To talk to school about this?

[Canthisonebeused]

I'm a bit apprehensive as I have had to talk to school quite a lot over the last few months due to concerns about how the deal with behaviour and squabbles etc. they either seem to total over react or play things down. And I don't want to come across as PITA.

Anyway my dd age 8 was playing with another child and they had a verbal squabble about who was holding a shipping rope. My dd said she backed down and gave it to the other girl who is 9 and this girl grabbed her arm and attempted to bite her. Dd pushed her and the children where separated by the playground supervisor one sent one way the other another way. Apparently the girl then followed my dd and fronted her up about pushing her. dd said she went the head and they were both sent into a room to talk about it. From dd said there was no adult supervision and the child then told my dd that she (the other child) is a bully and loved being a bully, and that she left her old school because she was a bully and no one liked her and she strangled someone so hard they fainted. She then bagan pushing dd around and looked "really scary" according to dd. Another teacher walked past and seen what was happening and intervened.

May all be rubbish the girl was saying I know but still dd was placed in quite a vulnerable situation and I'm concerned that if this child has a history of this sort of thing and the school know it then why the bloody hell were they sent unsupervised to talk about what happened? I'm not sure if I'm over reacting but seriously a 9 year old who is substantially bigger than my dd could potentially have hurt her.

Book an appointment and speak to the head. Make sure you have everything clear in your head about what your DD said and then ask them what they think happened from their perspective. (There may be a discrepancy between your DD's account of events).

How does your DD feel about this other girl now? Is she intimidated? Worried? Not bothered? This should guide how the school deals with the other child in relation to your daughter- by this I mean if she is scared then the school should ensure that at break times the older girl is watched closely to ensure she doesn't continue with this bullying.

Definitely talk to the school. It's unacceptable that 2 children were just put in a room unsupervised to work it out between them when they'd already had issues and your daughter had sought help from the head. My old school took the talk it out approach to bullying, totally ineffective but at least they supervised us! Ask to see school policy for these situations and ask that it be followed, it won't say put the children in a room on their own and let them get on with it!

It's the Whole talk it thing I've had issue with in the past tbh. I'm aware dds account may not be 100% so if I talk to head I'll enquire about what happened first but if I'm honest I have more faith in dd telling the truth that school being 100% honest.