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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

to have called my DS#2 ' a bit dopey' to the TA in the playground this morning?

48 replies

OrmRenewed · 15/09/2010 11:19

because she reacted as I I'd called him 'spawn of satan' and told her I beat him with barbed wire to drive out the demons

He is lovely, bright (in his way), loving and enthusiastic. But he is 'away with the fairies' a lot of the time - a description that she accepted btw.

Is 'dopey' a bad thing to say [confused}

Oh well that's my 'very supportive mother' reputation gone for a burton

OP posts:

irishma · 15/09/2010 11:24

YANBU

Dopey is EXACTLY the word I would use to describe my DS too and if anyone would like to argue with me about that then I invite them to spend an hour with him...he would get distracted by a fly......

BuntyPenfold · 15/09/2010 11:25

Dunno really.
Not that bad imo.
'Away with the fairies.' surely an accepted technical term.

werewolf · 15/09/2010 11:29

The school's obviously got an under-the-counter book of Terms To Be Used, a bit like the travel agent's real info on tourist places. 'Dopey' doesn't cut it, whereas 'away with the fairies' is ok.

According to my school, 'daydreamer' is acceptable too.

anonymousbird · 15/09/2010 11:48

YANBU!!!!!! At all!!!!

My DS sounds very like yours - bright enough, however daydreams for Britain (generally with hand down trousers - all innocent, he is only 6).

And I have always said to his teachers at the beginning of the year (at an appropriate moment) that he has a tendency to dream a bit, and may need "reminding" to engage and focus a bit. Think I describe it as "cloud cuckoo land" which in my book is exactly the same as your "away with the fairies". And I have no qualms about using that phrase and if a teacher reacted badly, then that is her problem, not mine!

I'm merely short cutting her to realising that yes, he is a bit prone to that, he won't snap out of it without encouragement, so rather than her waiting and trying any subtle tactics (which would wash right over his head) she simply needs to say "AB's son, please pay attention" (or whatever they say) and give him the virtual prod he needs from time to time.... she doesn't need to waste her time trying to coax him out of his little world, a direct approach is absolutely fine by me which is why I have always been pretty up front about it with the teachers.

YADNBU!!!!!

pinkbasket · 15/09/2010 11:49

I told my child's teacher he had a been a little sod that day and she went and told the head...

ChippingIn · 15/09/2010 11:50

YANBU

It's all getting far too ridiculous!

BuntyPenfold · 15/09/2010 11:54

what happened pinkbasket? lines, naughty step?

Mouseface · 15/09/2010 11:55

I hear much worse things being said directly to DCs when out.

YANBU and I think that the TA is pre-progammed to react like that to even the most gentle of 'derogatory' comments.

pinkbasket · 15/09/2010 11:56

The head came out and spied on my kids while they were waiting for me and then asked if everyone was happier than the morning.

BuntyPenfold · 15/09/2010 12:03

Do they have children?
I call mine 'rotsocks'. Thought everyone did.

Original poster

OrmRenewed · 15/09/2010 21:03

Hmmm...do you think obnoxious, stubborn little twat would be in their little book of acceptable epithets?

Probably not. Well I won't say it, just continue to think it....

OP posts:

PixieOnaLeaf · 15/09/2010 21:06

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn

Galena · 15/09/2010 21:20

I would grin and nod if a parent told me that one of my class was 'a bit dopey'. Particularly if he/she'd forgotten their homework/pe kit/brain for the hundredth time that morning!

2rebecca · 15/09/2010 21:26

YANBU, but I think it sad that daydreaming is so under rated and called dopey rather than "contemplative and imaginative".
Give me a contemplative kid who lives in his own world some of the time over one with hyperactivity who can't sit back and contemplate or daydream any day.

You'll be sounding like my mother and saying he has "no common sense" next.

corlan · 15/09/2010 21:31

I have just looked up ' a bit dopey' in the book and I think you'll find the correct term is 'easily distracted'.

streakybacon · 16/09/2010 08:02

Reminds me of the positives-only comments on school reports. Seems that teachers/TAs are so over-focused on only saying good things about children that they're quite taken aback when they hear anything that doesn't describe them as wonderful, especially if it comes from the parents.

I think that was my downfall during ds's time in school. Nobody seemed to recognise any of his obvious difficulties (he has AS) and it was frowned on when I drew attention to them. They seemed to find it hard to differentiate between "My son has a problem - what can you do to help?" and "My son is a twat, I hate him and you'd better call in social services sharpish before I hit him with a pan."

Emo76 · 16/09/2010 08:25

YANBU. My sister was always "dopey" when we were young, and she really WAS!! She got a degree from Cambridge in the end!!

2rebecca · 16/09/2010 08:29

I don't think of dopey as "easily distracted" to me that's more an ADHD thing and I'd say dopey was the opposite, more inclined to think about things, just not necessarily the things you want them to think about and a tendency to daydream.

scaryteacher · 16/09/2010 09:36

Dopey to me is my ds first thing in the morning not having his brain or common sense in gear and having to be hassled to get himself and all his kit sorted out. He has been like this since he was 11; rapidly approaching 15, I live in hope his teenage male brain will learn practicalities one day.

Daydreaming is something else, which is profitable and creative, but not to be undertaken in school time or when your mother is attempting to get large teenage male out of the house on a short time scale in the morning.

'Easily distracted' applies to most teenagers when faced with maths homework and a desire not to do it. Hardly just an ADHD trait.

Tippychoocks · 16/09/2010 09:45

Oh dear. I thought the accepted British Way was to merrily slag off everything you hold dear. I always do: refer to my house as a filthy hovel when it's not really or my angel child as a little horror. Am I likely to be reported to the Head too? Or Social Services for having an over active self-deprecation gland?

Dopey would be the least of my worries

StayingDavidTennantsGirl · 16/09/2010 10:01

Good lord - if calling your child dopey or a little sod gets you Sent to the Headteachers Office, what on earth is going to happen to me when I mention selling one of the dses in order to a) have a spare room and b) have the money to furnish it as a spare room cum art studio!

Or when I suggest to my choir committee that if one of them will take one of the dses off my hand, I will house the choir music library in the extra space this will generate!

Vallhala · 16/09/2010 10:05

My god, when will these people get a grip! Where do they get them from? And why?

Telling the HT because you said your child had been a little sod that day? What! I'd have told her something; to get a life and get back to what she was paid to do... teach!

serenity · 16/09/2010 10:10

I've never described DD as dopey, but I have told her teacher she was the spawn of satan and a demon child

MaMoTTaT · 16/09/2010 10:11

well DS1 is often a little sod, DS2 lives in cloud cuckoo land much of the time and DS3 is a little horror.......

ahhh well - thankfully the school don't seem to have an issue with me calling them such (besides I've sat having coffee in the staffroom after assembly often enough to know that the reports do not reflect what they often think of some of the children they teach )

Last year DS2's teacher said he was "in touch with his feminist side" (he's 6)

Tippychoocks · 16/09/2010 10:23

Really MaMoTTaT? Feminist? Is he protesting against Hooters? I love the idea of a feminist 6yo boy. Why the heck not?

Don't tell me she meant feminine and shatter my illusions

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