To ask teachers if you are scared

I worked in primary some of parents are worse than the kids id say.
A few parent for sure one that almost hit me because i told her 8 year old off she saw this as abuse because she never yells or raised her voice at her child.
Her child climbed onto a chair and stood next to an open window throwing books out.
Another because her son didnt get class star of the week as i tried to tell her all children will get it but I went down a list so it was fair.
The dad that said he will follow me home if his daughter did not get the good part in the school play.
The last few years I worked i was blamed for abuse every week if i told a child off.
The school gate mums we had few kick off at each other im thinking this is a school for kids and they are acting like teenagers.
The one i will never forget was a lady that always said its because im an older mum isnt it no its not she always made it about her and not her kid.
Always being told that the child has SEN or being tested.
I had an 9 year old tell me he would get his dad to murder me.
Ive been spat at pushed shoved sworn at threatened.
I left in 2020 enough was enough with entitled parents and children i now work in cattery and love it.
Many of my friends have left as well.

It’s been headline news all day long, what are you on about?

Primary. I'm definitely on edge most days. More at risk of flying furniture or being hit than knives but it's not completely unlikely to happen in Primary at some point.

This year is the hardest of my 15 years.

An interesting if depressing thread. I admire anyone who teaches and when you throw in the worsening pupil and parent behaviour I can't envisage how things will look in a few years.

Some excellent points on this thread and @Combattingthemoaners point about being expected to tackle all of society's ills pretty much sums it up.

The problem is that there is no one but us now. All those support services were cut back so far that they barely exist anymore, meaning that seriously traumatised children are now going without support and parents are no longer being held accountable.

What ever happened to parental accountability? We are accountable for everything we do but if parents don't want to play ball with behaviour and supporting their child then there seems to be nothing to do about it. I come across so many of these parents now- can't be bothered/ too busy/ aggressively dislike education. No wonder the child is so disruptive/ unreceptive.

This is what really irks me.

Maybe he is just 'verbalise his frustration' but in no other job would you be expected to just accept that level of aggression or threat.

I mean, maybe if you'd gone into the prison service, you might expect some degree of it (although not to accept it without question) But you didn't. You became a fucking primary school teacher!

I think this sums up how I feel - I don’t feel scared but more and more frustrated. We seem to have forgotten that schools are a place of learning. Instead, we are expected to fix all of societies ills and tolerate more and more abhorrent behaviour from students and parents. There are too many excuses given for this behaviour instead of admitting it isn’t good enough and protecting teachers/other staff.

I left at Christmas (secondary teacher for 13 years) and I wouldn’t say scared was the right word for how I felt. I would say more aware and frustrated. The straw that broke the camel’s back for me was when a pupil threw a book at my stomach when I was 8 months pregnant and because my school (that was previously excellent at behaviour management) had started to go down the restorative conversation route, there was no punishment. And the pupil refused to apologise or have a conversation with me so that was that. I found it quite upsetting that despite the parents knowing what happened I got no form of apology (either verbal or letter) and that he didn’t even receive a detention, never mind an exclusion which is what would have happened a few years before, pregnant or not! So scared isn’t the word but worried about the direction some schools are heading in - absolutely!

I have to say that it is hugely disappointing that this story is getting so little traction vs the number of threads moaning about school issues. Two teacher were stabbed by a pupil and nothing. But god help us all if someone feels like their kid didn't deserve a detention.

Not for myself in primary, no. My dh teaches secondary though and I do worry for him. He regularly deals with very tricky situations and would be the one putting himself in harm’s way to save others. They had bleed training as part of INSET recently (more thinking about potentially needing to help their kids who are involved in gang activities), have had police on the gates for periods of time more than once when things have been going on among local gangs etc. That I do think is scary and speaks to lots wrong in our society that this is where a huge number of young people are at. School should be a place of safety.

Never scared. Just tired, overloaded and frustrated at times.

I am lucky to work in a lovely girls' grammar school. The parents are almost universally lovely and appreciative. Parents' evening is almost enjoyable! I have worked in considerably less nice schools. If I had to put up with what goes on in many schools, I would quit teaching. The only reason I can deal with the workload is that I'm not also trying to firefight behaviour. Sending and to everyone who is.

Primary here. Repeated threats from a yr 5 child that he will get a knife from the school kitchens and stab me and or cut my throat. SLT say he’s just verbalising his frustration. I’m scared.

Yes, I had a pupil who was known to carry a knife in School threaten me last year. The SLT in charge of behaviour told me he was harmless. I discovered after he left that no one had warned his one to one TA that he carried a weapon. Terrifying.

Well I had a student threaten to rape me, other students setting off fireworks on the school field, got punched splitting up a fight, worked with students that had been arrested for carrying knives the weekend before.
I wasn't necessarily scared but the general aggression and rubbish SLT are one of the reasons I left and I don't teach anymore, and have a lovely job within a different public sector organisation where staff wellbeing and respect at work is a priority.

I worry for the students, not myself.

I've talked down a kid waving a kitchen knife around (and then got bollocked by SLT for needing to take a ten minute break afterwards) and cornered in rooms by both students and parents.

I'd be more worried these days about the parents scaling the fence once they'd heard about it and adding to the confusion/getting more people harmed.

I work in AP and special, and no, I'm not scared for my safety. My AP kids are hugely, hugely vulnerable though, caught up in very risky situations. I worry about them a lot.

I don't personally feel scared of my classes, and my classroom is out of the way enough that it's unlikely that anyone on a rampage would get to it. However two teens have been murdered by teens with knives in the local area recently and some of my kids have known them, so I worry for them out of school.

Or for parents to parent 😢

Or for parents to help teach outside of the classroom.

My DD is a HoD in a rough area, kids/parents regularly go on the rampage in and out of school. A few weeks ago she and a few other teachers were out on the street forming a corden so kids with machetes couldn’t get to a lone boy, his father then came to the school and started smashing windows trying to get in and ‘kill’ the ones chasing his Son. Didn’t even make the local news, the local council estate is controlled by a few families and people don’t ever talk to police.

Exactly how I feel.

Scared? Not at the moment.
Weary and losing engagement? Yes.
Got one of the most exhausting classes I’ve vet dealt with right now. So many challenging children. My patience and ability to car is ebbing away.

Primary, so do not feel under threat from students. Parents, however, is another matter... Aggressive and attempting to physically intimidate staff, we have protocol for teacher-parent interactions in the hope of avoiding confrontation. I've been physically threatened with violence by two dads, which was scary.