AIBU to not expect my son to be exposed to so much shit at school?

[HadenoughnowFFS]

Son is year 1.
Sick and tired of him coming home with swear words the other kids have taught him, terrorism facts the parents have allowed them to watch on the TV, hitting each other as they're allowed to at home - the list goes on.
Teacher thought it nice to create a dog and diary.
Dog comes home with you and in the diary you find something from the newspaper to stick in and write a little about.
Comes home and the previous kid has an entry about the ivory tusks of elephants being taken off and more elephants being killed to death than being born.
Surely the parent can't have deemed this appropriate for a 5 year old to write about? And the teacher has just ticked it so clearly she does.
Aibu?

And I would encourage you to talk to your DS about terrorism and how much threat it actually presents - otherwise you risk him being much more scared by any news etc he might hear or read (and he is going to be reading far more now, I expect).

Don't shield him from knowledge: arm him with it.

Tell your child that although he will hear swear words, you don't expect to hear him using them. Because he will hear them in the playground, and you really can't control that.

The rest of the points you make, I understand your wish to protect him for as long as possible, but it isn't realistic. Other people parent differently and so he is likely to hear stuff at school that you have kept from him. You really won't be able to stop that happening.

Personally, I never bothered to shield my kids from the news etc. for all of the above reasons.

As I once heard a woman say to a child of about 4 (in Southend, out of season so probably local): Stop that fucking swearing.

My DGD once wrote about the completely legal, childrens' hunt meet she'd attended with the class bear. Some po faced parent whined to the teacher about it. Her response was simply, " Mrs Slappedarseface, it is not up to you to police the Diary. That's my job ".

I suggest you heed that advice, OP and wind yer neck in whilst you're about it.

Actually most of the news/newspaper reporting stuff is KS2 rather than infants.

I think the OP has a point, You may choose to discuss issues with your child but I don't think you should impose your values on other people's'.

I bet they could find environmental/local issues to raise which wouldn't potentially upset other children (some of whom have only just turned 5, so wouldn't be reading signs in museums and zoos) but are also important.

I find that it's easy to feel outraged about some of what DD1 picks up from other kids at school, but then I realise that DD2 will probably be the one to bring this stuff into school as a result of having an older sibling.

nanny
They aren't imposing values on anyone.
A parent and child studied a topic and a 5 year old has done a little piece.

Nobody is telling the class they should all campaign against the ivory trade. It's just something they found interesting.

If thr OP wants to have a policy of 'don't read the book' at home then fine. But her sensitivities shouldn't lead to other parents being told they can't put legitimate topics in a book. I hate the word snowflake but this comes close.

More fool anyone who thinks they can protect their child from ever hearing anything on any topic that doesn't fit their 'approved' topic criteria.

www.amazon.co.uk/Akimbo-Elephants-Alexander-McCall-Smith/dp/1405218118?tag=mumsnetforum-21

This is a lovely book for 5 year olds.

The trouble with the swearing is that it only takes one child saying a swear word and suddenly the whole class are saying it and all the teacher can do is say something like 'we don't use words like that at school' because quite often these words are learned from parents and we can't be seen to criticise parents.

The hitting, yes that needs to be sorted out, but it's hard and as you said, some children are allowed to hit at home, so the teacher isn't getting backed up. I've even seen parents tell their child to hit another child if they keep annoying them!

The news thing you are just being precious though, it's up to the other parents what their children write about and its up to you whether you let your child read it.

You didn't think the elephants thing was appropriate.

Another child's parent clearly did.

Why do you think your idea of what's appropriate should take precedence over that of another parent? It's subjective. You can't expect everyone to stick to your fairly arbitrary decisions on where the boundaries lie. I'd say it was pretty normal for a child to have some idea of what's going on in the world, even at 5. Children see and hear news all the time; they've only got to be in a car with the radio playing to hear a news bulletin about terrorism.

FWIW, I remember being fully aware of IRA hunger strikes and the Falklands War when I was your child's age, and I didn't grow up to be some sort of damaged trauma victim as a result.

Actually it's not up to me to let him read it as you put it as the idea is to share the stories and read where the bear has been from the other children who have had it beforehand

It's totally up to you what you read with your child in your own home. You can just say "no" and return the book to the teacher. So much easier than trying to police what other parents do.

Why shouldn't a 5 year old know about elephants being killed by ivory hunters?

I think you're being a bit precious tbh.

If my reception age twins were to do this, they would zero in on the more gruesome stories running that day.
Never mind about baby elephants, it'd be boys falling into zoo enclosures and being devoured, journalists on holiday washing their hands in the river and being devoured, headmistresses going canoeing and being murdered and devoured... you get the picture.
Either that or Donald Trump poking ladies bottoms.

Sorry OP. They have two older siblings. I am strict and scary about bad words.

some parent who hasn't decided what's age appropriate IMO

They have decided what's appropriate, and in their opinion, learning about why it's important to look after iconic species is appropriate. You differ, obviously, but that doesn't make you right and them wrong.

I mean, your kid is five, surely they have an awareness that things die, right? Or do they just think that all the dinosaurs live in a different country? Yes, the ivory trade is upsetting for a 5 year old. It's upsetting when you're 45 too, if you don't turn a blind eye.

Just explain swearing and hitting isn't allowed in your house or at school and sit down and have a discussion with your child using real facts about any issues raised at school by other children.

You wait until Christmas where he will undoubtedly come across children who will tell him what they think about Father Christmas. In addition to this, if your child was at my ds school he would also have all the details of exactly what happens to a person once they die and are collected by the undertaker thanks to the very knowledgeable children of the local funeral director. You may as well start considering how you will approach these subjects as they will crop up at some point in the next few years/months/weeks.

I have raised my boys without shielding them overly from what actually takes place in the world. Things like the death of elephants, reasons for war, climate change, politics, marriage equality, slavery etc. From an age about where your child is at. I answer their questions, and if we don't know the answer we look it up together. We have done this for years, and they are far more mature than most of their peers now.
This will be the world they need to change. They need to have it explained by their parents from a factual perspective. Rather than react, explain. Provide possible solutions you have read about, talk about it.

By the same token, my two are the kids banned from age-inappropriate violent video games, and have highly supervised online activity. They also were exposed to bad language and rubbish behaviour filtering through to them from school. We police that behaviour at home, again by explaining why it's not ideal etc.

You can't raise them in a bubble ( well you can but that will not be to their advantage). If you keep exposing them to good behaviour, good manners, and rational general knowledge at home, they will be fine.

You are being precious, I agree. I think children have to start learning things and over shielding does not help.

I am chuckling at the assumption all parents make that the child could only possibly learn bad language at school. I swear. My children have heard other adults swear. They hear it when we are out and about or if they happen to come in while I am watching something less child friendly. It's everywhere.

I have taught them that those words are for grown ups only. But... I can easily imagine ds joining in the general chorus of swearing if it starts up at school. He would not dare to use those words in front of me, but i am kidding myself if I suggest that he doesn't know them. I think it's probably the same for most families. Believe me, they have heard these words before they are exposed to the dangers of all those feral children ...

Well if you are not willing to fork out for private school I'm not sure what you are expecting exactly. I'm sure that the poor teacher has her hands full enough trying to make sure that all children cone out at the end of the year literate and alive.

Throwing money at it won't help. I went to boarding school, it was much worse.

They have to grow up into the world OP. It's horrible but true.

But he does have control over allowing this silly book to do the rounds with some parent who hasn't decided what's age appropriate IMO to do the rounds of all the other kids!

Oh, those bloody books!

1. Parent picks child up from school and is presented with a toy and diary to fill.

2. Parent realises that it is only September and that they are therefore one of the first to make an entry in the diary. They don't really know what they're doing or how this thing is supposed to work, but they also need to set the tone for the book and get it right.

3. Parent is fully aware of the fact their child's entry (and, by extension, their own parenting) will be judged by all subsequent parents and understands that they risk becoming the talk of the playground/enduring complete social isolation if their entry doesn't meet other parents' expectations.

4. Parent shits themselves as they're spending all of Saturday running boring but essential errands (too dull to write about), then Sunday doing the obligatory visit to distant family that's been arranged for ages and will involve hours in the divery pub in the awful home town they escaped from to start a new life (too embarrassing and defeats the purpose of starting afresh).

5. Parent decides that perhaps that child can write about something they care about, just to fill up the pages. Foxhunting? No, as there might be a few parents who actually support that and the point here is not to offend. It needs to be a non-controversial viewpoint. The Ivory trade? Perfect! Everyone's against that nowadays.

6. Parent helps their child do some research and makes child write really, really slowly and carefully, anxiously hoping they don't make any spelling mistakes or use goofy letter formation that other kids might make fun of. Said writing takes the best part of Sunday evening.

7. Parent breathes a sigh of relief when dog and diary are returned to school for another year.

Eh, at 5 I learned about sex because I'm a nosy bugger and found a book all about it. Obviously had to read it as I love books. Mum was horrified when she found out later on but I digress...
We had a rabbit we could take with us and I remember I took it to Scotland with me during the Easter holidays and I've still got the photos to prove this... but I'm pretty sure my entire entry was about soldiers and guns and tanks because they had the parade of them and that's what I wanted to write down. Seeing as my granddad was also in the army my dad gave me some info on it all... Pretty depressing stuff but still. At the end of the day they're going to come across things. Maybe with the elephant that was their favourite animal and so to see it made them sad and they wanted to learn more so they could try and understand why people would want to do that to them.
I do agree the hitting and swearing is bad though. That would drive me insane.

I have three kids , 22 ,19 and 9 . The eldest 2 girls both at uni and very open and aware about the big bad world,the 9 year old god I so want to protect him from anything horrible and would do anything to prevent him from stuff I don't want to expose him too . It is however impossible, real life is drip fed into school and there is always kids in the class that are way ahead of there actual age ifyswim . It's sad but it's life

Op, this is the world in which you decided to have a child. A world where elephants are becoming extinct, where terrorism is a real life reality for many people (?all of us?).

Why on earth would you bring a child into this and then object when they are faced with a (child interpreted) view of it?

Did you not look around you before you decided to have children? Or did you think yours would live in some bubble where this stuff isn't real? Imagine how poor "cross face of Syria" would be feeling in your shoes.

I get the instinct to protect children but that protection has to be within the realities of the world they are occupying not some Disney fairy tale you'd like to construct and control.

Five year olds are certainly old enough to learn about the horrors of exploiting elephants for ivory. They've seen elephants in the zoo/safari park/TV and surely you're explained why they are an endangered species? How on earth is that inappropriate?

If you don't think five is an appropriate age to know bout terrorism what age do you think acceptable? Surely it's better to teach your children about these things when the come up, in words they will understand rather than leave them to be horrified at school because they are so ignorant? Primary school kids were blown up in Manchester this summer, so any child with siblings of Ariana Grande fan age or above will have been affected by this and their parents will have had to talk to them about it.

Better to explain the world to your child in your own way than fake protect them and leave then to the misunderstood rumours of the playground.

The more you hide stuff the worse it gets, and it breeds distrust.