To think DD's punishment from PE teacher was draconian?

[moonlightshadow1]

DD is in Year 10 and came home quite annoyed about a punishment she got in PE for something very minor in the first place. Her teacher made her get changed into her PE kit at lunchtime (without any tracksuit in the cold wet weather), and run laps around the football pitch for all but the last 15 minutes of the break (so she could eat), much of it whilst the boys were having football practice, who apparently found it quite funny. Is it overreacting to think this is a bit out of order? I might not have been surprised when I was at school but I can't help be a bit annoyed, seems a bit like it was intended to embarrass her and unnecessary.

Italian, that would MASSIVELY disrupt the class!

Argh!!!!!!!!!!

Yes, crystalgall, but I can understand why she was embarrassed, especially then not having "a peep out of her" yet still being made a show of again, in the same lesson, by the teacher? I just think it's a bit unnecessary, not that the teacher is totally in the wrong, far from it.

Italian you're not a teacher are you?

A loud 'funny' statement like that is the equivalent of the student laying down the gauntlet. If you ignore it you are asking for trouble, others will join in and your life will be a nightmare.

The student lays down the challenge, you accept and best them. You demonstrate clearly you have the authority. Very, very basic classroom management.

Failure to control low level disruptive behaviour is one of the biggest issues in schools. This teacher acted entirely correctly.

Is the purpose of school really to control every millisecond their time and stop them even having an original thought! This is ridiculous. It must be apparent to all now the dd was being a tiny bit silly and the teacher was miffed and totally took it out on her, how is that ever good teaching?

I think some of you have got so entrenched in the position of teacher is always right that you cannot see that maybe this was a tad OTT.

By all means ask the teacher what she/he said and what the dd said.

i never believe my daughter fully when she says stuff at home but she is pretty compliant at school. yet I would still approach a teacher by asking 'this is dd's version, can you confirm what happened, or simply what happened? Same with DS.

My dd's class had to be fucking evacuated from the classroom because one boy was kicking off and policy was to leave the class.

Why can't school focus on that disruptive behavior and not a pretty innocent fart joke!

Original, but that's the difference! It's not having a go at the OP because her DD is lippy, it's pointing that going to complain to the school about her DD being punished for being rude and disruptive is insane!

If the OP just sucked it up, fair play.

My DS2 has been in trouble this term and I haven't agreed with everything the teachers have done but I wouldn't in a million years go and tell them how to do their job and I'm a teacher!!!!!

So she's 14 not 10, my word child seemed misplaced to you and yet..

Not at all. I expect a 14 yo to act more mature than a 10 yo but accept they are not an adult so cannot be treated as one. Whats difficult to understand about that?
Do you treat 10 yo and 14 the same Italian?

So she isn't an adult and yet she isn't a child. And it's OK to discipline her in a way that seems designed to humiliate her publicly?

She misbehaved publicly. She was happy to have the classes full attention when she was disrupting it. She was not humiliated then.

I think her doing it alone with the boys watching was designed to make her self conscious, if you cannot see that I can cannot tell you.

She was doing it alone because only she misbehaved. Do you expect all the class to be punished?
Also the teacher was supervising the boys training session and had to supervise lippy girl too. 2 birds one stone.

Maybe the punishment was too soft! What if she has been made to run around in her underwear!

Now you are being foolish and desperate.

You see punishments made to embarrass kids are just not nice. I think the teacher knew what they were doing and if they did not they should be told.

She was embarressed because of her own bad behaviour. The teacher did not do that.
She plays hocky in front if spectators so clearly is not embaressed by being seen running. She was embarressed because the boys knew she was in trouble. That is all her own doing.

Italian, but it wasn't an innocent joke was it, from the sounds of it it was a "look at me and how funny I am I can make the whole class laugh" joke.

This year I don't have any kids trashing my classroom but that doesn't mean I don't find behaviour management exhausting with the constant talking, not listening and don't even get me started on flipping bottles. Argh!!!

The student lays down the challenge, you accept and best them

How terribly mature...

And I love the idea that a stupid fart joke is original thought - low standards of original thought there?

Michael Wilshaw wrote a white paper on low level disruptive behaviour. It really is a major issue for schools and teachers.

Low level disruption leads to more serious incidents. Controlling and being firm with low level disruption reduces the amount of serious incidents.

Fart jokes are never 'innocent' in schools.

EveningShadows "Italian, this is all only from the OP's DD" See my last post, I've said what I would do. We only have the version here to go on. I would find it hard to know what would be appropriate to warrant that punishment. I think it was mean.

But of course, if it was my dd, I would want the teacher's view.

"I highly doubt they thought "oh I know what will humiliate this girl, I'll make her run in front of boys" Then they need to be told that this would be the effect on quite a number of children and especially a loan girl in front of a field of boys. If they do not realise this they are not a very aware teacher!

"I've seen my colleagues reduced to tears many times not just by children's awful bloody behaviour" THAT is wrong and should not happen. I am not* supporting that.

But by the same token I've seen my dd and other kids reduced to tears by what happens at school. Maybe kindness all round would be better. i am not sure you get it by punishments like this.

"I reiterate my point, let the OP teach for half a term" But that is not how it works is it. If I feel the police have harressed me or not treated me fairly, or a doctor has not spotted a fatal illness or whatever, no one would dream of saying 'sign on with the flying squad for 6 months or go and work at Barts then you can have an opinion.

Any many parents, like me, have volunteered in schools, on trips, with reading, and with class activities. So we have been around kids and we know they can be bloody hard work.

And I am not anti-punishment, not at all.

crystalgall

Our girl tells me all the time she has the strictest teacher. She also tells me all the time, she is the best teacher ever

This is probably because she keeps order in the class so it isn't chaotic. (Helps that our girl is a very well behaved child and rarely is on the sharp end of a telling off - except for talking!)

Ollie I wish teachers lived in a world of polite, mature individuals. They don't.
Classroom management is all about power and control. To pretend otherwise is naive in the extreme.

No wonder we're facing a teacher shortage, with some of the attitudes on here to pupils' misbehavior.

Blimey you've had some ridiculous responses OP.

No but not many people claim to be experts on policing or brain surgery but everyone thinks they're an expert on schools - including people who say I've been on school trips so I know what it's like to teach.

Parents are my biggest stress without any doubt - bigger than OFSTED, paperwork, workload. The shit that parents have put me through in the past 15 years is untrue.

We are doing our kids no favours by asking teachers to justify every decision they make on a daily basis - especially when the child is 14.

As said above low level disruption is a huge problem in schools and these same kids will have one hell of a shock when they hit the working world and realise that they do have to be respectful, follow rules and observe behaviour codes.

We do them no favours fighting their battles for them.

EveningShadows

"Argh!!!!!!!!!!" It sounds like you are in pain! please ignore me if this is causing me grief, you don't need to talk me round to your way of thinking. You don't need to worry either, my dd is very compliant and would probably do whatever stupid punishment a teacher thought up because she would not want to get into trouble! So don't worry. i would have at her age too! It;s only now at 50 something I realise that some punishment are not really a good idea. Like me being humiliated in Georgraphy. Guess what, I did crap at it, guess what subject I still pretty much would not want to study... you guessed it.

I think there is a bigger picture you are missing here. Here comments were mild and presumably factual. No big deal, IMHO.

Originalfoogirl loan teenage girl running in shorts and t-shirt close proximity to large group of boys. Can you really not see why that could be a problem and can you really not see that being forced to do that would have the opposite effect of building her confidence!

Bitofacow "Italian you're not a teacher are you?" no, I have taught English as a language but not in a state school.

"A loud 'funny' statement like that is the equivalent of the student laying down the gauntlet. If you ignore it you are asking for trouble, others will join in and your life will be a nightmare."

I don't think when you read the comment you can know that. It was to my mind an innocent comment.

I'd even go so far as to say that one which a lot of children would make in similar circumstances without there being a major issue.

sookies "Whats difficult to understand about that?
Do you treat 10 yo and 14 the same Italian?" No but that is not the point, I would not want to pass on to anyone (including my own dd's) a punishment that was intended to embarrass.

"She was doing it alone because only she misbehaved." so her words did not lead to a general meltdown as some might anticipate!

"Do you expect all the class to be punished?" of course not what an odd idea, if the teacher felt this was really any issue I would have said a few words would suffice, the punishment was OTT.

"lippy girl" lovely. Do you teach?

"Now you are being foolish and desperate" Actually just sad so many people seem to think this is OK.

"She was embarressed because of her own bad behaviour." I do not think most kids are embarrassed to make a pretty harmless comment about farts. To feel dis-empowered in this way seems counterproductive. One of the many things I think schools seem to not do so well at. They comes times come down like a ton of bricks on fairly innocent behaviour and then major things happen and go barely punished.

Sounds like it was handled badly by the teacher. There are ways to deal with this sort of behaviour and this isn't one.
What's your relationship like with the school? I'd be making an appointment for a chat with the head.
You fully accept your daughter messed up but having concerns about a punishment if designed to humiliate is valid.
This is school, not the army. Sounds like a beasting.

So you think the teacher should have stopped teaching the class, told then to wait while she went over and whispered in your DDs ear? Or should she just have been left alone to do whatever she wanted in case she got embarrassed at being punished?

No Francis, I just don't see why she needed to be told to simply cross her legs again, and in a belittling way, stopping the class, asking "and how did I tell you to sit?" She was sitting quietly as needed so I can't see why it was so important?