School issue - violent kid

'Parents like you' can you expand @Worriedmotheroftwo ?

Do you think parents shouldn't be concerned if their child is being assaulted?
We live in Scotland and I've had to remind the school it's 'getting it right for EVERY child' so that included the children who were being assaulted.

I think the way you start this: "Another witch hunt" is very unkind to the OP. The OP is asking whether it was reasonable to expect the school to have made some inroads into improving the situation in 2 - 3 months (not minutes!).

She then talks about looking for a new school herself. And is clear she is trying to gauge opinion on what might be a norm.

She has not vilified the other child. She has heard other parents potentially in the same situation but has not grouped up with them to talk to the school.

I can hear from your message, you've had a tricky journey. But I think you have allowed your own experience to colour your judgement here and ended up unsupportive of a parent whose child is being regularly hurt.

You have a useful perspective to give so it is a shame that you have assumed some negative motives in the OP which I just don't think you can assume are there.

I would be keen for the school to support him AND keep the other children safe from harm. Which might well mean separate or supervised social time with a very small number of peers; specific social skills teaching; close adult supervision / 1:1 / separate seating in the classroom; separate safe space; sensory room for re-regulation.

It should never mean that other children or parents - or staff - should accept a predictable elevated risk of physical harm ‘because the perpetrator has SEN’.

This is a ridiculous take. Are you seriously saying parents should just accept their children being hurt and not complain about it? No child should go to school and be hurt on a regular basis. It's not a witch hunt if the child actually is hurting others.

This is exactly what happened at my kids’ independent in year 1. Quite a few physical incidents, but at some point a little girl was given a black eye by a boy with additional needs and the parents were really unhappy and vocal about it. The parents of the boy were given the choice of paying additionally for 1:1 support or remove him from the school. I know about it detail because the parents of the boy complained a lot on the WhatsApp group about how unfair it all was and their son shouldn’t be made to feel different by having a support person.

A diagnosis might explain the behaviour but it does not excuse it. The school still have a duty to keep other children safe. I'm sure if your child was being assaulted on a daily basis you would also want them to be kept safe. Both children's needs are important here.

@aRealitycheck I hate to say it, but what if your child did one day end up with a diagnosis or have some physical or mental trauma that affected their behaviour? Would you not want their school to be really keen to support them? Because God forbid that could happen to anyone.

This is the point I was trying to make @NobleWashedLinen not that you were suggesting that the child should be excluded, but that some private schools will throw money at it, not resolve it and then move quickly to exclusion. Which is not actually helpful especially at this age where children NEED early intervention.

What needs to happen is that the money in that school is put to good use implementing a range of strategies until they find one that works, or absolutely everything is exhausted. There is a culture of "I'm paying for it so make this problem go away" that can put schools under pressure to move more quickly to expulsion to keep parents happy which can be detrimental to vulnerable children who deserve a little more work put into helping them sustain school in the context of keeping all the others safe too. A one to one wouldn't be enough intervention for me either.

It is really difficult, because the school needs to meet each child’s needs - both the child with potential SEN and the children at risk of being hurt. Schools almost universally find themselves needing to provide the support -eg 1:1 - first and work out how to pay for it afterwards.

In the case of a private school, which will have smaller classes, more money per child and generally much less SEN need, then this is much less if an issue. Some private schools have a policy that full cost of 1:1 or other SEN support must be borne by the parents.

However, regardless of any SEN, the other students have a right to safety and parents are quite reasonable in working with the school to ensure that safety. (And I say that as a teacher of many, many pupils with SEN, some of whom have put me in danger, let alone other students)

Bless you OP, you sound like a perfectly reasonable concerned parent - obviously worried about your own DC, but also trying not to demonise the other child.

Mine is only 2 and a half but hasn’t started nursery yet and is going through the hitting and pushing stage - some of the posts on threads like this make me dread him starting nursery at 3 as I don’t know if it will be resolved by then 😢

Sometimes no amount of “No!” or “Kind/Gentle hands!” or “Use your words!”or even taking him out of the room/taking toys away (for repeated infractions) stops him, especially if he’s tired or getting silly. Just the other day I had a lecture from another mother at toddler group (who was lucky enough to have a what seemed to be a naturally quieter girl) because DS had grabbed/pushed her daughter (apparently he “needs to learn” but I’d already stopped him and told him off!). I just wanted to cry when she told him off too as he stood there bewildered -anyone giving him extra attention (even if it’s negative) after he’s done something wrong doesn’t help discourage it😩

I suspect many parents of naturally “easy” children don’t realise that usually the parents of more “difficult” children are doing their best too! But I genuinely hope it gets better soon for your DS ❤️, hopefully the school can keep a better eye on the boy who is hurting others 😢

My son is autistic and adhd, unfortunately he lashes out in a meltdown, both at teachers and students. He’s in the process of an ehcp to see if he needs to attend a special needs school or if he needs a 1 to 1 at his current school. It’s taken a year and a half to get to the process of an ehcp and months to be allocated one. What I’m trying to say is the kit that’s hitting may have additional needs that is not supported overnight. It’s hard for yourself and your child - but also hard for everyone involved

I would focus entirely on your child, and ask for a detailed explanation or risk assessment of how they will keep your child safe from non-accidental injury in school. It should include in class, free-flow, playtime, lunchtime, toilet use etc etc.

I would ask for a meeting this week / start of next for this being put in place. For this initial meeting, I would ask for your child’s teacher and their immediate senior - eg phase lead, deputy head - to be there.

Assuming they have 2 more weeks of term, I would ask for weekly meetings with class teacher to review progress - keep a diary of any incidents or any comments from your child.

If the measures put in place are successful, I would ask for less frequent updates next term, after an initial fortnight or so, and then move to ‘reactive’ meetings where you simply call one if an incident occurs.

If they are not successful, continue the weekly meetings, ALWAYS focusing on ‘how will you keep my child safe’ not ‘what are you doing about child A’ and start looking fir another school. The other thing to get in place at that point is a written assurance that, should you need to move schools due to their failure to keep your child safe, they will waive their normal notice requirement for fees and return your deposit so that you can make a quick move without penalty.

Be unfailingly polite, insistent, and totally focused on your own child.

@NobleWashedLinen I'm sorry that happened to you. The well being of one traumatised child shouldn't be put above that of another. All children are vulnerable.

@PeloMom what sanctions are actually being applied to the child doing the hitting to help them stop ? Sounds like the child needs solid help with emotional regulation. I appreciate that at 4 they still learning.

Having 1:1 support is no guarantee of safety. Many children either at school or out of school are able to damage other people, themselves, objects or buildings whilst having 1:1 support. It's a step in the right direction in terms of keeping everyone safe but isn't the 'solved' answer some people think it is.

Children can run away from 1:1 staff. Children can act so quickly it's impossible to intervene.
Children often have no triggers and therefore cannot be pre-empted.

At a private school I would expect this to be resolved by the end of term. They can either meet the child’s needs and should do it now or they can’t and the child should be asked to leave.

@Lavender14 I did not say the child should be excluded. I said the school is able to mention exclusion as an option IF that's the only way to keep other children safe but the focus of my post was 100% about protecting all the children and keeping them safe. This is not something that is "wrong" with private education. Something that is right in a private school is that if it costs money to resolve a situation then it's not wrong to insist that that money must be made available. A violent and dangerous child must have 1:1 adult supervision for the protection of all the children. The acceptable amount of peer to peer violence in school is zero. The rights of all children to be safe and protected in school is paramount. That doesn't mean that a child that will hurt them shouldn't get an education but they must be educated with resources around them to protect others. What is terribly wrong in state education is that similar situations are happening in huge numbers of schools and they are just expected to cope with it with no extra resources.

There was a boy in my primary school class who used to regularly beat me up until I was bleeding. The adults explained to me that he was angry and upset because his parents were getting divorced. I was seven. I did not have the capacity to understand why being upset and angry with his parents meant that I was supposed to be understanding and sympathetic about getting injured regularly at school.

I imagine they will offer the parents the choice of paying extra for a 1-1 for their child or asking the child to leave.

OP isn’t asking for anything more than an assurance that her child will be kept safe at school. The school should be putting this to an end immediately, by giving the child who is being physical a full time adult supervisor and then working with his parents on behavioural strategies to manage the issue. If this child is neurodivergent or had another explanation for why he is behaving this way then it’s not his fault and he needs support. All OP is actually asking is that while that support is put in place, the safety of her child is guaranteed. That isn’t kicking off, it’s basic parenting.

Your child was hit with a stick close to his eye. I think I would be looking for a meeting with the head at this point and given that it's an independent school I would let them know I'm thinking seriously about whether he will carry on there next year if things don't change. They need to make a serious workable plan to keep your child safe.

OP, as others have said, I would want to know in really concrete terms what they are going to do to protect my child. As a parent who 'let' this go on far too long, for fear of being labelled ableist and out of sympathy for the perpetrator and their family, please don't make the same mistake I did. I ended up with a 7 year old who wasn't sleeping, wasn't eating and was terrified of attending school. I made many polite requests of her class teacher to ask her to protect my child, but when she came home with a black eye enough was enough, I called the head and told them my daughter would not be returning until they guaranteed her safety. Within an hour the perpetrator was moved to a specialist unit within the school where their needs could be met, and my daughter returned to her class. It took several months though before she lost the look of fear in her eyes going into school, and ultimately only fully recovered when she moved schools.

An adult who has been assaulted could take out a restraining order, but we expect children to just take being hit as 'the other child can't help it'. EVERY child has a right to feel safe at home and at school.

It's great that your ds was supported and is doing well. It sounds like a very different situation to the OP though. It sounds like your ds' school quickly put in support which helped your ds and protected the other kids too.
OP is talking about her ds being assaulted daily and wondering if it'll be resolved in 2-3 months or if she needs to remove her ds from the school to protect him. No decent parent would be ok with that, no matter how supportive they were. Unless they were supportive of other kids but not their own child I guess.

My son was strangled in reception by another reception child.

He was punched. Hit. Pushed. Taunted. All by the same child. Not once. Multiple time.

The child in question had SEN. I do feel sorry for that child. I worked with the school and was supportive. The mother approached me in the playground and cried. She told me how hard it was for her and her son. The whole focus was on the perpetrator. My son needed to report the incidents. My son needed to be more forceful. My son needed to not play in the same part of the playground. My son needed to understand that the other child was big and didn't know his own strength. My son needed to know that the other child didn't mean to hurt him.

The long term impact on my son of being subjected to consistent physical violence by another child was, and still is, horrendous. It didn't matter that that child had a diagnosis. The impact of being strangled or hit, of feeling helpless and worthless and not protected- doesn't disappear for a child just because the perpetrator has a diagnosis.

The point is, all children matter. Your child doesn't matter any more than my child. It doesn't make it a witch hunt to protect my child.

To the poster who spoke of her son, t's not for other parents to support your son and be understanding of his dysregulation . My son has autism, has been on the receiving end of this and very recently hit someone himself. No child should go to school being worried about being attacked. There should be stronger rules about excluding kids who do this rather than putting it all down to disability and I say that as parent in this situation. Op i would kick up a fuss. If the school excludes the child that also demonstrates their needs cannot be met there, although I'm not sure how public schools work

OP don't wait 2-3 more months of your ds reporting being hurt daily. That's ridiculous. Tell the school it needs to stop now. They need to provide a 1-1 or stop it somehow. The previous poster said a 1-1 is doable in a private school. I wouldn't have accepted my dc being hurt daily in a state school either. Not wanting your dc to be someone's punchbag is not "carrying out a witch hunt" it's normal parenting.