Parent Problems

[millhill]

An incident occurred recently where a father of one of our children approached a mother of another child. He grabbed her arm and told her that her son had hit his daughter. (This had happened the day before)

 

The mother went mad, swearing in front of the children using the 'f' word, then saying she will get him arrested for assault and etc.

 

I asked them both to step outside the room so the children could not see the commotion.

I spoke to both parents; to the father, infront of the annoyed mother, I explained that he should not approach the mother in this way and should speak to the staff if he has a problem.

The mother was calling him names that I would not like to repeat, the father apologised for his actions.

The mother said it was not good enough and she wanted an apology in front of all the parents who heard his accusations.

 

The mother then requested that she take her son out and went into the room, a member of my staff comforted her speaking to her for over 15 mins.

 

I spoke to the father, repeating that he must come to us if there is a problem, he then left.

 

The mother still decided to take her son home and told me that she may not bring him back. I tried to convince her this was not best for the child, but still took him home.

 

The boy did not come back and she informed another parent that he would not be coming back, so I left it at that.

 

The mother is now complaining to other parents at the local school,(not formally yet, I've heard from a member of staff) that we have done nothing to help her, that we did not telephone her after the incident etc.

 

I felt quite upset after I heard this.

I did not tell her that it was unacceptable to swear in front of the children and I tried to convince her not to take her son out, but I respected her decision and thought that was enough.

 

I was wondering what you would have done in this situation, as we don't seem to have it written in our policies that we contact parents after they have decided to take their child out for reasons beyond our control.

[Guest]

oh dear why are some parents so difficult and we all know that sometimes there is a no win win situation. I think you handled this correctly, although I think I would have probably mentioned to her that her behaviour was also unacceptable.

Certainly the father had no right to approach the woman in the way he did, neither should she have sworn in the way she did especially in front of the children.

How was the incident dealt with on the previous day and how did he know it was her child that had lashed out? It seems to me that both sets of behaviours were a bit extreme if this was the first and only incident, is there anything else going on? Do they know each other?

I would have probably telephoned her although I do not have a written policy on it I would have probably also telephoned the Dad as well when things had calmed down. Did anyone witness him grabbing her arm? She was obviously in shock and he was very worked up over an incident that after all is not that unusual with littler ones - how old were the children? Are you sessional term time, if so then there is only a few weeks left to the end of term, were they both due to come back in September?

Sorry just read this post and not much help at all.

Nikki

[hali]

We had an incident where a mother took her child out as she was unhappy.. went slating us off to the local school, but it all died down, parents who know you will take no notice and undersatnd the situation, its horrible but i am sure it will be forgotton about quickly.

[Smiles]

We had a similar experience with a parent was slating us off at school and intimidating a member of staff. We ignored it - wasnt easy for the staff memeber as it was about her but I agree people who know your setting well will not listen and ignore the situation and hopefully it will die down.

 

Smiles