To be pissed off with DS's science teacher?

[teameric]

DS started secondary school for the first time Monday. He was really looking forward to it and came home on the first day in high spirits.
This continued until wednesday, he was a bit quiet when he got in and I knew something was up. Eventually he told me that in his Science lesson the teacher shouted at him ....for scratching his nose.
I thought he was joking but apparantly, the teacher slammed his fist down on DS's desk and got in his face shouting at him that no fidgeting or scratching was allowed in class and that if he did it again he'd get detention.
Apparantly he shouted at another boy for something as equally stupid as well.
I have tried to downplay it a bit, and said that maybe the Teacher is just setting an example of how he wants the class to behave, but inside I'm fucking seething, DS was really anxious this morning (not usual for him) because he has Science again today. He's a good kid and wants to do well, I know his school days aren't going to be all plain sailing but ffs surely this teacher could have gone about it in a different way?

Why don't you make contact with the teacher and mention your child was a bit upset. Call the school and ask him to call you or see if you are allowed his email address at school.

Explain that you sone was upset. Ask if he did anything specially wrong or if he is over reacting a little. If you ask the teacher gently rather than challenging him you will have more chance of getting another side to the story and of forming a working parent/teacher relationship with someone who is going to have quite a bit to do with your child.

When the teacher realises his behaviour was too aggressive for this child, he should be a bit more sensitive. If he really turns out to be a consistently horrible bully than you can go to his Head of Department.

Don't go overboard too soon. Teaching is hard and it is hard to handle every child well all the time.

I can't believe how many parents think they get approval on how a teacher disciplines their classes.

Believe it or not, some pupils are not angels, and they can and do misbehave. Children will be very selective with the truth when recounting tales from the classroom, and are good at packaging their behaviour as trivial. In fact, this is known as 'low level disruption' and the scourge of most schools. Pupils are generally able to stay on one side of a boundary so that it is difficult to punish them, but their collective behaviour is very detrimental to the learning of others.

I would wager that this teacher was rather astute and knew exactly what was going on in his class.

In the old days, when we misbehaved and got caught, it was a case of 'honours even'. You did wrong, you were punished. End of.

Nowadays, pupils know exactly which parental buttons to push, and then it is straight to the head/governing body.

Some partnership in education.

BTW, if my son had come home with this tale, my reaction would be to say, 'well don't scratch your nose again'. That would be it. Finished.

Your attitude is quite extraordinary, MmeBlueberry. You're happy to 'wager that this teacher was rather astute', whilst pouring doubt on the OP's son's account of what happened. So you know the OP's son's teacher better than the OP knows her own son?

I take it you would be accepting of a boss who shouted in your face?

Great, mmeblueberry.

I have miserable memories to this day of being disciplined by a teacher (many times) for sneezing & blow my nose in class. How the fuck a child is meant to not sneeze & blow their nose when they have a dust allergy & the classroom is, inevitably, very dusty, I don't know.

So I guess your answer to me would have been - don't sneeze?

Let's hear the the teacher's side of the story before passing any judgment.

Fair enough to that, Mmeb - but it is very easy to assume that kids are bending the truth, when in fact, of course, teachers like everyone else have bad days, pmt, stressful home lives etc, and may on occasion behave unreasonably too.

And a life lesson is to accommodate people when they have an off-day.

If my DH were to go up the line when he was offended by his boss's PMT, it would be very, very detrimental to his career.

Sometimes, you just let things go, and it is important to teach your children this.

Being easily offended and wanting retribution is not often profitable for you.

MmeBlueberry said: Let's hear the the teacher's side of the story before passing any judgment.

Speaking to someone at school about what's happened does not necessarily mean a judgement has been made. And besides, you've already made a judgement and sided with the teacher!

Naturally.

If my child came back and told me such a tale, yes I would side with the teacher.

I always side with the teacher unless there is a persistent significant issue. And the persistent and/or significant issues I have had to raise have been to do with the behaviour of other children and the inability of a teacher to deal with it, to the extent that safety and/or learning have been compromised.

If a teacher starts term with the scary approach, I say tuff it out.

Despite my somewhat flippant comment about science teachers earlier, and my usual default position of teacher defender, teachers can just get it wrong.

It might just be a one off, never to be repeated, bad day etc but it also could be an under-confident, new teacher to the school trying to assert themselves or a teacher who has problems with behaviour management but you wouldn't necessarily know this yet, your son being so early into yr 7. This sort of confrontational/stamp on anyone who twitches is more common in male teachers and, I note in your OP, you say 'he'. What usually happens in these cases is either the teacher settles down or the older years give them a really rough ride, like a pack scenting weakness - and older, wiser colleagues intervene. There is also a shortage of science teachers nationally and that can mean school take what they can and find they are better at the science part than the teacher-relationships part. A generalisation, I admit since I work with fab science teachers, but one borne out of PGCE/NQT Prof Mentoring.

In teameric's shoes, I'd either let it go but keep a watchful eye or mention ds' upset to the head of year/pastoral manager (not the form tutor) as they have an overview of the cohort (useful if there are any other complaints re this teacher) and can have a quick word in their official capacity to HofScience or the teacher concerned if they deem it necessary.

Hope your ds has a better time in lessons next week.

Pointydog, I reckon it depends on the child. If my dd had been shouted at in such circs, it would be fair to assume that she probably deserved it - if not for that, then for the 20 other things she'd done earlier - but other children are very different.

I think at least one crazy teacher is important in the rich tapestry of childhood. I remember the Dragonlady of my school years well.

Of course it depends on the child but my Very Good child (natch ) was shouted-at-in-the-face when she'd done nothing, along with a few others. Were any of us unduly troubled? No. I told her to pull the finger out and improve her homework.

DS had Science again today, and apparantly teacher told the class he was going to be a bit nicer to them today, but be warned that in the past he was known to tear up homework that wasn't up to his standard. So yeah going for the scary teacher approach I think, which is fair enough.

Oh and Mmeblueberry for what its worth, yes I "do" get approval of how a teacher disciplines their class if it means my child is affected by it. And no my DS isn't an angel but like I said I know him and this was definately not a case of him being "selective with the truth". If this had happened when he had been at the school a while I wouldn't have even posted it on here.

Oh dear, the staff must live in fear of Year 10.