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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

Teacher quit and walked out

368 replies

Moonlitarsehole · 03/02/2016 16:23

Nc'd to not out myself.

Ds informs me on the way home that his teacher walked out on his last class this afternoon.

Apparently she'd asked on numerous occasions for quiet, and threatened to not help with their coursework. Then said "fuck you lot, I quit", collected her bag and walked out.

I was like Shock ds was vague and said he didn't want me to call the school, as they'd all had to make witness statements.

Anyway, dh is home today and asked ds if he'd been talking too (after I tell him what had happened) and really told ds off for being so disrespectful.

Ds is upstairs writing a letter of apology, not sure what the school's take is on it. Not even sure if she'll get it.

So aibu to think the teacher just lost their shit, which happens to us all?

OP posts:
waitingforsomething · 04/02/2016 16:23

Ive walked out of a 6th form lesson before. They had a different teacher the prior year who encouraged their 'banter' (outrageous disrespect). I didn't say I would quit but I told them I had had enough I wouldn't be teaching them for the remainder of the week and I would meet with them at a later date to discuss. It worked. In my head I was thinking 'fuck you, I quit'. Poor woman I bet it was a horrible lesson out of many

wannabestressfree · 04/02/2016 16:34

I have asked today to 'trade' a boy who abuses me every lesson, doesn't complete homework and was escorted out yesterday for calling me a bitch.
All his mother asked was if he was facing me when he said it :/ these are top set children. No one else will take him.
I am at the mo teaching 22 lessons and team teaching another 3 as the poor man is hanging by a thread and I am a disciplinarian.
And mine is a good school.....

ToastDemon · 04/02/2016 16:42

My brother left his teaching job as it was that or his mental and physical health go completely down the shitter.
Wasn't in the UK but similar idea - pupils protected by law to the point where there is no effective way of sanctioning them, teachers on the other hand under scrutiny for every transgression.
Add to that it was a failing school with dreadful results which meant under constant departmental scrutiny and ever-increasing admin loads. He was constantly behind as he reckoned that even if he gave up on sleep there was no way he could get through the lesson prep, marking and admin.
Headmistress undermined him including in front of the class.
The kids were a nightmare, they would turn up to class drunk and stoned, talk amongst themselves for the entire lesson, swear at him.... headmistress gave him no support whatever and in fact just bollocked him for not maintaining discipline - she didn't much like it when the pupils broke into her flat and trashed it though.
If he'd been permanent he could have just gone on the sick for months if not years like everyone else but he couldn't even take a day off as he was temporary.
He was there for a year and in that year he was ill more frequently than in the previous twenty.
Feel very sorry for the teacher in the OP.

FarrowandBallAche · 04/02/2016 16:48

Got to be more to this than some lad saying seeet and talking non stop.

Kennington · 04/02/2016 16:50

Teachers are treated like shit by parents and children so am not surprised
They are also expected to solve the ills of each child and teach
And deal with low level disruption with no support
Hope that teacher is ok!

MrsGuyOfGisbo · 04/02/2016 17:45

ToastDemon
Which country? I assumed that elsewhere sanity prevailed Sad

Original poster
Moonlitarsehole · 04/02/2016 18:12

Ds said she was in today, but not for his lesson. He was the only one to apologise.

OP posts:
SexLubeAndAFishSlice · 04/02/2016 18:49

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Howaboutthisone · 04/02/2016 19:02

I'm glad she was able to come back today though wonder if she needs some time off sick as she must have hit rock bottom yesterday the poor thing. I hope she's back because she feels strong enough to be and due to pressure to be there.
Have any of the class been dealt with by senior management? It's crazy if the school don't at least speak to this class before they meet again.

Howaboutthisone · 04/02/2016 19:03

*and NOT due to pressure to be there

areyoubeingserviced · 04/02/2016 19:11

Don't blame her for being pissed off
My best friend is leaving teaching at Easter.
Being called a ' fucking dirty bitch ' on a daily basis finally got to her.
It is a real pity because she is an outstanding teacher
It's about bloody time there were some consequences

MrsGuyOfGisbo · 04/02/2016 19:16

'time off sick' is a fig leaf - completely pointless unless there is treatment for the 'sickness' - which is not the case here - it is NOTsickness - the school needs to get a grip on behaviour..
Sounds like she really should leave and find a better job - waiting for SLT to get a grip would be a loooooooooooong wait.

SuckingEggs · 04/02/2016 19:22

Why the hell is there a no-tolerance policy of this shitty behaviour?!

SuckingEggs · 04/02/2016 19:22

*isn't !

jaykay34 · 04/02/2016 19:28

My daughter goes to a secondary school, and has mentioned on several occasions that teachers have burst into tears in her classes.
She has also had one teacher tell her class that she hates them.
I'm not really surprised that teachers break down like this, some of the behaviour that goes on within the classroom is appalling.

JessicasRabbit · 04/02/2016 19:40

sucking, because zero-tolerance would mean that a child would have to be educated elsewhere. Which is expensive, and nobody wants to pay. The government seem to think that the behaviour of a child / teenager is always the responsibility of the teacher / school. The massive elephant in the room is that mainstream schooling isn't, actually, the right setting for some children. PRUs and schools for students with BESD do amazing work - for the lucky few who get a place.

I would quite like to video all my classes for a week, or month, and have it shown publicly. I work in a good school, and I'm very good at behaviour management. But I'd like the general public to see just how much of my lesson time is taken up by dealing with low level disruption.

ThevoiceofRosie · 04/02/2016 19:56

Poor lady.

Some children are feral, and roam in packs. Individually, they are often delightful and intelligent, but cannot be seen swimming against the tide of prevailing pupil culture. Pupils quickly realise that there are no effective sanctions, so are free to behave exactly how they wish. Nothing frightens them. (Not that I believe that fear should form part of the school day). The group/herd dynamics and peer approval prove agreeable, and so the poor behaviour continues.

I knew a teacher in a tough inner-city primary school where it was difficult to fill permanent posts, and where supply teachers refused to go. He persuaded his child-rearing teacher wife to come into the school for a short period to help out. She agreed, on the understanding that their three year old daughter came too.

The class behaved appallingly, of course. She was, after all, the sixth or seventh teacher they'd had that year. After a couple of days, the young daughter also started misbehaving. That was it, mum put her across her knee and smacked her bottom. The class were shocked into silence - this woman hit children and she didn't get the sack! Word quickly spread about the school.

Other teachers took advantage of the shock and awe and would ask her to pop her head around their classroom door and fix a naughty child with an evil glare. She was untouchable and had no more trouble for the rest of her stay. "Miss" had applied the ultimate sanction, and the pupils respected the fact.

ThevoiceofRosie · 04/02/2016 20:05

Years ago, tiring of a disruptive child's poor behaviour, I asked his mother to come in to discuss it with me, his class teacher. Mom was in denial of her little treasure's lack of perfection, and asked me what strategies I would be putting in place to help him. "Just the one" I replied. "I'm telling you about it!". It worked.

cressetmama · 04/02/2016 20:24

There is a stage in children's lives the one where they learn that the sanctions for misbehaviour are uncomfortable when corporal punishment works better than anything else. I know... I'm waiting for the shit storm!

nattyknitter · 04/02/2016 20:26

I remember a lad in my class calling my English teacher a bitch. She was at the back of the room and as she walked to the front, she shoved him in the shoulder. He went home and told his mum that Mrs W had hit him. She asked what for and when he told her she slapped him upside the head and gave him a shiner.

Of course the word spread that Mrs W had done that to him, so she didn't get any shit for years after that.

He was also a lot more respectful and the teachers had the fall back of, 'Do you want me to call your mother?'

I can't say I condone violence, but at least his mother stuck up for the teacher. Mine would have been mortified if she thought I had been anything less than polite and attentive and I would have known about it too.

Kids used to be scard of consequences, whether it be parents, police, anyone in authority, but not so these days. I dread to think where society is going.

Audreyhelp · 04/02/2016 20:34

Yes also lots more abuse towards children and they were too scared to speak up about it as well. Adults were always right it wasn't all great years ago.

Werksallhourz · 04/02/2016 20:35

loving the suggestion that school leaving age should be 14.

I believe there could be some merit in this idea. Not to have a school leaving age at 14, but for pupils to have a year out of education for one of those middle years (either year nine or ten).

When I was teaching, I often thought that there really wasn't any point in many of my year nine boys being in the classroom. They barely learnt anything, were just coming into their identities as young men, and I suspected they would get a lot more out of being in the world -- either in an apprenticeship or some sort of paid work or even just dossing about for twelve months.

The problem with the nature of the school system is that it functions as a bubble for young people that, to a large extent, distances them from the reality and vastness of the adult world. So teens end up existing within a kind of hyper-reality that is almost solely informed by media sources, just at the vital point when they are attempting to create their own initial adult identities and their personal values and beliefs with reference to the other major influences in their lives, which tend only to be family or local friends.

In short, a lot of young teens live in a false reality, but that false reality informs how and what they think. Giving them a year out, pricking the illusion, could go some way towards re-calibrating their attitudes to education, school and teachers -- particularly when they discover they cannot really do very much without a couple of decent GCSEs.

I mean, it has to be said that, in the past, kids who messed about at school often woke up when they left at 16 and got back on track by attending an FE college or night-school.

MrsGuyOfGisbo · 04/02/2016 20:42

The problem with the nature of the school system is that it functions as a bubble for young people that, to a large extent, distances them from the reality and vastness of the adult world.
Exactly.
Would benefit them far more if they had to exist in the real world, and then come back to academia.

Roonerspism · 04/02/2016 20:42

I'm horrified with the shit teachers have to put up with.

There need to be consequences for kids acting up. And right now, there aren't.

I would want the school to tell me if my kid was doing any of this and would come down so hard on them if they were.

Not just a letter. No ipads/computers for weeks.

We aren't doing these kids any favours.

I always wish I had been a teacher but it sounds like I had a lucky escape.

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