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AIBU?

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Original poster

to be shocked that I heard the teacher shouting this to a primary age child?

160 replies

CrapBag · 28/09/2012 20:23

I was in the school the other day. A class were having PE, I don't know what age group. It was a male teacher with a particularly loud shouty voice. From the shouting I established that a boy had cut in the line (they were lining up to leave the hall). The teacher really shouted at this boy about cutting in and how rude it was etc etc, really going for it. Then we heard "YOU ARE NOTHING BUT A BULLY" shouted to this lad.

I know I don't know this child, he may be a bully. I don't know the context other than he cut in line at the end of PE but I was quite horrifed really to hear a teacher shout, and I do mean shout as in bellow, at this lad and call him this.

I must admit I am a fan of labelling the behaviour rather than the child. I am by no means a perfect parent but if DS is playing up, I will always tell him that what he is doing is naughty etc, not that he is naughty.

I wouldn't have been at all happy had this been my DC. I know it wasn't as mine is in reception and this was an older class.

Should I be shocked? Am I just being too precious at my first born being at school now?

OP posts:
ArielThePiraticalMermaid · 29/09/2012 18:39

Perhaps a day trying to teach a classful of children may make you more understanding, LittleBairn. Presumably you have never shouted or wanted to shour at your children, if you have them? If you have though, imagine 34 of them.

Kalisi · 29/09/2012 18:50

That's the teachers issue not the children. Everybody loses it sometimes but when we start seeing that behaviour as acceptable, therein lies the problem.

AgentZigzag · 29/09/2012 18:55

Under what circumstances would you shout at a child they're nothing but a bully Ariel?

BonnyDay · 29/09/2012 18:56

i dont shout at work or at home.

very rarely if there is a hubbub in the class. never at a kid. I did before i had kids and worked at a well rough school though

ArielThePiraticalMermaid · 29/09/2012 19:08

God, I'm not saying that the teacher was right in shouting what they did! I'm saying that some of the frothing that goes on when a poster hears an adult shout in school is just ridiculous. Sometimes teachers shout. They don't generally want to, though occasionally it is effective. When I was 24 I stood in front on my first class - a year 6 class of 34 - after 9 months of teacher training and virtually none of that included how to discipline. It was assumed that you would somehow magically work it out for yourself. And yes, sometimes I shouted. Even in primary school, children work out which buttons to push and they push them.

Shouting occasionally at a class is ok. Shouting all the time is not.

I'm not a teacher any more, thank fuck.

AgentZigzag · 29/09/2012 19:11

It's not frothing to be concerned about a teacher labelling a child a bully.

Shouting, so long as it's not bawling, I would have no problem with in school.

But this isn't what the OPs about.

Kalisi · 29/09/2012 19:14

I'm not a teacher any more, thank fuck.

Haha! Gotta love the job eh? Grin

Valdeeves · 29/09/2012 19:15

Trust me - sometimes in the classroom you see pupils
being systemically bullied by others. There lives are being
made a misery EVERY day by individuals. A real bully can make
almost the entire class laugh at one person. A child can
feel very scared and unsafe in that enviroment and often begin non
attending.
Sometimes as the teacher it's very hard to bring a bully
to heel - but you have to. I agree that the best way is not
to bully them back by shouting - however in life and sometimes
you just have to stop beating round the bush.
If a bully is a bully you need to tell them - and if they are
some hardened inner city school child who is
doing the above EVERY day - you tell them loudly!!!
I'd put money on this child being one of those as the teacher
has clearly run out of patience.
Btw to the poster - I think that's a mild comment and
if you are shocked by that it just makes me wonder where
you were educated?

ArielThePiraticalMermaid · 29/09/2012 19:18

I was talking in general, not about that specific shout, as I thought I made clear in my opening sentence. Obviously not. There have been a couple of threads recently along the lines of "I heard a teacher shouting, I was horrified" etc.

"Nothing but a bully" is troubling. I shouted something once at a "difficult" boy in my class, and I apologised to him the day after and told him I was wrong to have done that. Perhaps this teacher did the same. The OP won't know.

Valdeeves · 29/09/2012 19:19

Littlebairn - every body's different - some children are quickly
bought to heel by shouting, for others it's like lighting
the blue touch paper of a firework. We are trained not to shout
but sometimes you have to to be heard over 31 voices!
It's not a form of humiliation - it's about quickly regaining control so you don't waste time when someone is ruining someone else's education.

For the record though - I don't shout - my child is a firework.

BridgetBidet · 29/09/2012 19:20

Good good I am terrified of what it will be like when my DS goes to school if this is the kind of reaction you get from other parents when a teacher disciplines a child for bullying.

Original poster
CrapBag · 29/09/2012 19:31

Ok, I pointed it out further up the thread and I am going to assume that people haven't read it. We do not know that this child is a bully. Yes I only had this snapshot. Maybe the child is, maybe he isn't. We can't assume he is at all.

For the posters saying they wanted to know more about the situation. It was like this. I was in the next room. Teacher had a class doing PE in the hall. He was shouting sometimes as it was hard to concentrate and to hear my instructor and I know she was fed up. Then it went quiet as the class left, we were very relieved. Another class came in with the same teacher. Noise level went up again and really hard to concentrate, I was blocking it out as best I could. Then we heard them being lined up to leave. Teacher shouts at a boy for cutting in line, telling him how rude he is, continues to berrate him for a little while, all shouting, then the line "you're nothing but a bully". I remembered it vividly because we all went silent in the room I was in.

OP posts:
MoRaw · 29/09/2012 22:00

Thankfully it appears that Whitehall has seen the problem with the wishy washy approach to dealing with problem kids at school. This was probably brought home to them by the London riots. There is a lot of noise about returning more power to the teachers. All this shock and horror at a teacher shouting at an unruly student.

A similar problem can be seen in terms of academic performance. Failure was considered a dirty word. No child was allowed to be told that they failed. Look what has happened to the GCSEs. We are producing students who cannot adapt to the working world and who cannot compete with other countries.

ilikemysleep · 29/09/2012 23:08

Moraw. I'd like to hope you are missing the point; it's not that he shouted, it is what he shouted. And if all the kids in both lessons this teacher was heard to be constantly shouting in were unruly, then either he is a crap teacher or the school has a serious issue with discipline that one man yelling will not solve.
Are you a Daily Mail reader by any chance? You sound as well informed about teaching and education as a Mail jounalist...where on earth do you get your info that no-one has been allowed to be told they have failed and it has caused Sodom and Gomorrah on the streets on Britain? I would bet my bottom dollar it's not from working in education. I work in education and trust me, there are children failing and only too aware of it all the time. Not every ill in society can be cured by bringing back flogging, standing in the corner with a dunce's cap on, and an education system where only 2% of pupils get an A grade in their 0 levels...

Original poster
CrapBag · 30/09/2012 07:53

"it's not that he shouted, it is what he shouted"

Thank you!

I think there are others who have missed that point too! I am guilty of shouting at the DCs at times, I try to stop myself and do it in a calmer way, but it wasn't about the shouting, that was just setting the scene so people could get an idea. Not quite the same effect if teacher is just standing there calmly saying "oh you are nothing but a bully" in an offhand way.

OP posts:
scrablet · 30/09/2012 08:07

Teachers can be bullied by a class too. 11 year olds can be quite capable of making a teacher's life hard. Not necessarily thru malice, just cos they can and it can seem funny.
Not the point of the thread, I know.

Prarieflower · 30/09/2012 08:11

YABU

Kalisi · 30/09/2012 08:13

I don't really see what point you are trying to make here MoRaw. The 'shock and horror' you describe is just people expressing the opinion that on this occasion, the teacher appears to be behaving unreasonably. If the gym teacher had been screaming at say a child with undiagnosed SN or who had horrific problems at home would you be so quick to blindly defend the Authority figure over these 'No good kids of today' Afterall it is just a teacher shouting at an 'unruly' child right? I highly doubt that these new steps to go back to the good ol days of hangings and floggings will do anything to fix the actual underlying problems with society just like shouting at and belittling a PRIMARY school boy for cutting in line is really not going to enforce good discipline and bring the little bastards in line.

baskingseals · 30/09/2012 08:19

YANBU

the teacher had lost control.

totally agree that it is not the fact that he shouted, but what he shouted. even if the child is a bully, all the teacher has done is perpetuate the nasty circle of bullying, as i would have thought that in order to regain face, this boy will take it out on somebody weaker than himself. just like the teacher did. by saying what he did, the teacher is part of the problem, not the solution.

hobnobsaremyfavourite · 30/09/2012 09:00

Jeez home ed your kids then if you are so convinced you are so perfect.

Kalisi · 30/09/2012 09:09

Don't be silly. School is important and most teachers I have come into contact with are hardworking, intelligent, maintain good discipline and can effectively teach children. The guy in question appears to have been behaving like a bit of a dick so it would seem reasonable for the OP to report it.

baskingseals · 30/09/2012 09:47

who is saying they are perfect?

he shouldn't have said it hobnobs. it is not discipline shouting to somebody 'you are a bully'.

cory · 30/09/2012 20:47

"You are nothing but a bully" does seem a particularly unfortunate way of phrasing it though. Not much incentive to the child to show any better sides- teacher has just told him that bully is all he is.

fwiw dc's primary schools had a splendidly firm approach to bullying, but they seemed to be able to put it more aptly.

Original poster
CrapBag · 30/09/2012 20:56

"Jeez home ed your kids then if you are so convinced you are so perfect."

Who exactly is that aimed at? Hmm

I don't believe anyone thinks they are a perfect parent so how about you get off your high horse.

OP posts:
MoRaw · 30/09/2012 21:38

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