To think a teacher of all people should have had more sense???

[Mands0603]

Will try and give you the short version of this:
Basically my DD has been playing out over the past week or so with her friend from up the road - our back garden leads out onto a field so they have been playing making dens etc. She sometime plays at the front of the house but always comes to tell me where she is and I am constantly checking on her. They are both aware of where they are allowed to go.

Anyway yesterday she fell over and scraped her face (just a graze nothing serious) she came home i wiped it clean then said she could do with letting me put some cream on - said no she wanted to go back out to play so would come in and have some on when she came in for tea (she was allowed out until 6pm this was about 5.15ish)all ok off they went on the field.

About 5-10 mins later friends mum came knocking asking if they were at our house explained no they were on the field she says they werent - hence mad frantic search which lasted only about 10 minutes but felt like hours.

Basically a woman saw then on the field my DD must have been saying her graze hurt so this woman took them to her house which was past ours and over the road and took them both inside and then put some cream on my DD.

The woman i later found out is a teacher and said that if we report her we could get her into a lot of trouble.
I must admit that i had a very stern conversation with my DD (as did her friends mum) but I was more shocked that this teacher did took them to her house.

I thought about it and if i was in that position i would either take the child back to her home and explain that they were hurt or go home alone and get the cream and take it back to the child.

What made it worse was that once she had put the cream on she let them out of her house alone to cross over the road by themselves - we were searching for them so found them before they attempted to cross over.

Hubby saw woman and he was quite abrupt saying she shouldn't have done that as she is a stranger and she has taken our child away from where she was allowed.

AIBU?

Hmm, did the teacher have her own children with her? That wouldnt make it ok but may make it a bit more understandable why she didnt want to go out of her way/thought it was ok to take DD to her house. I dont think she acted very thoughtfully but luckily that isnt yet a crime.

Glad your not looking to report her as that could backfire on you...it is you that has responsibility to keep your child safe, no one elses. You felt she was safe to play out, fair enough, but you were mistaken as she clearly didnt understand the 'stranger danger' rules.

I agree with Pagwatch about the scenarios, when DSSs first started playing out alone (at 8 and 9), I went through lots of scenarios, particularly about people who are not strangers (including teachers if it wasnt in school) offering them lifts/treats. And about how far they could go if they felt threatened or scared, which was basically run and shout, or if someone was holding them to kick, scratch, punch or bite. It's tricky teaching them manners and keeping themselves safe, which I guess is why I wouldnt let DS (nearly 6) play out alone yet. He's too young to understand the difference between being polite and putting himself in danger. His desire to be praised and to 'do the right thing' is age appropriate but means he is not able to keep himself safe.

Sorry if I've gone on too much, it is SO hard balancing safety and freedom, at least on this occasion it would appear no harm was done.

And before anyone flames me of course most teenagers are responsible, sensible, kind types but you would still want to make sure they'd expressly taken on responsiblity for a 6 yo rather than fallen into a situation where the child had become reliant on them (by following them, say) and they either hadn't realised or then suddenly didn't want the child around.

I ought to add that I'm not suggesting there was anything sinister going on. Maybe she's a little odd, that's all.

I agree about the age thing. When I was about 12, I fell off out riding when the horse bolted. Luckily a woman from the village, drove me back to her house and bathed my face/arms whilst my parents were called. I was 12 though and could have easily have said I didn't want to go.

However, if your dd was only 6/7, she perhaps felt she couldn't say no to the woman. The woman was irresponsible in taking your dd to her own house when she had to go past your house in order to reach her's. Surely, as a teacher and knowing all she knows about both safeguarding children and adults, that she was putting herself in a compromising position by taking the children into her own home. Also silly to put cream on her if she didn't know that she wasn't allergic (alhtough if your dd is old enough, I guess she could have told her). You odn't even know what the cream was? Might have been completely inappropriate for all you know.

Glad the kids are okay though.

Just read that your dd is 6.

To be honest, the fact that your dd actually told the woman that she isn't allowed to go and should stay where you told her, sends out alarm bells to me about the teacher. I would actually mention it to the school - someone in her position should have known better and why on earth would she take her back to her house to put cream on her face when you had seen it and said it was okay to wait until later. Obviously your dd wasn't in need of urgent medical attention.

I don't know what to think - part of me thinks she was just trying to be kind and helpful then part of me thinks that it was a stupid thing to do.

She didnt have any children with her she was walking her dog.

The field is attached to our back garden so the gate is always open for her to come in and out so it is not like she was far over the field plus as you say i had already seen the graze and it was visible as it was on her face (her cheek) but it wasnt bleeding just grazed.

I think the cream used was savlon as i put a bit on (what i call magic cream really as it comes in handy for lots of things to do with kids) and she said that it was what the lady used.

I havent seen her before although I think i will be keeping an eye out in future.

Re: stranger danger: My sister was checking that her son (aged about 5, I think) knew what she meant by a stranger. "Yes" he said "It's someone in a big black cloak with a mask".

I'm sorry you've had such a scare and I'm very glad there has been no harm done.

Do you know for sure that she's a teacher? Maybe she said that on the spur of the moment when she realised she had done something a bit stupid.

I agree with Pixyonaleaf at the start of this thread.

6 is rather young to be left in a field on her own even if it's attached to the garden - particularly if she doesn't feel able to say no to a stranger. It's your responsibility to keep your child safe after all. I think you just need to take the incident on the nose and learn from it. Learn that you need to be more aware of where your daughter is and what she is doing. Yes that woman shouldn't have taken your DD back to her house but thankfully she was fine. That woman could have easily been some perve that did awful things.

Your dd has proved she is not ready for the level of responsibility you have given to her. She needs to be playing outside the house were you can keep checking on her. Then in the future you can reassess.

I'm sorry but I think this teacher is way way out of order.

She took a 6 year old, who she didn't know, into her house, without telling anyone, then let them out again, to cross a busy road? I wouldn't care what age group she teaches. All teachers know about what is acceptable, and what she did certainly wasn't.

I'm afraid I would be visiting her again, with my DH to talk the whole thing through with her. I would want to know that she realises she was most definitely in the wrong, and would go about helping in a more appropriate way next time.

Very & :( that people are so unhappy about this.
Sounds like old-fashioned kindness.

I fell and broke my arm outside someone's house when I was 10yo; the owner came out, fetched me inside, gave me a drink, set my arm (she was a nurse) and phoned my parents. Would have been so much better if she had left me on the pavement outside, eh?

Thank goodness for old fashioned kindness, methinks.

At about 5, after much begging, I let my DD go down the road (less than 40m and just along one pavement) to buy a doughnut from the corner shop. I warned her fully and carefully about not talking to strangers. Well, OF COURSE I followed her, dodging behind parked cars and lamp posts and keeping out of sight. The first thing she did was have a long chat with the builders at number 8. When she came back, I asked her if she had spoken to any strangers.

"No" she said.

"Are you sure?" I pursued the point.

"Yes, Mummy, quite sure".

"So did you talk to anyone at all?"

"Oh yes, but not strangers, just the men building the scaffolding."

Hmmm...so she would probably have accepted a lift from them too!

The word stranger means something very different to small children. It is best to tell them not to go with ANYONE without telling you first.

Oh please don't report the teacher to the school. She was kind and realised she was stupid, but no harm came from it. On the contrary, good came out of it because now you know that your daughter isn't ready to be out on her own like this.

ragged the OPs DD was taken past her own house to the lady's house. There was no need for the teacher to take the little girl into her house. Why didn't she just say "I'll take you home to Mummy" She must have realised a 6 year old wasn't far from home. I think its a really odd thing to do.

If it had been me walking my dog and saw the girl, the fist thing I'd have done was to ask her where she lived. Then I tell her to go home and I'd call round and speak to her mummy (if I thought her mum perhaps didn't know about her face). I would never have taken her away from the area she said she was allowed in, to my own home.

Even though I'm a caring person and have 2 young children of my own, as long as she wasn't in danger or seriously ill (when I would call for an ambulance), then I would never put myself in a situation where my behaviour could be questioned.

If that woman is a teacher, she would have had enfless training on how to protect herself from allegations; taking children to your house without telling their parents would surely be first on the 'never in a month of sundays' training schedule???

Pixie - I don't think that the mention of the much older teenage brother or sister of a friend was intended as a vilification of a teenager - it was an example of someone whom a child might not think of as being a stranger, but whom, as a parent, you might not want your child wandering off with - someone you don't really know.

vintageteacups - exactly. well put.

But ragged we're not talking about a serious injury, and the child was nearer her house then this woman's house AND told her she wasn't meant to go with strangers! Totally different scenario.

Agree with Vinegartits "IMO 6 is a bit too young to be playing out unsupervised"

Yo're upset because somebody helped your injured unsupervised child?