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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To think this teacher is fucking loopy?

271 replies

OverReactionMuch · 16/02/2013 18:12

DS2 (just 5) apparently broke a branch off one of the trees in the school playground. He was swinging on it (normal boy behaviour?).

Teacher, who is Head of KS1 then paraded him around all the KS1 classes with the offending branch lecturing the other DC on how naughty my DC was and what a terrible thing he did.

She also phoned me (I did not know she had taken him round the classes) to inform me of my DS's 'crime'. I said I would talk to him. She also took the 'dead' branch into the afterschool club and showed all the DC there and so the staff could show me the offending article when I picked him up.

DS has said that he did not mean for the branch to come off.

I am actually quite furious that she has demonised my DS to the other DCs. DS has found it very hard to settle into school and I actually had a meeting with this woman before he started at school as I was concerned about how he would settle (undiagnosed SN is my mother's gut instinct) and she has totally ignored every thing I said.

AIBU to loudly voice my displeasure on Monday?

OP posts:
iwantanafternoonnap · 16/02/2013 20:31

I am still laughing at people saying that it is not normal behaviour for kids to climb/swing from trees!! I actively encourage my DS to climb trees and I climb with him.

The National Trust has it as one of its 'things to do before you are 11 and 3/4' along with swinging on a rope swing. It is normal, very normal and I know loads of girls who climb and have climbed trees. I did it a lot as a kid along with swinging from anything that I could the same as all my friends.

Yes the teacher was out of order to do what she did and it is a massive over reaction to a kid swinging from a tree even if he had been told not too.

The wind rips branches off trees too for all those that think trees should not be climbed upon etc.....you going to go parade the wind around a school! FFS!

DreamsTurnToGoldDust · 16/02/2013 20:31

Mmmm, I really struggle to believe that a teacher would parade a little child around all classes and then the asc and demonise him until the end of the day without another adult saying something, I really think you need to talk to the school to get clarification, something doesnt sound right about it all.

soverylucky · 16/02/2013 20:32

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Message withdrawn at poster's request.

DreamsTurnToGoldDust · 16/02/2013 20:33

Teachers dont call children naughty, they might say the behaviour is naughter but not the child.

MrsDeVere · 16/02/2013 20:33

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Pandemoniaa · 16/02/2013 20:35

As you are so certain YANBU I'm left wondering why you bothered to start the thread in the first place.

Imaginethat · 16/02/2013 20:35

By contrast, my 5yo was caught trying to wrestle a branch from a school tree. A teacher aide reported to me that she dashed over to deal with it before a teacher proper noticed. She said, no breaking branches darling, we leave the trees to grow. To which he replied, But why? Why do we need all trees for air? I need this branch for my broomstick! And so it went, gently resolved. Thank you kind teacher aide. My point being that the concern at this school is for respecting nature. There are several trees which are allowed to be climbed, the others must be left in peace. The swinging on a branch being a safety issue surprised me. Not in UK!

LindyHemming · 16/02/2013 20:39

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Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Fairenuff · 16/02/2013 20:41

Would you, for example, think it ok for your child to climb the trees in your neighbours garden? No. Because those trees are 'off limits'. Trees in your local park or woodland are fine. Trees in school are off limits.

It's not about tree climbing, it's about breaking rules.

FreyaSnow · 16/02/2013 20:42

There are some trees which are acceptable to swing from and some which are not.

If the tree in question is a delicate thing which your child has damaged by wrenching off a branch off it on purpose while swinging, that is rather a different matter to if it is an enormous oak tree where nobody would expect a large branch to snap.

DD's school had trees. They were delicate and in a nature area that the children and parents had worked on. If a child had gone out and damaged one of them, a big deal would have been made of it.

The 'typical boy behaviour' comment gives the impression that your son is allowed to get away with some rather impetuous behaviour which most parents would deal with, but perhaps that was not your intention when you made that comment.

FlouncingMintyy · 16/02/2013 20:48

Who has said it is not normal for children to climb trees?

Thymeout · 16/02/2013 20:49

Yes, Freya - just what I was thinking.

If this tree were a young tree, planted as part of the landscaping, at some expense, I'd be hopping mad that a child had thoughtlessly damaged it by pulling one of its branches off. And I'd want all the other children to know that it was wrong to deter them from doing the same.

Get the true facts, OP, before you go in with all guns blazing.

mousebacon · 16/02/2013 20:58

I used to work at a lovely little school where the playground was surrounded by trees and a little trail for the children to explore. All the children knew they could explore the wooded area but they were not allowed to pull the plants, swing or climb on the trees or anything of the sort.

Even though these were clear school rules there were always those children (boys and girls) who couldn't resist climbing on the low branches.

The reason for the rule was purely to protect children from hurting themselves and to protect the school from irate parents whose children had fallen. It's a sad fact these days that people are quick to look to legal action when there's potentially compensation to be had.

The point I'm trying to make is that the trees etc were a lovely resource for the school but we had to protect ourselves as well.

Do I think your DS should have been told off for climbing/swinging? Yes.
Do I think the teacher should have taken him round the classes? No - but I would probably have used it as a prompt for assembly the next day.

mousebacon · 16/02/2013 21:06

I agree with you Euphemia

I think there's a tendency for some people to think schools have the capacity to provide those sort of experiences. Lovely though that may be (alongside tree climbing) those are the sort of things I'd want my children to do as part of our family or as a guide/scout etc. The focus on sats, league tables and the constant assessments have killed much of the spontaneity we used to have in our primary schools.

HollaAtMeBaby · 16/02/2013 22:26

YABU and I can't believe how many people are up in arms at the thought of a child having to face consequences for what sounds like wilful destruction. Tree branches don't just pop off the tree - you have to repeatedly pull and swing on them and you can hear and see them gradually breaking. Part of letting children interact with nature is teaching them to respect and care for it.

FamiliesShareGerms · 16/02/2013 22:45

If parading a 5yo around to every class to show them the broken branch and say how naughty the boy had been to swing on it is deemed suitable punishment, I would dread to think what would be done for something more serious (bullying, fighting etc)

I agree with some other posters that it doesn't seem quite right (even going into after school club??)

bugster · 16/02/2013 23:01

YANBU. Teacher sounds like a total head case.

Agree that swinging on a tree is completely normal behaviour - if told to stop they should, but not ever trying swinging on a tree would be more worrying.

Fairenuff · 16/02/2013 23:01

I think this is a one-sided view. It's come second hand from children who saw and heard some part of this but by all means not all of it.

The OP uses phrases like 'paraded round' and 'demonised' to make it seem even worse.

It is extremely unlikely that all these facts are true. OP should probably go and speak calmly with the teacher to find out what happened before jumping in to 'defend' her 'humiliated' son.

And she should be ready to apologise on his behalf for him breaking the rules and damaging property, should that turn out to be the case.

fluffypillow · 16/02/2013 23:02

That is really nasty. I would talk to the Teacher about this, and then the Head. It was a complete over reaction.

FreyaSnow · 16/02/2013 23:27

Whatever the child had done, it would be an over-reaction to treat a five year old like that. I think the best solution would be to point out that it isn't right to take a five year old round various classrooms telling them off, and talk to the school about that. Trying to defend the tree swinging is besides the point.

rollmopses · 16/02/2013 23:29

When has climbing trees and swinging from branches become 'BAD' behaviour?
Give me strength............

Feenie · 16/02/2013 23:33

When they have been asked not to. And only then.

Keep up!

LindyHemming · 16/02/2013 23:33

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

FreyaSnow · 16/02/2013 23:34

It always has been if you damage a tree. I'd have been told off for it as a child and had a very outdoorsy sort of childhood in a rural area.

DeepRedBetty · 16/02/2013 23:35

I remember destroying a young tree by climbing it and most of the lower branches got broken, when I was about five. My dsis was three, she was involved but it was my idea. It was in the garden of the pub that friends of my parents had recently taken over, they'd posted me and dsis and their own dds (definitely littler than me) out there while they drunk a couple of G&Ts had some refreshments on the way back from some massive family jaunt.

It really hadn't occurred to me until I saw my mum's face that I'd done anything wrong.

So... yabu to say boys will be boys - because girls will be destructive little monkeys too.

yanbu that children that age really don't understand about permanent damage. If your ds had not been told not to muck about with the trees in the playground, the punishment is disproportionate. If he had, it isn't. If my parents and Mr and Mrs Whatsit had said 'Don't do that' I wouldn't have done it, and if I'd heard them say that and did it all the same I would have deserved the punishment. I had (and still have) a fairly strong sense of natural justice. Most children do.

I don't remember being punished for that crime, so I'm pretty certain I'd not been told not to do that. My parents were pretty strict but always fair.

If you think ds has sn, you need to start the ball rolling with diagnosis and statement. It takes for bloody ever. DNephew has had to wait until halfway into Yr 2 to get his Aspergers official, and that process started with a Report to GP from the leader of his nursery when he was only just turned three.