WWYD parents/school related

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• 25-Sep-2009 21:48

  WWYD parents/school related

  muffins Joined on 06-May-2003 United Kingdom Posts 2,220

  Contact I have posted this on the other site, but realise more parents are on here!! Today my daughters weekly school newsletter came out with this statement in... May we remind all parents and carers who come onto the school grounds to wait with or for pupils that they should never take an issue of pupil discipline into their own hands. If there is an incident where you feel some discipline or strong words are needed please come into school for help, tell us what has happened and leave it to us to deal with. Once through the school gates all pupils come under our care and you may find yourself in a more tricky situation than you bargained for. It would be a shame to ban parents from the playground, as some schools do, for it is a chance for people to meet and chat. The school has an acting head at the moment who started two weeks ago, it is a primary school (4-9 years) The incident that triggered this was a 7 year old boy hitting another boy repeatedly over the head with his book bag (with books in) to make the other boy move out of the way. The father of the boy being hit, told the boy who was hitting his son to 'STOP at once', this was said firmly but not aggresively. This boy then ran to his mum who shouted at the dad for telling her child off. In the playground before school there are many issues between children, most if not all can be sorted out between the children or with some help from the parents. However, if a serious incident is occuring, from this letter are we now expected to go into school and fetch a teacher to deal with incidents, and leave a vulnerable situation (two children fighting, bulling etc?) The teachers do not come onto the playground untill the whistle goes and the children have lined up. It can also be read that we are not to disciplin our own children!! The tone in which it has been written does not help, as it is passive aggressive and whilst I agree that the school should sort out situations, without the presence of a teacher on the plauyground, surely it is not safe to leave two children fighting whilst one is fetched!!

• 25-Sep-2009 21:56

  Re: WWYD parents/school related

  Julz Joined on 21-Jan-2007 United Kingdom Posts 3,399

  Contact What a piece of nonsense. Surely the children are not in their care until they are in school if there is no school staff supervising them in the playground? (Just as they are not the school's responsibility on their way to school). They cannot have it both ways. At L & L's school parents are not allowed in the playground at all, but there is staff on the gates who supervise the children once they are in. I actually find it's much better that way, but I know a few people are not happy with it. I would ask them if they are going to man the playground as they cannot expect invidents to effectively be ignored until a teacher is sought. If not then they should actually be reiterating to parents that the children are not their responsibility until the bell/whistle goes and they are inside. It sounds like the Mum has complained about the Dad telling off her child, perhaps she should just accept she should have done it herself by the sounds of it.

• 25-Sep-2009 22:20

  Re: WWYD parents/school related

  PoloAddict Joined on 21-May-2003 UK Posts 2,847	Contact They should have a teacher on the playground, surely ?! Where I teach, we man the playground from 8.45 am.  Lots of schools are going down the route of banning of parents due to safeguarding of pupils being a whopper issue at the mo. H born 24/06/06 M born 29/09/07

• 26-Sep-2009 7:43

  Re: WWYD parents/school related

  MollyP Joined on 19-May-2003 United Kingdom Posts 3,667

  Contact I think that is ridiculus. what was the boy's mum doing when this happened? Did she just stand by and let him hit another child over the head or did she not see what happened? The mum should have been there to tell him off herself. It really annoys me when parents do this. If mine ever do something wrong and for some reason I don't see what's happening then I have no problem with someone else telling them off. Likewise if another child was hurting my child and there was no sign of their parents I wouldn't hesitate to tell them to stop. The father of the boy being hit did nothing wrong, he didn't shout at the boy or smack him, just firmly told him to stop, which is surely what any parent would have done. I certainly wouldn't want to leave children who are fighting or bullying alone while I went to fetch a teacher. If they don't have a teacher supervising the playground then they are not under their care and they should be reminding parents that they need to supervise their own children and discipline them if necessary.

• 26-Sep-2009 7:58

  Re: WWYD parents/school related

  sherry Joined on 17-Jun-2004 Lincolnshire Posts 37,029	Contact WES - it seems a silly thing not to have staff on the playground before the whistle goes.  WHat if a child falls over and their parents haven't stayed on the playground with them? We always man our playground from 845am and parents stay the other side of the fence (although at the end of the day they can come on to the playground).   Caitlin born 10/12/1999 Ethan born 4/11/2008

• 26-Sep-2009 10:44

  Re: WWYD parents/school related

  Brian Parkes LSWPP (HIB) Joined on 15-Sep-2003 United Kingdom Posts 1,743

  Contact My wife is a primary teacher so I do get to hear about what happens the other side of the fence a lot. Teachers are put in absolutely impossible situations. Lets face it, some parents are crap and should't be allowed to have kids, some of the things I've heard are just too horrible to possibly even imagine. The basic problem is parents not supporting the teachers or their school, for instance this lady probably screamed at the head teacher and threatened she was going to call the police for intimidating or threatening her boy. It doesn't have to be true, parents are often worse liars than the kids. The head teacher probably wasn't in a position to see what really went on and so is probably going by what this lady said and then possibly hearing the mans side and then deciding to play it safe. What can they do? If some sort of accusation of a threat has been made then take no action and they are dammed, take action and they are dammed too. My wife's had to sort out lots of problems between kids which are usually quite easy, then deal with the problem between parents, which is often much more serious and out of all proportion to the incident between the kids. My best advice is to follow their request where practical, but if somebody is hitting your child, by all means ask the other child to stop! She had one problem recently where she had an excitable and boisterous but basically sweet natured boy who was always playing with another boy and together they would get a bit rough and a few times the other boy was hurt during the rough and tumble. The mum of the other boy interpreted this as the other boy bullying her son (which wasn't the case, it was usually the other play initiating the play!) and so started a vendetta against the other lad. She basically spoke to all of the other parents about the 'bully' in the classroom and lots of the parents banned their kids from playing with him, anytime there was something in the playground with this boy regardless of whether he initated it or not she used it as ammunition and was basically bullying this lad in the worst possible way. It got the point the school had to call the parent in to see the headmaster, crazy really!