To want to scream at this mother?

[GooseyLoosey]

A bit of background: ds (7) has problems integrating with his peers. We thought he might have an ASD but when assessed by an Ed Psych in June the conclusion was that he is about 7 years ahead of his peer group and his difficulties stem from that. We have worked with the school for 3 years to help ds. The school are quite clear that he is not an agressive child, just loud, and are aware that he has become the class scape-goat and is frequently picked on by other children (although he can stick up for himself).

The current issue is that there is a very "growm up" girl in his class. She made lots of comments to ds that he was just not able to deal with. As far as I (and the school) am aware, he called her names and she called him names and they mutually dislike each other. The girl also said pretty unpleasant things to my younger dd. This was all in the last school year, now they ignore each other.

It turns out that since, on several occassions, the girl's mother has made excuses to come into school and has waited for ds in corridors to tell him off and has called him "horrid boy" and "bully" and similar. On the last occassion she did it in front of many of his class mates and they told me about it. There is no suggestion (even by the mother) that at any time that ds did anything other than call the girl names.

Clearly I have told the school and they have talked to her and she admits it and sees nothing wrong with it. I am so angry I could cry - we have spent so long trying to help ds fit in and I feel like she has just undermined it all. I really do want to scream at her.

Am I over-reacting or am I being reasonable?

Ok, shame about that.

If you are worried about doing the school run this afternoon could you do it with a friend?

Otherwise can you get a bit of time this afternoon to practise your best Paddington Bear Stare?

I wouldn't waste your time even looking at this woman.
Engaging with her means she has dragged you down to her level and will only fuel her fire. Unfortunately there are some very strange people in the world.
The best thing you can do is empower your son to deal with a difficult situation. Make sure you keep communicating with the school- it is after all their responsibilty to ensure your ds wellbeing whilst at school. How about making an appt to see HT with your DS so he can be reassured of the measures the school is taking to protect him and you can agree together the best course of action for ds to take if any further incidents occur. It will show DS that you and school are on his side and give him more confidence.
Good luck with it.

You are all right - I will try my best to ignore her. Am going to do pick up with a friend though just in case she does not ignore me!

If she does want to "chat", I am thinking of agreeing but only at school with the head there as it happened at school and they are better placed than either of us to know what happens there. Does this sound OK?

I am a non-confrontational person, but on the other hand, I really feel that I need to visibly support my son here.

Yeah, that sounds fine. If say something like that and just walk into the school. Make it clear that you do want to talk to her but only in school. Ignore her if she keeps shouting.

OP, that is awful!

I hope the school has made it clear to her how not on that is...

Definitely best plan.
If mad mother approaches you I should just say "I'll be happy to talk to you, but at school gate is not appropriate. Let's make an appt with the HT for us all to discuss this problem" so it doesn't degenerate into a slanging match- which would be highly likely with someone who thinks it's OK to have a go at a 7 yr old.

If the school can't get a handle on it, or she continues to bother him or you outside the gates, I would consider talking to the police. After all there are laws to stop harassment and she is bullying a child at school where he should be safe. If she was hanging around outside your house to taunt him, calling the police would be an obvious option, but for some reason schools get this bubble we don't interfere with.

They would likely just send someone for a chat, but it might put the wind up her enough. It also gets it on record and if, gods forbid, she gets worse, you could consider a restraining order. It sounds extreme, but it's the "proper" way to go about it rather than taking it into your own hands.

Don't be afraid of her shouting at you.

If this happens there will be lots of witnesses and you will look at her with a bemused expression on your face. And you won't say anything unless it's something like 'Are you ok?'.

What's a Paddington Bear stare? Like the sound of that.

I agree don't talk or engage with her, ask head what she is doing to keep your son safe, ask what next, ask how you can be reassured ask at what point will she be banned from the school etc and I would seriously consider an informal phonecall to the police

Jump on it NOW. Put in writing to the school what the woman has said/done, with witness statements if possible and keep copies of everything.

Send copies to the Head and the LA, telling them what you want done and how - eg, to bar the woman from the premises. Direct them to the Teachernet website which gives template letters for schools to use (and posters for them to print and put up) about abuse towards staff, children AND visitors and reminds abusers of the school's right to take away their implici right to entrance, whereby they will be trespassing.

If you get no luck, refer to your MP and OFSTED.

Now I'll tell you why...

When aged 6 and 7 my DDs went through this treatment... only the woman was calling them fucking cunts, saying she was going to fucking get them etc. She also carried out acts of physical assault, and was equally abusive to me.

Despite having witnesses I got nowhere with my complaints, had to eventually take my DDs out of the school, where they were doing really well and were happy and I have had school fear and refusal situations with DD2 ever since.

I DID NOT at the time know about the rights and responsibilities to us all which the school had. They told me that they could do nothing, but it's all there on the Teachernet website.

For Gods sake don't go through what we went through.

**To clarify - my DDs were doing well and were happy with their friendships in the school where they were abused by a parent... but they, DD2 especially, were PETRIFIED of the woman, shaking, crying, begging not to be made to go in, begging that I didn't leave them.

www.teachernet.gov.uk/management/atoz/t/trespassers/

See here, especially the last paragraph, and the links which go with it.

Paddington had a particularly hard stare he was taught by his Aunt Lucy in deepest darkest Peru. And no, I haven't been reading Paddington Bear to the DC I can just remember it verbatim from my childhood

I think you take it to the Head teacher and put it in writing, has this woman got a CRB check to be in school so frequently and hanging around corridors.

So these are my steps:

Write to the head and cc the governors.
In your letter do not talk about anything other than the adult waiting in corridors and calling your son names, it really doesn't matter what he has done, IMO. So the safety of the school is compromised for your son because an adult is determined to bully him, this adult has no place in a school. The school is failing in it's duty of care.

Ask for an assurance that it won't happen again, explain if it happens again you will be taking it to Ofsted and the LEA.

Good luck GooseyLoosey. Some good advice here.

It does not matter what your son has done or not done, she has not right to talk to him about this.

Thanks all - had to go and do some work for a while and am now girding my loins for the school run. I have been rehearsing lines in my head all afternoon.

Valhalla - your story sounds terrible. Its hard to believe that adults can be quite so disgustingly horrible to small children. I truly hope that this does not esclate in that way.

Thanks for all the advice, initially I was so stunned by the fact that an adult would lie to get into school solely for the purpose of lying in wait to verbally abuse my 6/7 year old child, I thought perhaps I was over-reacting in the feelings of rage I had. Glad to see that none of you think so.

Didn't see her on the school run so have to gird my loins all over again for tomorrow.

You may find that she is an absolute coward and you won't see her for a while.

God, I hope so!!

I agree, don't talk to crazy lady but do speak to the head.