To think that 3 teachers shouldn't have done this to my son?

[Marn1e]

My DS is 7 and in year 2. He's been swimming with the school every week for the past two terms and enjoys it a lot.

Last week he had a flare up of his eczema. For background, he's suffered since he was 3 months old and has been involved in clinical trials/ all sorts of treatments etc. I now generally just keep him moisturised etc and only use his 10% steroid cream when need be. Last week he was covered so I immediately used his cream and gave him anti histamine etc.

It coincided with swimming so I popped into the office on the relevant morning and told them he'd had a flare up of eczema and I was going to keep him off swimming for two weeks ( necessary because the steroid immediately gets to work but further applications are needed even when the patches are gone to continue "dampening' it all down.

Today was the second week so I didn't send him in with his kit. He's still covered but on the mend so he will be back to it next week.

He came out of school today and told me that a teaching assistant had approached him and asked him why he wasn't swimming. He told her he had eczema. She then called over another teacher and a helper and between them they asked him to pull up his trousers so they could see his legs and then asked him to pull up his tops so they could look at his chest, tummy and back. He did this but was obviously a bit bothered as it was the first thing he said to me when he came out of school.

I called the school and the relevant teachers had gone home, although the teacher I spoke to said there would have been a very good reason why they did this and he " probably said his skin was hurting so they had a look".

He didn't say this. He has never once complained about it and he's never had time off school for it. Besides, he told me he was approached by a TA who specifically asked to look at it.

I've asked the school to come back to me with an explanation. They obviously don't believe me ( err not sure why?!?! ) but instead of calling me they chose for three of them to get him to pull up his clothes.

So is this a big deal? Wwyd?

I don't know how anybody can be certain about the motives here. Curiosity.
Checking whether you are lying about the eczema.
Checking whether you are lying about how bad the eczema is.
Checking whether you are covering up child abuse.
(I must admit the last one was my first guess - more than one member of staff present, not touching the child themselves, reason being used for 2 weeks etc).

So, I agree that the OP needs to ask the school to clarify what happened and why and to voice her concerns.

OP, I don't understand why you are so certain that they wouldn't suspect your son of having been physically abused. Your reasoning so far seems to be "Because I wouldn't hit him" which isn't answering the question.

OP firstly I'd be proud that your ds knows to tell you straight away if a kind of physical contact has made him feel uncomfortable, even if it comes from a person of authority.

Now you need to let the school know that the teachers have touched your child in a way that made him feel uncomfortable. I'm not saying inappropriate, but if your child was unhappy, which he clearly was then that is an issue. Next there's the fact that Althea have either not passed in your message or not believed it and as a result ds was embarrassed and uncomfortable.

The only reason I can come up with, where I would say this was ok, is if hey had a child protection concern and thought you were keeping him off swimming to avoid the teachers seeing bruises. I assume ds is still taking part in PE? If he is then that suggestion is out of the window too because bruises could be spotted while he changed.

Go and speak to them OP.

Who is Althea?? I meant either lol.

This reminds me of a story my grandfather told me. I can't remember the exact facts, but some older boys had been kicking his legs and holding him down and walking on his legs until he was covered in bruises. He was frightened and ashamed and went to great lengths to hide this from his mother.

Child protection worries don't necessarily mean they're accusing you of hurting your son.

But they didn't touch him, just got him to lift his top up.

so when a serious case review finds that the abused child attended school and had bruising all over his body how did no one see them?

because the mother said that the child had a serious skin condition and could not go swimming it participate in PE.

no one questioned her or asked the child.

FFS, if you are worried a child is abused, you phone social services, you do not check for yourself. There are 2 reasons.....1.) you could fuck up the evidence for a court case and most importantly, 2.) you could risk the child going home, telling the parent and getting killed that night or the child pulled out of school and moved out of area, out of the eyes of concern.

Really concerning that people think teachers should be checking a child's body if there is risk of abuse.

Serious case reviews (such as Daniel Pelka) did not suggest the teacher whipped off his closes but reported MUCH earlier that he was stealing food and appearing to have lost a lot weight. They key word here is reported. Schools play a huge role in protecting children but they really need to go about it the right way or else they put the child in serious harm's way.

candy also imagine a child with three adults around them, three adults of whom mummy has said "you must do as they tell you". And they're telling you to lift/remove clothing. It's a bit if a weird one for a little head to get around. I'm just so glad that he knew to tell his DM if he felt uncomfortable. Now she just needs to work out a way to show him that he did the right thing by Telling her.

I'm not convinced that the reason for 'asking' the child to do this is important, what's important (at this point) is that the child in question felt so uncomfortable he told his mother as a priority. This is a young boy who, as a result of 3 adults putting him in a position where he felt he couldn't say no to their orders, has likened the staffs' actions to a CP advert.

If they had concerns - and that's a big if - there are correct procedures to follow.

well to be honest most 6 year olds are usually pulling off jumpers and tops ride up or scratching their bottoms so trousers are half mast.

I work in a school with this age group, I iften am asked by a parent to apply eczema cream etc, it's very commen.

if a child said to me they had a sore back, tummy I would look at it. obviously other more intimate parts you would listen to the child and act accordingly.

I have no idea of the staffs motives but if your son was upset at this them yes by all means discuss it but the idea of calling ss when you can simply ask the child to pull up a jumper (not pull down their knickers)for a quick look is ridiculous.

we would be calling them all the time. get a grip and into the real world.

Why do you keep saying they did it because they don't believe you? It's obvious they didn't know.
You put nothing in writing, no email, letter or note in his planner, just 'popped in to the office' not even to his class teacher. It's been forgotten, or may be they didn't realise it was for two weeks or maybe the member of staff you told a week ago was away. School offices are busy places in the morning. If your child is missing a curricular activity you need to formally record it.
If the teachers didn't know then they probably thought he had forgotten his kit and was trying to get out of trouble, especially as they have no record, apart from a note on a reception file that he has eczema at all.
He couldn't say mum sent a note, or it's in my planner, so they asked him to show them, in the same way if a child said I can't do PE because I fell over at lunchtime it would be obvious to check for damage.

Child protection concerns have to be raised and managed in very specific ways for very good reasons. The procedures involved do not include a bunch of school staff taking a child to one side having a look at what is under his clothing. Again this is for very good reasons.

From an uninformed point of view it might make sense that a teacher can do her own investigation when she's concerned about the welfare of a child but that is absolutely not the case.

If the school had child protection concerns they would have to address them through the proper channels and OP would know about it. The parent has to be told unless there is good reason to believe to do so would put the child at risk of very significant and immediate harm. The OP would know if that were the case so she is right to be satisfied that they were not looking for injuries.

so when a serious case review finds that the abused child attended school and had bruising all over his body how did no one see them?

because the mother said that the child had a serious skin condition and could not go swimming it participate in PE.

If the school had any reason to believe that the mother was covering up abuse by preventing him from swimming, they have procedures to deal with it which don't include investigating it themselves.

Sigh.

He's not being abused. Can I just reiterate that? The school don't think I'm whacking him. Can I just reiterate that as well? How do I know that they don't suspect me of having given him a good hiding? You'll have to just trust me on that one when I say they don't. To explain why would be to out myself possibly but I will say that the nature of my career makes it pretty unlikely that I'm an abuser ( and yes yes yes i know that all sorts of people abuse from all walks of life!) feel free to continue speculating on whether they were checking him for injuries though

Of course I'm in favour of abuse being spotted and teachers doing all they can to step in early. My OP isn't about whether some of you think the teachers believe he has bruises.

Anyway - I've sent in a follow up email using a few salient points from this thread. I've asked for an explanation.

On talking further with DS he says one teacher asked him why he wasn't swimming. He said because he was having a flare up etc. the teacher replied ' we will have to check that won't we? ' and some time later, at lunch time , she took him off to a corner of the lunch hall with two other staff members and asked him to lift up his clothes.

I've been calm and so far just asked about their procedure and told them that my son felt a bit uncomfortable . I've also asked why they didn't give me a quick ring.

So I'll wait to hear back and update.

I appreciate all your comments

yeah thats not good for your ds a) for discomfort and b) because he probably felt the implication of being a liar.

I would stick to my guns for an explanation.

Okay it sounds like she hadn't been informed, went off to check for email, note etc, found no record that he was telling the truth. He probably felt uncomfortable because he picked up on the fact that by this point they thought he was lying, which is fair enough, that is something that would have upset my son at that age, but he would have been cross with me for not having let them know properly and putting him in that position.

With regards to ringing you, for the record in my time working in a school I have been bollocked by parents more times than you might expect about contacting them (I've even had what do you expect me to do about it, about a puking child!)

teacher replied ' we will have to check that won't we?'

she took him off to a corner of the lunch hall with two other staff members and asked him to lift up his clothes.

Both are inappropriate, both are unprofessional and both could cause unnecessary distress to a child.

I hope they make sure she is told very clearly never to act like this again.

One phone call, before or after the session he missed, or a conversation at collection was all it would have taken to sort this out.

Why is 'we will have to check that won't we?' inappropriate, Maybe if you say it in your head in a creepy voice but surely in this context it is referring to a letter from home?

I would be more cross with the school office not letting the teachers know really.
Your son telling the teacher he can't swim because of eczema may be the first the teacher knew about it, so quickly checked him. I don't really see anything wrong with that tbh.
If the school office had told the teachers then none of this would have happened!

As a side note, I noticed a few others mentioning swimming being good for eczema. But please be careful, I have severe eczema too, and when I have been swimming in the past it used to make my eczema ten times worse, which was horrible as I love swimming :(
Eczema can vary from person to person, so I would just like to point that out, to make sure it doesn't make it worse for him.

I think this sounds very, very sinister OP, or at the least worrying and uncomfortable for your son. I'd withdraw him from the school. I don't know how you can trust these adults with his care every day.

dreamofwhitehorses
that is something that would have upset my son at that age, but he would have been cross with me for not having let them know properly and putting him in that position.

I doubt many 7yr olds would make a distinction between methods of notification and a judgment against their mother because she chose to speak to the office. The OP says this was the second week of her son not swimming, so she might have used the same method previously, without issue, and even if she hadn't, the relevant adults would have been primed by the son missing swimming the previous week.

for the record in my time working in a school I have been bollocked by parents more times than you might expect about contacting them

It's unfortunate and inappropriate that some parents react that way, but it doesn't make it the wrong thing to do.

This thread makes me despair ...assuming it was a case of suspected abuse (and I'm not sure that is the case)

Honestly I couldn't give a damn if three teachers (actually it would be one with witnesses) took her to one side and checked to see if my child (a few weeks off being 7) had bruises ...just checking her chest and legs ...
Better this that an abuse case gets missed.
Maybe the OP would be happier if she had a visit from (overstretched) SS to check it wasn't abuse...
It may be against 'procedures' etc - but that doesn't make it wrong - I suggest the procedures may be wrong - and that is why cases get missed...

But unlucky the Social Services wouldn't visit her, because her occupation prevents her from hurting her child, or her child being hurt by anybody else, don't you know?

Logg1e - I didn't get the sarcasm of your first post - relieved!

I think it might just be me but I wouldn't think anything of 3 teachers asking one of my dcs to show them their tummy or legs? I would much rather that than a) my child chooses not to swim without my input or b) they were being abused.

OP you should have put it in writing.