3 and half year old in trouble at school, sorry a bit long..

[mandybagpuss]

My son for no reason struck a little girl at pre school on the nose, her nose bled and it all turned into a great big scene, the parents of this little girl are obviously angry, my husband and I are mortified and we applogised to the mother of this girl, saying how toddlers are rough and he has been told off at home and understands he must not behave in this way, the mother sadly did not leave it there and went on and on about how it must never happen again, and that the girls nose bled for on and off for 5 days. Now the parents of this little girl have made a complaint to the school, the teachers have explained away the situation that it was rough play.
Today when I collected him from school his teacher was very angry with him and said that had pushed her to the limit that day, she wouldnt even look at me, when we left he told me that the teacher had smaked him, I had heard of smacking stories at the school before, i should point out this is a school in Italy, as I am sure its illegal to smack in the uk. Anyway the long and the short of it is how to I confront this toddler madness, and should I confront the teacher about the smacking incident. She is a big terrifying loud shouty sort of woman and frankly with the language difference it aint going to be easy.

[alarkaspree]

The 'toddler madness' - do you mean your ds hitting and annoying his teacher? Because tbh your original reaction sounds about right, he is being a rough toddler and you will deal with it and it will get better.

The school sound as if they can't cope with normal children's behaviour. Are they understaffed or something. I can't imagine a teacher saying a child had 'pushed me to the limit'. The smacking, well as you say, in the UK she would be dismissed on the spot I would think. But even if it's acceptable in Italy (really? can this be the case? It has been illegal in the UK for a good 30 years in schools) I would expect teachers to have better ways of disciplining toddlers.

If you can take him out, I would. It doesn't sound like a nice place.

[ChopsTheDuck]

I know in europe they have a different approach to early years education, but if it was my chidl I would be fuming. Her JOB is to cope with the bad behaviour, she is in the wrong role if a 3.5 year old can push her to the limit.

Toddlers are rough sometimes, I'm sure most do something similar at some stage, and you dealt with it appropriately.

Could you find another school? If smacking is the norm, I doubt even complaining is going to do much, but surely there must be different schools with different methods.

[mandybagpuss]

yes the school is understaffed, they dont have much do all day, not allowed to paint or make mess etc, I think the children are bored, looks like I might have to try and change the school. grr

I just told my mum on the phone about the teacher smacking incident, being quite old skool she said he probably deserved it. grrr again

[nannynick]

Does your son need to go to pre-school? If the school is understaffed, doesn't have suitable things to keep the children occupied, doesn't respond to challenging behaviour the way you would, then probably best to remove your son.

[SusieDerkins]

Sounds like the pre-school are as much use as a chocolate teapot. They should be working with you to overcome this (pretty normal) toddler behaviour rather than being so unhelpful. How is he at home?

p.s. the little girl's nose probably "bled for 5 days" because she kept picking it.