I am so f'ing unpset right now!!

[babybumpx]

Talk about childish behaviour, you try to encourage your children to know right from wrong and make them apologise for their inappropriate behaviour and your penalized for it??

My DS1 of 6 had an incident the other day at school where he was involved in a little fight, the teachers dont inform us of this as they believe that it as been dealt with at school? My personal opinion is this is that I feel that is wrong, we as parents need to know if something like this has happened? So the following morning in the playground im standing there and I can hear clearly that my DS is being bullied, one of the other children said to DS that he cant play with all his friends anymore and if he does that means the "the bully" cant play with his friends, so I went over and asked "what is going on" bullying is not tollerated by anyone so stop now please" the little boy replied " my mummy said I cant play with DS and if he does then he's not allowed to play with his friends" I was upset about that to say the least, then I get to find out why this as come about and its because of the incident.

I instantly approach the little boys mummy ( the one that was the victim of the fight) to get all the facts straight, she informs me that it wasnt my son who actually hit anyone he was just cheering them on, that is what her son told her! So then i contact the little boys mummy (who told my DS that he cant play with his friends) to also find out whats going on) i ended hearing all different stories (headache)!! and so I decide to speak with the teacher at the end of the day, she informs me that DS did actually grab the little boy, so when DS came home from school we had a talk and yes that is what happened.

Also unfortunately that same day another child had grabbed my DS and another child, my DS's reaction was to grab him back! my DS told me himself, I wanted my DS to apologise to the boy the next day as it is not appropriate and I need to see that he understands this, as time out against a wall is not sufficient in my eyes. The mother was quite rude and abrupt, she said that this has been dealt with in school and that it is not necessary for him to apologise, my quick reaction to that was "well im his mother and id like him to apologise!" basically dont undermine my parenting!!! I'd like to think that im raising my son to know that you do not get away with this kind of behaviour!

Also this is a school that literally encourage our children to keep secrets from us as parents!?!

am I being unreasonable??

apologies for the very long and stressed post...phew glad thats finished with.

its not keeping secrets....was your child told not to tell you? no!

its done,move on..

Yes you are being ureasonable

the school have dealt with it and you don't need to get involved.

I don't think YABU. Our school encourage us to get involved and inform us if something has happened. It makes sure we get the straight story and it gives us a chance to back up discussion of this at home. They do emphasise that punishment is issued already though and ask us not to punish again.
IMHO apologising helps children to put it behind them and to move on. Parents getting involved and telling their dcs not to play with other children just causes no end of problems and leads to bullying of the most horrid sort.
Had your ds apologised already? If not I don't think this was a problem.
Encouraging dcs to keep secrets is a very very dangerous and sinister road to go down.

I think keeping it in the school is probably not a bad idea. At that age, little fights and fallings out are quickly forgotten and the kids move on unlike their parents with whom these situations can fester and get blown out of proportion and words like bullying get bandied about when in most cases the 'b' word may be a little extreme.

I understand that what you heard upset you but I do think that in most cases these comments are a one off and the next day the kids are all best friends again.

how old is your ds btw, no your not being unreasonable its good parenting to expect your ds if you feel he needs to apologise i would do the same and on the occasion my ds had something simular happen i went in school and asked them to let him apologise and he also made a card and apologised to the teacher for being naughty which i thinks lovely and shows he understood, ive had expierience of other parents before so i wouldnt of approached her because of some parents agressiveness but good on you at least your the better person because you tried

also forgot to mention that she has contacted the head master to complain about me approaching her to get my son to apologise

I can see what you are saying Accio but the problem is different versions of events are reported at home and parents get very upset about things which haven't happened or believe the edited version their dcs tell, in which they star as little angels rather than as normal little dcs.
If teachers inform parents then a more rounded version of events is delivered to all.
I agree that parents do get a bit wound up by these things but at least then they are getting wound up by the real story rather than a Chinese whispers version.

The woman said there was no need to apologise as she felt it had been dealt with and you read that as undermining your parenting and demand that your son apologise. I think that is a little odd on your part but I wouldn't be reporting you to the head - were you aggressive?

the only person getting anything out of the forced apology would be you.......so why did you push it??

its just using other people (the children) to make yourself feel (and look) better

my last response was to the OP not carrots&celery.

to carrots: I take your point but in this case, the little boy had not reported any problem to his mother, nor had the school, nor had the other parents and children involved. To me that suggests the whole thing was a non-issue - until the OP made it into one and now it's all ending in the heads office.

YABU and have got way too involved in this.

You say you overheard your son being bullied but it just seemed to be one comment made by another child, I don't count that as bullying.

You then complain about another mother trying to undermine your parenting but you are trying to undermine hers if she feels it has been dealt with and sorted out.

If you get involved in all the he said, she said that children come out with through school then you will end up completely loopy.

Something must have been said to one of the other mums by someone or she wouldn't be encouraging her dcs not to play with people, which is the scary part of the story to me.
If the school had told everyone after school the day before then everyone would have had the same story and would have known how it had been handled at school.

I also think an adult directly approaching a young child and telling them that they are a bully is a bit dubious. Perhaps that why the mother has reported you to the head?

I think incidents that happen at school are best left to the school to deal with in most cases. Parents do have the capability of blowing things all out of proportion (as I have recently done ) I think you should have spoken to the teacher first about concerns about your ds being "bullied" and given them the opportunity to sort it out.
My dd has "bullied" for most of this academic year and I have been working with the teachers to resolve it. I would never dream of making another parent feel bad about something their child may or may not have done (because actually, I only have one side of the story.) All I knew was that dd was scared of going to school because of the behaviour of one child. Anyway, despite the teachers being a bit crap, it's all sorted now (touch wood) after meetings with the head teacher.
I hope you can get it all sorted out, there's nothing worse than seeing your child miserable going to school everyday :(

IloveTIFFANY....

Also this is a school that literally encourage our children to keep secrets from us as parents!?!

Yes they are literally told that I qoute "we dont have to tell our mummies everything do we, we can keep some secrets"!!, this is a separate issue.

I dont feel like I was aggressive at all, this mum that was involved is supposed to be a friend of mine, I was personally training her for FREE, a while ago but because i was getting extremely tired as i was in my first trimester i asked if i could start it again afterwards, she's never been the same since!

She was very rude when she spoke to me! All i wanted was for my son to apologise for grabbing him?

With the "fight" (separate incident) it was when I saw my son being completely excluded because a childs mother told him to not play with DS and if he did he would not be allowed to play with his friends! that is WRONG! and bad parenting!!

Bettyboop63 - thank you, my DS is 6

that should read has been "bullied"

where have you seen that they are told this.....in print somewhere?? are from the teachers mouth herself?? where?

You're way too involved in this op, the kids would have moved on straight away if this has been left in school and the parents left them to it!!

I have 3 dc's: 21, 20 & 4.5 and am discovering that "playground politics" seems to have moved up several notches since my ds's were small! Everyone seems so uptight, defensive and involved in every tiny thing. The thing is kids, like adults, don't get on all the time and imo they need to learn to handle these things on their own. I find I'm much more laid back about these things than lots of mums, and dd gets short shrift if she's moaning about every day playground stuff.

There's a big difference between a bit of an incident at playtime and bullying.

AccioPinotGrigio

I also think an adult directly approaching a young child and telling them that they are a bully is a bit dubious. Perhaps that why the mother has reported you to the head? I never approached a child and directly said your bullying my son?

He said to me DS that he cant play with him and then told his other friends not to play with him because if they did he would not be their friend...then they shouted " lets run away from....."

"we dont have to tell our mummies everything do we, we can keep some secrets"!!,

How do you know the teacher said this. Who told you that?

ok, you wqanted to apologise and she didn't want you to

can you explain why what YOU want is more important than what she wants?

you must find life pretty tough if you always get this upset at other people having differeing opinions

I've told dc to stay away from other children for a while if they're having problems with them. Perhaps this other mother thinks that her son and yours together egg each other on whereas they can play better with the other children separately.

You sound very judgemental and a little unhinged to be honest. I think I'd avoid you in the playground too.

I've got 3 DS's here so have had a few argy bargy moments.

I have never approached another parent in the playground over argy bargyness...it always leads to more hassle than the original incident warrants...kids fall out every five minutes when young.

Usually my DS's teacher will catch me at the school gate or phone me at home to let me know if there has been an incident...tell me what the punishments are IF there are any and that is that.

If they haven't informed me (very rare) I've always found it's best to approach the teacher for a breakdown of what happened. Then I've always been told school have dealt with it... to which my usual reply is Ok.

If I then carried on punishing my child after school has dealt with it then I would have felt I was punishing my DC twice imo.

Tbh if you had approached me in the playground I think I would have been very defensive too...the incident is over, punishments/talking to's have been issued and all I want to do is get back to normal asap...not get caught up in my childs playground nonsense.

Sorry OP, I can see that you're upset about this, but I too think you're overreacting. Is this really bullying?

Things dealt with in school must be left there, if there's something the school needs you to know they will tell you, have no doubt about that.

What about the other little boy that you spoke to first? I wouldn't do that again, if I were you, and if that other mother had seen you, she'd probably report you for that as well. I agree that an apology is a waste of time, there's nothing to be gained from it when you intervene like that - but perhaps just remind your son to apologise when he does these things, straight away.

If you are contacted by the school about this, you can stand your ground and ask that you are notified of any further incidents like this one, but try not to over-worry and hovver over generally small incidents.

IloveTiffany Yes from my DS's mouth!

I would have been fine if i the boys mother hadnt of told him that he cant play with my son....also baring in mind that this little boy does encourage my DS to do alot of things and is the stronger one of the group, with lots of parents/friends complaining of this, My DS being handed a sharp object my this little boy on the way to school! Being encouraged to play outside without parental supervision at the age of 6, he is allowed to do, telling him to do silly things in school etc...

No i dont like to get involved in the 'playground politics' this isnt something i do, i keep myself to my myself! Not when i feel a duty to stand up for my son, maybe my reaction to very sensitive but I dont feel like ive done anything wrong! the opposite, I will also stand up for what I believe in but i will also hold my hands up when i am wrong