Teacher asked DD how she IDs

This ⬇️

It's very telling that so many of us are relieved and maybe surprised that the school recognised the breach of safeguarding and professional standards so promptly.
It a reminder that most schools centre children and their needs over the demands of trans extremist adults.

👏👏👏👏

I remember a similar piece of good news being shared on a different thread. You have to scroll down a fair bit to get to the good news but according to this FOI, all schools in the Bolton Safeguarding Partnership are now expected to follow the draft Gender Questioning Children guidance, after the Safeguarding Partnership removed its previous "transgender children" guidance and replaced it with the DfE's draft GQC guidance. As guidance goes, it's not perfect...but it's definitely better than a gulf into which activist or teachers can fill the void with their own ideas.

I do hope the OP's leadership team demonstrates this deeper level of understanding by removing flags etc and putting some better guidance for staff on what is expected from them in place🤞🤞

That's a fantastic outcome OP. Well done to you and your DD for speaking out. You've made that school a bit safer for all children (and hopefully that trans flag has been binned)

It's very telling that so many of us are relieved and maybe surprised that the school recognised the breach of safeguarding and professional standards so promptly.

It a reminder that most schools centre children and their needs over the demands of trans extremist adults. The outlier schools must be challenged by the government and compelled to return to being politically impartial and to root out all adults using their role to gaslight children into the dangerous to children gender identity ideology.

All the girls had short hair when I was younger. Still girls!

I primary school it was encouraged to avoid nits!

Will they be telling the teacher to take her Pride flag down?

Good stuff. All the girls had short hair when I was younger. Still girls!

This is bloody amazing, OP! Well done you and well done to your daughter too for being brave enough to explain how it had made her feel 💪💐

It sounds like the school might get it...... so the next logical question is what are they going to do about it next? For example, will they tell staff not to "virtue signal" their belief in any what whatsoever? E.g. the flags that this teacher has, perhaps some are sharing their preferred pronouns in emails to students, do they teach children that the only way to be kind and respectful is to use someone's preferred pronouns?

In other words the key question is do they really get it?

Obviously that's not to take away from the brilliant news that you've just shared. But just a note of caution that their understanding might be superficial and because your daughter hasn't indicated that she has a gender identity that differs from her sex.

This is very very good news well done for taking it so far despite all the risks and issues.

Was this an official documented complaint? Will the school commit to writing down the substance of the complaint, the details of what steps they will take immediately and steps they will take to prevent this in the future?

Excellent post from you too @WarriorN

That said, I have to admit that I had a chuckle to myself that Glinner might swoop in and finish your last sentence with an alternative suggestion. Obviously this isn't a laughing matter but when the stakes are high (like the significant risks to children that are demonstrated in this thread), my dark humour sometimes kicks in.

I'm not going to explicitly say what he might suggest, as I don't want my comment deleted and obviously I can't read his mind.

But I'm going to say this instead: for a very long time, I was quite appalled by Graham Linehan's ranty tweets. For example, I couldn't understand why he was seemingly randomly labelling people as "groomers" when to my eye they were just attending a Pride event with children present. In hindsight, I now recognise that he was drawing attention to the type of clarity that SingleSexSpacesInSchools instigated on this thread. I've heard him saying since that he knew he would get headlines with it - and I've also heard his long form thoughts on it all. I guess it's a risk if you don't bring your audience with you when it comes to soundbites, but it's fair to say that I personally no longer think he's appalling. Vulgar and blunt sometimes, yes. But I now feel like I understand why and I thank him for it.

Also a teacher here, of over 25 years.

Complain.

Not acceptable.

Excellent posts from @BonfireLady, @SingleSexSpacesInSchoolsand @MrsOvertonsWindow

keeping children safe in education 2025, the latest RSHE guidance and the impact assessment for that are all clear that biological sex is a priority and teachers are to remain neutral regarding discussions around the sex gender debate.

Asking how she identifies is not neutral. The teacher had been clearly told she was a girl. Saying so in front of the class was exceptionally humiliating and damaging. The teacher believes that she may have a gender identity and is communicating this in front of the class.

the teacher is sexist

Looping in @2fallsfromSSA as they occasionally come onto MN and may be interested in this thread.

SSA, some context if you see this and don't get chance to read the whole thread:

The OP has raised a concern about a teacher who has taken her daughter to one side to quiz her on whether she really is a girl. PPs have been exploring this kind of behaviour as virtue signalling vs activism vs grooming. MrsO linked in an SSA article that explores some of the impacts on families if school leadership and safeguarding teams fail to recognise their ignorance.

Thank you for sharing this article MrsO. Safe Schools Alliance continues to be one of the best voices on this. I hope lots of people read it because it's all too easy for the Be Kinders not to realise how and why teachers' actions may significantly contribute to children being isolated from their parents.

It's such a key reason why we have safeguarding laws.

IMO this should be looked at a similar way to Prevent legislation because all of it involves coercive grooming. If a child was at risk of religious extremist radicalisation, we wouldn't expect teachers to take them to one side and quietly ask them if they know how much God/Allah loves them. Or if they're at risk of county lines recruitment, we don't expect teachers to quietly chat to them about how lovely it is that they've found a friendship group and don't feel lonely any more. Instead, we expect teachers to recognise and call out the coercive behaviour for the safeguarding issue that it is.

You are correct. It has been obvious from the opening post that her mindset, particular belief system and parenting skills are based in reality and supportive of her daughter, which is as it should be.

Luckily you don’t need to. Click on See all OP’s posts & it will just bring those up.

Hope you've been able to make contact with the school OP (no need to update if you don't want to).

I was thinking about how transactivists have been able to weaponise schools to bully parents out of safeguarding their children from age inappropriate gender identity beliefs. Safe Schools Alliance have an interesting piece about this by a parent. I noticed this comment from their MP:

"Whatever the government does or does not do, I have seen up close that parents across Britain really do need to watch out for ‘Progress Pride Flag’-flying schools, and ‘woke’ teachers who are so scared of their own shadow that they’d rather send children - young autistic girls in particular - on a damaging and irreversible path than engage critical thinking about the harm that their virtue signalling is doing"

The teacher in me is horrified at the failure of certain schools to engage in that critical thinking and due diligence. It's why it's so important that parents like the OP find the confidence to challenge schools about this.

Link to article here:
safeschoolsallianceuk.net/2025/07/16/are-schools-failing-gender-questioning-children/

This wasn’t stated in the original post which is what I was commenting to. I’m not reading a whole thread of 100+ posts, not enough time in this world!

I agree with the poster, if DC is upset by it, put in a complaint by all means. The teacher very clearly stepped over a line by continuing to question. Hopefully a complaint raises staff awareness in the school. Also agree that flying a flag in a classroom is very much unnecessary.

But persistently asking is grooming.

Yes, it is using your position of power as an adult authority figure to repeatedly try to over-ride the child's natural defences. The groomer may think that they have good cause to do this, but it is still grooming. They are using the child to fulfil some need in themselves

There are some dreadful accounts on here from parents. And as @BonfireLady so clearly explains, using fear and intimidation to bully parents out of protecting their children is wicked.
This is happening because our useless (and in many cases trans captured) politicians are still in thrall to the dodgy queer theory groups insisting that children must be transitioned, that girls have no right to single sex sport, that mixed sex changing is essential and teaching girls to have boundaries stops poor sad predators from being able to abuse them (I may have exaggerated that last point😁).

But it's not funny - it's unforgivable that they fail to safeguard children because transactivists insist on their right to access girls and women undressing and vulnerable. Children are intellectually and emotionally unable to navigate this adult ideology involving belief, delusions and fetish. Gaslighting them that sex change is possible and desirable is morally wrong.

This ⬆️

I'd break it down into 3 levels:

1. virtue signalling and ignorance of the underlying risk

The majority of people will likely be in this group. Most won't take it any further than pronouns in their bio to show their virtue - they'll engage if the conversation comes up but will quickly pivot to "it's all so very complicated". For the teachers that are in this group, some will likely think themselves to be better "educated" and/or more understanding of what really matters than the fuddy-duddy parents who can't get to grips with modern life and/or are afraid of their child growing up.

2. Activism

This is the next stage, for those that really do believe that they're in the right. They won't disengage with the conversation, they'll actively lean in and/or start a conversation at a theoretical level and will actively champion examples of trans people to inspire children. They want to save children en masse etc. They won't see the line between activism and grooming, because at a societal level there isn't one: it's mass indirect grooming, similar to how a paedophile grooms the adults first (so that the adults reassure the children about how great the person is). For clarity, I'm using paedophilia here as an analogy to describe grooming behaviour, not to say that anyone who is part of trans rights activism is a paedophile.

3. grooming

Speaking directly to a child in attempt to get them to recognise that they might be "in the wrong body". Again, for clarity, I'm not suggesting that teachers who groom children into believing that they might be in the wrong body are paedophiles. I suspect the vast majority think that they are genuinely saving children from bigoted parents.

Pretty much all teachers in group one and most in group two would likely have this approach:

A quick. "I'm sorry." and then moving on would have sufficed. Like when a child is known by the second name and a new teacher inadvertently calls out the first name - a quick correction and that's the end of it.

But persistently asking is grooming. It can't be anything else. The motive for the grooming is immaterial if the outcome is that the child is encouraged away from their parents. I have met one such family, whose daughter was groomed away from them in a school setting. I felt both heartbroken for them and scared for myself and my daughter, given my experience so for with the safeguarding leadership team at my daughter's school.

Activism and virtue signalling.

possibly grooming.

has to be stopped.

I’m also baffled as to why it was necessary or relevant for the teacher to clarify whether your daughter was a boy or girl in the first place?

A quick. "I'm sorry." and then moving on would have sufficed. Like when a child is known by the second name and a new teacher inadvertently calls out the first name - a quick correction and that's the end of it.

I’m also baffled as to why it was necessary or relevant for the teacher to clarify whether your daughter was a boy or girl in the first place? In front of everyone? Let alone needing to single them out afterwards to go deeper into the topic…

Good luck op, hope it paves the way for change at the school.

What does dressing like a boy mean?

I would complain. I'm a teacher and if I heard a colleague had done this, I would report them. It's SO inappropriate, even though it probably came from a place of misguided kindness. My son is gender non-conforming but is very clear that he is male. I don't need people muddying the waters.