To ask if you’ve ever complained about a teacher

[Justwondering14]

It seems the view is that this shouldn’t ever be done.

I have complained a few times. Once about a male member of staff telling my fifteen year old she looked like she was enjoying that in a suggestive way when she had a lollipop.

Is it always ‘wrong’, then? I’m not a teacher ...

Aye that makes sense sadly. I often wonder if the parents like the last example you give do the same to their child’s manager when they’re at work.
I’m all for raising free thinkers and kids with imagination and opinions, but manners and courtesy matter too. Nobody gets anywhere in life being an entitled, arrogant person who treats others like shit.

SoddingUnicorns

Agreed. And there's is a time for free-thinking and questioning authority - when someone is being hurt or threatening to hurt you. Not when you are being asked to show basic respect.

Anyway, off my soap box now!

I absolutely agree Pengggwn

Rainingcatsanddogs

You wonder how parents find out a teacher has been sacked? I was travelling on the tube one evening with the DCs, when I realised I recognised the face on the front page of The Standard, the person opposite me was reading:

www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&source=web&cd=4&ved=2ahUKEwiTocSHpcfbAhWlI8AKHbTEDe8QFjADegQIBBAB&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.standard.co.uk%2Fnews%2Fboris-headmaster-watched-porn-in-his-school-office-6931395.html&usg=AOvVaw2H0UXRwuMR2XjMHMlMUNqm

lotstothinkof actually, I think the admission from the principal that there was an issue with that particular teacher and his methods of classroom control more than supported my complaint. I never said at any time that I was in agreement with DS's behaviour, however if he was a pleasure to teach in every other subject, with every other teacher, even though they reported a little bit of silliness occasionally, then it says more about the one teacher that sends more than half a class out of the room to cause chaos in a classroom than it does about the pupils. If that method does not work, you try something else. You seek advice on how to cope with these situations. You don't come into teaching as an unqualified teacher whose previous experience as a scientist was in a pharmaceutical environment rather than in managing a class of 16 year olds, and then expect them to behave like colleagues instead of kids.

I work in education myself, I am supportive of the school and certainly am not a pearl clutcher. I just happen to believe that you don't change anything by not acting, and I also believe that as a teacher, a fundamental part of the job is crowd control and facilitating a learning environment, rather than losing any semblance of credibility and respect by either ignoring poor behaviour and allowing it to go on for so long that most of the class becomes involved, or panicking and sending a group of kids into a corridor to mess around some more together. How is that an effective strategy?

I got accused of being racist by a mother because I sent her son out of class for continual disruption.
We are of the same race!
Thankfully I was supported by the headteacher.

AndNoneForGretchenWieners ''you don't change anything by not acting, and I also believe that as a teacher, a fundamental part of the job is crowd control and facilitating a learning environment, rather than losing any semblance of credibility and respect by either ignoring poor behaviour and allowing it to go on for so long that most of the class becomes involved, or panicking and sending a group of kids into a corridor to mess around some more together. How is that an effective strategy?''

Because in some schools the slt are so rubbish with supporting behaviour that teachers have struggling teachers can sink. It's a sink or swim mentality and if your sinking with a class then no matter how many parents you call or how many emails you send nothing gets done. Behaviour begins from the top.What would you suggest as a a strategy?

just wondering how parents know the teacher has been sacked

Because the principal told me. I went to her with my concerns and she encouraged me to make a formal complaint. I had actually been hesitant to complain because I knew the teacher socially, our older children were firm friends when they were little, and I felt sorry for her; I knew her life was difficult. But the principal pointed out that the children's welfare had to take priority. I only regret not speaking out sooner.

I agree about the classroom control. Principals need to be more supportive of their teachers.

''I agree about the classroom control. Principals need to be more supportive of their teachers.''

Bad behaviour can be eliminated or deeply kept to a minimum if behaviour systems are air tight and support is strong- the problem is that they are often not and the teacher will get all the blame.

Oliversmumsarmy

In my case the teacher was gone within an hour after I complained.

Doesn't mean that she was sacked

But I later found out I wasn't the only complaint she had. Including one from a TA from a different class in the school. And her class TA had voiced concerns

there are some seriously unprofessional people around if they are spreading rumours like that.

I suppose if schools are as incompetent and unprofessional as some of the ones on here, they are incompetent and unprofessional enough to give confidential information out to parents...

One of the TAs was one of my older dd's friends.

BertrandRussell

True, I was thinking the same thing.

Oliversmumsarmy
One of the TAs was one of my older dd's friends.

So she either broke a professional confidence or...

Or she was a fellow mum at the time who had her own issues with this teacher

.. I have read all these replies As a parent , I understand that you want the best for your child.......

I am also a teacher and face an almost daily battle with disgruntled ill informed parents....who have no idea about the daily demands faced by teachers , the excessive workload .. having to get pupils through exams that they have no chance of passing ..

The expectation that the teacher and school will in the short time they have them .. teach them everything that they need to be a fully functioning adult !!

Quite frankly I am sick and tired of parent ringing up complaining about this that and the other !

Oliversmumsarmy

She shouldn't be working anywhere where she should be keeping professional confidences.

boiler the thing is, the other teachers, including NQTs, manage well and the discipline policies are much better now since the new principal started three years ago. Ofsted have been positive about the behaviour of pupils and the SLT management of the school, I know that they only see a snapshot, but it is still a reasonable indicator of how a school is run.

What would I suggest as a different strategy? Asking for help to start with, trying to engage the pupils with the curriculum instead of expecting them to sit and read from a textbook in silence - a science lesson is a great opportunity to demonstrate cause and effect with experiments, which may inspire the kids and encourage better behaviour. Deal with low level disruption firmly and consistently before it becomes a bigger problem and all semblance of control is lost. Disciplinary sanctions applied other than sending kids out of the class - detention, speaking to the parents, behaviour reports are all things that could be effective but had not been tried.

It's easy to say that the kids shouldn't be disruptive, and I agree, however in the real world 16 year olds are not perfect and also do give in to, and apply, peer pressure and that inflames a situation. Even removing pupils to an internal exclusion room is better than just giving up then losing your temper. You seem to think I have no reason to complain because my son was involved in the messing about. My complaint was not that he was punished unfairly - my complaint was that nobody was punished beyond being sent out of class, which didn't have the effect of being a punishment and so didn't encourage them to modify their behaviour. If I had been told he had been implicit in poor behaviour, at any point, and given a sanction, then I would have been disappointed in him and annoyed that he had let himself down, and would have absolutely supported the sanction. I only found out about a term of what sounds like riotous behaviour that carried on unchecked by going to parents evening. That is the crux of the complaint I made.

If you, as a teacher, lost control of a whole crowd of teenagers, would you not reflect on that and try to think of ways to prevent it happening in the future? Even if only for your own benefit in not having to deal with a class of marauding numpties?

If you are questioning professionalism, when doing an inquest after she had left into who else had problems we did come up with a theory that the children who were targeted by her all had a same feature.

It might not have had anything to do with her targeting certain children but no one else's children were affected.

I also don't think it was professional to target certain children and refuse to educate them

*Oliversmumsarmy

She shouldn't be working anywhere where she should be keeping professional confidences*

Well unfortunately she didn't have a crystal ball to look into the future to see herself working there.

I doubt they would have taken my friend on if they thought she was unprofessional.

@SoddingUnicorns

I was less than impressed when their union rep turned up

You can be damn sure that mine would be there if a parent made a complaint. I've paid hundreds in union fees over the years.

AndNoneForGretchenWieners

We will never know if the teacher asked for help or if they did what did they received.

however in the real world 16 year olds are not perfect and also do give in to, and apply, peer pressure and that inflames a situation.

If you have a class with a core of pupils that don't want to learn or don't like the teacher then there is little hope of getting them to learn by any means. And at 16 years old they should know not to be dicks.

a science lesson is a great opportunity to demonstrate cause and effect with experiments, which may inspire the kids and encourage better behaviour

If they don't behave they can't be trusted to do experiments.

I only found out about a term of what sounds like riotous behaviour that carried on unchecked by going to parents evening. That is the crux of the complaint I made.

And that is a valid complaint.

If you, as a teacher, lost control of a whole crowd of teenagers, would you not reflect on that and try to think of ways to prevent it happening in the future? Even if only for your own benefit in not having to deal with a class of marauding numpties?

Where I have worked we have a positive management, in that they support the teachers and pupils that want to learn. Groups of pupils have been removed from classes, taught separately and split up then returned to different groups. Parents have been called by said management to explain that their children's behaviour is unacceptable.

Yet we still had a hard core group of these children supported by their parents that continued to cause trouble inside and outside of class till a number of the leaders were permanently excluded. (and the parents still appealed against the evidence that was put forward).

Sometimes -as a teacher- no matter what you do you can't win.

AndNoneForGretchenWieners No i agree with you, I am on your side and think the teacher was possibly unsuitable for the class or whatever but what I am just asking you to consider the bigger picture too. Sometimes a failing teacher can do everything by the book and still fail because they are not helped.

They may ring parents and the parents are not supportive, they may face blame and indifference from managers when asking for help....Sometimes all the teacher can do is sit and bear it as there simply is no help there.

“I also don't think it was professional to target certain children and refuse to educate them”
Of course it wasn’t. But that does not excuse sharing confidential information about staff and children with other parents.