be doing next. We would not contact the parent by telephone during the day - unless for a medical emergency and then it would be the school Admin person who has responsibility as teachers are expected to be teaching and preparing at all other times. It is best to speak to the parent face to face rather than over the telephone.

 

If a child had been hurt by another child, we would explain that we would also be speaking to the other's child's parent. We have a huge emphasis on honesty - If a child for example had hit or pushed another child, we would talk to each child separately, we would find out what had happened before - were they playing with each other, who else was playing, what were they playing, and the incident itself. If there was an inconsistency in stories, then I would remind them of how much we value honesty (in language appropriate to their age) and give them a few moments to have a think about things - usually we know the children well enough to know when this is needed ;-) and then settle the rest of the class on to what we are doing (we remind children even in reception that they are to raise it with the teachers/dinner ladies outside and they deal with it without time in class being disrupted to deal with incidents in the playground). We would them come back to them and ask again. If a child is overly distraught and it is out of character, we would perhaps leave some time for them to calm down a little to be in a position to talk to us calmly and then we would gently ask again. We do emphasis with children that unless they tell us what happens we cannot sort something out. If a child hits or pushes another child, we would generally keep them inside for the next playtime. If it is a continued offence, they then visit the next in line in the chain of command, with the Head as final follow up - firm but nice on the first (and hopefully last) visit.

 

If for example has happened, other details about the incident emerge overnight, parents usually speak to us the next day. We would then further investigate during the day and feedback to the parent that evening. Sorry to ask but have you told the teacher the details that have since emerged?

 

If your son was in my class, then yes, I would have spoken to you as above. If parents don't personally collect children and the child goes home via childminder or grandparent, yes a note would go home explaining the details as I don't feel it is fair to ask that person to pass on a message from me - I would explain what was in the note and ask if they ensure the parent received it. The note from school seems reasonable and to be honest I personally would have spoken to the teacher rather than rung up and spoken to someone in the office who is not aware of the details and incident and may not have fully passed on the message. If teachers are not aware of all the details of an incident then it is not possible to investigate fuller. If further details come to light, then is possible to do this. We would speak to the child and ask them to tell us everything that happened, respond and deal with but if we don't know everything that happened then we can't sort it out. We do as a regular circle time remind children what to do when incidents happen in the playground including telling us everything that happened.

 

So going forward, I would speak to the class teacher, explain that since the incident happened further details have emerged and detail them, explain that your son is lacking confidence in expressing himself with regards to incidents and hold off from speaking to the Head. I would also be careful as Phil suggests in the language you use too.

 

I hope you manage to sort things out.

Edited November 22, 2011 by Guest

[HoneyPancakes]

Oh Waveawand,

 

I started to write a lot of 'advice' stuff, but then I realised that I can't help with the question you were really asking. Will be thinking about you, your little boy and the problem.

 

Hope it all works out well in the long run.

 

Honey

[Guest]

Hi waveawand, I teach so I can tell you from a teacher's perspective what I would have done and procedure I would have followed. First thing to say is that it is standard practice to have 1 or 2 members of staff out on the playground with up to 100 children at breaktimes and it is not always possible to have every child in view at all times. We are very vigilant but occasionally an incident occurs. If an incident occurs I deal with it at the time on the playground and then inform the relevant teacher when they collect at the end of playtime. With this particular incident, I would have found someone to take my class at the end of playtime (TA) and gathered the people involved together to get to the bottom of the incident talking to them separately if i thought it necessary. I would then talk the children through why they shouldn't have behaved in that way and then I would take all children to the head and explain to her what they had done so that she could talk to them further. The class teachers of those children would be told so that they could tell the parents at the end of the day. None of the parents of those involved would be informed until the end of the day even if they were distressed (sorry know it sounds cruel but that's the way it is) the class teacher would be the one to comfort the child. There is no expectation or requirement to write up an incident/accident report as such but any kind of injury would be recorded in the medical book. I do however record notes on certain children if there is a pattern of behaviour but that is just me.

Often is is very difficult or almost impossible to get to the very bottom of an incident and how it started unless you have seen it because it has escalated out of all proportion. The incident really should not have happened but to me it sounds like it has been dealt with as it would have been dealt with in my school. You say that the incident happened at last break which I imagine was 2pm ish (we don't have afternoon breaks at my school) so in reality it happened only 1 hour from the end of the day when you picked up. So if the teacher spent time after playtime sorting out what had happened it was probably pretty close to hometime by then. It may not have been possible to involve the head teacher or deputy in that short time (my head is out on average 2 days a week and the deputy teaches Y6 for example) From what you say it sounds like the incident has been dealt with as it would be in any other primary school with the information they were able to glean at the time of the incident and so I don't think criticising protocol is the way to go with the head (imagine you'll get nowhere!). You have obviously had a tough couple of weeks as a result of the incident with your son and I think you need to arrange to see the head and the class teacher together to explain that and share how your son is feeling about school generally. Go from the point of view of working together to find ways to improve his time at school rather than being confrontational about this particular incident. The incident happened 2 weeks ago now and even if the school has more information about who did what first and to whom through you, it has been dealt with, the children involved punished and their parents spoken to so the school will not revisit this with those children unless it happens again. For your own information though document the incident (and any previous ones) and the response from school as it may come in handy for if you go to appeal for a place for your son at another school.

Hope that helps!

Deb

[Guest]

I would certainly reiterate all that has been said above. Particularly re. informing you at the end of the day and the head not being informed. Whilst I have the deepest sympathies with what you and your son are going through I’m betting that this looks entirely different from the school’s point of view, not because they don’t care, but just because of the way things are as the above posters have pointed out.

 

Going forward with this incident I think you need to talk with the teacher face to face and explain what your son has said and explain that he lacks confidence so that next time (I'm sure there will be more, if there wasn't he would be having an unusually good primary school experience!) perhaps they can ensure he is spoken to alone.

 

I would also suggest not using the word assault as like someone said above it has certain emotions attached to it which I don’t think would come into play here on the part of the one who did this to your son and it’s not really a word that sits well when referring to such young children. Assault implies they jumped on him out of the blue, yet they it sounds like they were all involved in a game that involved at least some level of physical contact. The question is whether this was a game to which he had agreed. Did other children take turns at holding the hat in the centre with him joining in to get it? Whose hat was it? What happened when he was in the circle first time, did they get the hat off him? These are questions you might have the answers to already. Since this was a while ago now the incident will no longer be fresh in your son's mind and he might only remember the end bit which has been talked about since, so I would be reluctant to bring it up again so as not to spark off bad memories, unless you feel that he needs to talk about it further. Obviously you know your son best.

 

What the other boy did was no doubt meant to hurt, he obviously knows this is a sensitive area to go for, but he won’t see it from the same point of view as grown-ups. His objective was to get the hat and children this age, particularly when in groups, can lose sight of the amount of force they are using. This was no doubt just a game to them, and unfortunately the fact that your child hung on to the hat will mean that as children they would have no idea that he no longer liked the game. Remember they do not have the same level of understanding of others’ emotions that we as adults do and when caught up in games don’t respond in the same way to cries of distress from other children. Even though they probably knew they were hurting, the aim for them was probably to hurt enough to get the hat off whoever had it, not to specifically hurt your child – I know that sounds odd, but I hope you can understand what I’m getting at. For this reason, as a teacher, I certainly wouldn’t see it as an ‘assault’ but just a game that got out of hand.

 

The teachers who dealt with this would of course see it in the same way – a game gone wrong, and would have dealt with it accordingly. That your son was more distressed than they realised is unfortunate and they could have handled it better, for example by separating them out to talk about the incident, but if your son didn’t give full details they may not have realised how severe it was or how distressed he was. That’s a vicious circle there, as the other boy was obviously more vocal and wouldn’t let him get a word in, which was a mistake on the part of whoever dealt with the incident. They really should have listened more carefully and this is the only part of procedure where I would say they went wrong.

 

The main reason that the incident wasn’t dealt with as well as it could have been might be that the teacher was trying to deal with the incident after break when she had a whole class to try and sort out, or due to a member of staff dealing with it initially out in the playground who was perhaps not familiar with your son. Unfortunately these things do happen in school.

 

I really hope you get it sorted! Obviously you do need to talk to the teacher about it and only you know how your son has reacted to this incident at home, which is something you must impress on the teacher in a non-confrontational way. He was clearly distressed and that shouldn’t be happening in school, but approaching it from a 'let's work together' point of view will get you much further. Part of me also wants to say, please display confidence in his teacher in front of your son as this will increase his confidence in her, but I’m not sure how easy that would be. In my opinion I would say don’t have him in the room whilst you talk about this, though others might disagree with that for the opposite reason.

 

I think a fresh start for you and your son would be a very good thing so I hope you are successful with your appeal to move schools. I assume other schools are full and this is why you can’t just move him quickly? Hopefully something will open up soon.

 

Let us know how things go with his teacher and hopefully your son will begin to gain back confidence at school.

Edited November 22, 2011 by Guest

[Susan]

Brilliant responses from the 3 school people here. I have been deliberating a response to this since I saw it this afternoon.

 

In my school, we do have an incident book in which something like this would have been noted, just because we have had parents complaining about incidents long after the incident took place and we have decided to record issues that have been dealt with whether they be medical or otherwise.

 

I am sorry that your son has been so distressed by this but hard as it seems he has also got to appreciate that if he plays rough then he will at some stage get hurt and in our school we are continually cautioning the children against just this sort of game.

[Guest]

Oh waveawand how upsetting for you both.

 

I know this is another incident in a long of concerns you have with this school and their policies and procedures. It's so hard not to be confrontational when you're angry/upset and worried and fighting your child's cause and I wonder whether some outside help and advice may offer you some comfort and ideas for a way forward?

 

Kidscape http://www.kidscape.org.uk/ is a fabulous resource for information and they have a parent helpline 08451 205 204 available Monday - Thursday: 10am to 4pm.

 

Years ago, when I rang, (at the end of my tether) I felt SO much better after talking through my concerns with someone there. Their support enabled me to approach the school armed with facts and figures, knowing exactly what procedures school had to follow... I'd never taken into consideration that they were having to follow set protocols to deal with the situation and what I'd perceived as their inaction and lack of understanding was actually them working frantically behind the scenes to monitor, review, record and seek external intervention for the child making my daughter's life a misery....

 

Nona

Edited November 23, 2011 by Guest

[Susan]

Great idea, Nona.

[waveawand]

Thankyou all soooo much for your words of wisdom. I am due to speak with his teacher this pm as she wasnt there this morning. I am making an appeal but a colleague familiar with union issues has said that it wont be worthwhile me going down this route as there are no places in the school I want to go to. I will carry on but not using the phrasing I have used before and hope for a miracle.

In themeantime I will do as you suggest. This teacher is completely new to Y1 having had ten years with Y5 so I feel it is her inexperience that has lead to inadequate investigations initially. I do understand from the schools point of view re this incident and sort of why the head was saying it arose out of a game. Lessons do need to be learnt as my son has already avoided further conflict by opting out of a "fighting game" as he didnt want to get into trouble. A lesson is needed here I think in what is acceptable play and what isnt which I will also suggest to his teacher.

 

Ive lost my confidence in how they deal with things because of previous experiences with my daughter. His confidence has been lost because he has been shouted at by the head whom has also called him a fibber. I find this totally intolerable behaviour from somebody in such a position; children look to us as role models and to do this whilst telling my son he needs to control his temper is outragious. To be dealing with it all again is heartbreaking for me but at least I know some of the ways to converse with the school without getting there backs up. To be honest the teachers are fab its just the top guy that isnt that popular AT ALL.

I am struggling really with what angle to go with for the appeal too I have to write something by tomorrow and am on my own as my hubby thinks it is me being over protective of my son. Although he does agree his lack of confidence ( having started school sooo confidently) is an issue.

 

Thankyou again for making me feel less like a neurotic mother/childminder whom just wants kids to be looked after appropriately at such a tender age.

[waveawand]

pressed the wrong button due to a few tears but you have made me feel more empowered now.

Edited November 23, 2011 by waveawand

[Upsy Daisy]

I'm sorry to hear that this has happened.

 

It makes matter far more upsetting for us when we don't feel confident in the staff caring for our children. I know this from bitter personal experience.

 

I hope that someone give you a reason to feel more confident in them soon.

 

Can I suggest that if you think this is part of a longer process/complaint you would be sensible to write a factual account of the incident and the school's actions as far as you are aware of them so that you have a record if this matter is brought up again in the future.

[Guest]

I shall be thinking of you this afternoon waveawand as you speak to his teacher, hope it all goes well.

 

I've just had a thought about refering incidents like this to the headteacher. Perhaps it's a good thing they aren't doing this considering the way you've described his reaction to past things! I would try to look at it from that point of view. I remember once as a teacher not sending a year one child to the head for fighting in the playground after he'd been sent about three times before in the first six weeks because all she did was yell at him, phone his parents and ban him from playtimes the next day and frankly, he didn't care. This particular time I sat him down, explained at gtreat length how disappointed I was in him and how brilliant I knew he was in class and that he just needed to control himself outside. It was the last time he was ever in trouble for fighting that year. Something I said got through to him more than any amount of serious headteacher tellings off.

 

Maybe the teachers know the head would have blown this incident out of proportion and shouted excessively at both parties (one for grabbing your son and your son for kicking) and so are not refering incidents up for this very reason. Of course, this may not be the case at all, but just a thought that occured to me that might be something to bear in mind.

[waveawand]

I'm sorry to hear that this has happened.

 

It makes matter far more upsetting for us when we don't feel confident in the staff caring for our children. I know this from bitter personal experience.

 

I hope that someone give you a reason to feel more confident in them soon.

 

Can I suggest that if you think this is part of a longer process/complaint you would be sensible to write a factual account of the incident and the school's actions as far as you are aware of them so that you have a record if this matter is brought up again in the future.

 

Thanks upsydaisy and I am - though in the process trying to write a letter for an appeal; not sure how much or what to put in as dont want to come across as neurotic. So far have a list of bullet points if youd care to review for me I will pm you.

 

Kariana - thanks for your thoughts too - unfortunately the TA said my sons teacher was in this pm. Not so it seems so will have to wait another night now until tomorrow.

 

Thanks one and all again. I cant help feeling dissolusioned though hopefully will feel more confident tomorrow after our chat ?! Hmmph

[waveawand]

Hiya again, have finally spoken with class teacher on her own ( without my son) and told her about the extra information gleaned from my son. I have asked her to speak with my son first to try and build his confidence in speaking to her. I have asked her to speak with the boys concerned and /or do something with the class as a whole re safe play. Also to let me know the outcome.

 

She did say that Christopher struggles to explain things and was trying to say something but that it was at the" busy part of the day" ? As much as I like this teacher I find it incredible that she didnt allow my son time to speak.!

 

I cant help but feel in my humbly opinion, that this smacks of inexperience. She has been teaching for ten years in Y5 and this is her first time with this age group. I know this because she told me at the begining of term.

 

Will let you know any positives arising from this.

Edited November 24, 2011 by waveawand

[Susan]

[quote name='waveawand' date='Nov 24 2011, 10:04' post='308552'

 

She did say that Christopher struggles to explain things and was trying to say something but that it was at the" busy part of the day" ? As much as I like this teacher I find it incredible that she didnt allow my son time to speak.!

 

 

It is more than possible that the teacher did not have the time to investigate this more. I think she may well have given the best that she can. She will have been in charge of a class of small people maybe up to 30 of them and quite possibly on her own and however much she would have liked to talk with your son will have needed to proceed with the routines and expectations of the teaching day.

 

 

As for experience, she is a very experienced teacher--10 years you have said! She may be new to year 1 but this does not negate her experience in any way.

 

You are lucky to have had the opportunity at the start of the school day to bring this to her attention, many schools do not encourage parental engagement at this time. I would also be quite upset by a parent dictating to me how to run my classroom so please be careful that you do not antagonise her.

 

I think you need now to work with your son and develop some coping strategies between you. It will not help him or his confidence to know that his mum is at loggerheads with his teachers.

[waveawand]

[quote name='waveawand' date='Nov 24 2011, 10:04' post='308552'

 

She did say that Christopher struggles to explain things and was trying to say something but that it was at the" busy part of the day" ? As much as I like this teacher I find it incredible that she didnt allow my son time to speak.!

 

 

 

It is more than possible that the teacher did not have the time to investigate this more. I think she may well have given the best that she can. She will have been in charge of a class of small people maybe up to 30 of them and quite possibly on her own and however much she would have liked to talk with your son will have needed to proceed with the routines and expectations of the teaching day.

 

 

As for experience, she is a very experienced teacher--10 years you have said! She may be new to year 1 but this does not negate her experience in any way.

 

You are lucky to have had the opportunity at the start of the school day to bring this to her attention, many schools do not encourage parental engagement at this time. I would also be quite upset by a parent dictating to me how to run my classroom so please be careful that you do not antagonise her.

 

I think you need now to work with your son and develop some coping strategies between you. It will not help him or his confidence to know that his mum is at loggerheads with his teachers.

 

 

Im not at loggerheads at all, she thanked me actually.

[Guest]

Good to hear that you had a chance to talk to his teacher about everything and I hope you are feeling much happier about things now.

 

Although I'm not saying it's right I can understand why she might not have let him perhaps say all he wanted to and I would be inclined to put this down to the fact that she will have a lot of pressure on her time and a lot of children demanding her attention rather than inexperience as such. It is occasionally a sad fact of teaching that you can't dedicate as much time a you want sometimes to each child and each incident and I know from experience that sometimes you do make the mistake of pushing something aside that was more important than you think, but as a teacher you have to consider up to 30 children's needs as well as the need to fit everything into the school day. If you gave every incident a full airing and every child time to say everything they wanted to you would end up wasting time on petty and trival things rather than getting anything productive done. I don't mean this to sound like I'm undervaluing children's problems or what they have to say, but sometimes as a teacher you have to make that decision of 'is this just something silly that I shouldn't encourage by giving time to, or is this genuinally worth taking time away from the needs of the rest of the class?' Occcasionally we get this wrong, and I don't know a teacher who doesn't feel incredibly guilty when they do, but we are all human and all make mistakes from time to time. I guess what I'm saying is please don't lose confidence in her or write her off as knowing nothing about this age group just because she might have made a bad judgement here in relation to your son. It is unfortunate it happened and as a parent it's very hard to accept mistakes with regards to a child's well being, but I think that this is all it was.

 

Hopefully now you have brought this up with her she will react differently next time there is anything involving your son to deal with, or indeed any other child in the class. You say you like her and I get the impression that generally you believe she is a good teacher, and although I have said not to put too much emphasis on inexperience I'm sure she is still getting used to this age group and I'm sure she is still adjusting to the amount of time children of this age need to organise their thoughts and also adjusting to what needs to be addressed. Things that are petty when you are in year 5 and which teachers should deal with accordingly are not necessarily so in year one and I'm sure she is learning this and will make a few mistakes along the way. This doesn't of course mean that she doesn't have a clue, as I'm sure you are already aware.

 

To be honest I'm not sure whether she would, or even should, speak to the boys concerned so long after the incident has happened. I'm sure you know from experience yourself that children of this age have to have things dealt with immediately, so bringing it up again might not be a good option. Doing something with the whole class about rough play is a good idea though and I hope she would go with this option.

 

Overall I'm sure you are glad to be able to put this incident behind you and move on from it and I'm sure lessons have been learnt by the teacher. Hopefully your son will have a lovely week at school this week and his confidence will continue to build back up!

[waveawand]

It is occasionally a sad fact of teaching that you can't dedicate as much time a you want sometimes to each child and each incident and I know from experience that sometimes you do make the mistake of pushing something aside that was more important than you think, but as a teacher you have to consider up to 30 children's needs as well as the need to fit everything into the school day. !

 

I do understand what you are saying and the needs of others. But my point was that as my son was very distressed ( her words) and as it was the end of the day, couldnt she have found time when I picked him up to listen with me ? I do feel that it has been inadequately dealt with both by the Head and my sons teacher. She spoke to all of the boys including my son re safe play. and that was that.

He has had a better week but that is due to my support and encouragement at home; He actually ended up this week with star of the week for his maths.

 

Although he has moved on as kids do, it isnt completely forgotten. I have since found out that the child that deliberately attacked him is 'reknown' by the teachers and the parents because of the trouble he causes. This coupled with actually seeing the child for the first time angered me all over again. He is a big 'solid' lad for his age. He threatened one of my mindees and was made eventually to say sorry.

 

I ended up speaking with my sons other teacher as I was on the verge of reluctantly going to the head. I explained that I have delibrately tried to sort it out with them rather than the head as I dont see eye to eye with him. This she understood. She listened to the whole story asked me what if anything had been done or said. She acknowleged my concern but said, as you have, that it was a bit late in the day and the others involved would have "forgotten by now". I said " even the boy that did the worst thing ?" She replied that with some kids it is like water of a ducks back as he is always in "bother".

My son hasnt forgotten - he was extremely traumatised by the whole event. The child had even told him NOT to tell the teacher what happened. Despite this my son did try to but was thwarted again by the child talking over him.

I know that my son hadnt even received an apology for the attack. This is one thing I insist on in my own home, when a child has hurt or upset another.I said that all I was trying to do was get a positive out of all this. It basic principles we are talking here. That I felt that my son had been let down by them and that I was trying to build up his confidence to confide in them, when he needed them to listen most they didnt. She said that as she wasnt there she couldnt do anything. I thanked her anyway for listening and walked away, disheartened with the whole injustice of it all.

All Im talking about here is to look at the whole story - not part -and make a judgement based on the facts. Children do come to blows but this was a calculated attack on a defenceless child (he was on the ground surrounded by other boys whom too were holding him) It must have been very obvious to all that he was upset and NOT OK.

 

The next morning I was planning to call into the office. My sons teacher said that she had thought about what I had said and would speak to the child that attacked him. I said I would really appreciate her doing that.

 

So finally he was asked to apologise for hurting my son and did so readily - they shook hands. So now my son is happier and I am able to move on. It has taken the best part of three weeks to get that basic gesture instigated.

 

I am actively now, as well, encouraging a completely different group of friends for my son. His attacker is pals with the boy in his class that has caused him distress all through his reception year.......now why am I not AT ALL surprised ?

 

thanks for your thoughts and comments. Hopefully this is the last you'll here from me. Well maybe not, I might be back to say we have finally been given a chance to have a fresh start elsewhere....