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AIBU?

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Original poster

Assistant Head told class their behavior resulted in supply teacher being fired

217 replies

Rockingaround · 04/12/2018 23:10

Ok - the class had a supply last Wednesday . Whilst there, a few pupils (grade 4) wrecked the craft area ... made slime, cut up ping pong balls, wasted resources and stole craft items.
Today the Assistant Head comes to speak to the class about their behavior. She says how unacceptable their behavior is. How in future if they see any pupils behaving inappropriately they must tell a teacher. A little boy in the class says “but the teacher let us do it”, she replies “yes but he wasn’t a real teacher and he has been fired because of your behavior.
My little girl comes home crying saying what if the teacher has kids, what if he can’t afford to live, it’s just before Christmas etc. she also said “it just as much my fault as I should’ve told another teacher what they were doing”.... so I call the school, speak to the assistant head who talks about how appallling the children have behaved for 5 minuets; when there’s a pause I say “it’s not their behavior I’m concerned with, did you actually say that their actions caused the guy to get fired?” ... “well I told them he wasn’t coming back”. I said “my little girl told me that you said he was fired because of their behavior”. She said “well yes, because children need to understand there’s consequences to their actions”. I said “well that’s just not acceptable, they’re too little to have that responsibility, plus the supply teachers confidentiality - it’s just not fair, I’m coming into school in the morning to speak to the Head”

AM I GOING INSANE!!! Am I being unreasonable, this is not okay right????

OP posts:
HexagonalBattenburg · 05/12/2018 11:41

On the subject of amusing misbehaviour for supply teachers - one very very early booking I had there was a lad who'd been behaving in a low-level pain in the behind kind of manner and delighting in me not knowing his name to call him to account.

I looked at him and asked, "Dylan, stop talking" and he looked utterly horrified demanding to know how on earth I could possibly know his name, he wasn't going to tell me his name and it was against his rights for me to know his name! Totally deadpan I replied "I've just watched you doodle it 5 times on your pencil case for the last 10 minutes"

Malaco · 05/12/2018 12:49

I understand why you're upset, but I think it's your job as a parent to talk to your daughter and reassure her and explain your viewpoint on the whole thing. A meeting with the Head seems so unnecessary and likely to cause bad feeling with the school
I agree with this

MilkyCuppa · 05/12/2018 15:59

Schools get the most out of supply teachers when they are supported. When they are treated as "real" staff, worthy of support.
Yep. I’ve been a long term supply teacher, hired for the rest of the year (perhaps 6-7 months) because the permanent teacher is on sick or maternity leave. But I still wasn’t treated as a “proper” teacher. I wasn’t given a desk or cupboard. Wasn’t given any budget for class supplies so I had to beg pens and paper etc from other teachers. Wasn’t invited to attend training days because they didn’t want to pay me for that day. Wasn’t allowed to attend staff meetings or parent meetings because they didn’t want to pay me for those extra hours. Etc. It definitely impacted on the students, who couldn’t understand why their friend could go to a teacher’s office for extra support but they couldn’t because I didn’t have an office or any paid hours outside of the class hours.

ohreallyohreallyoh · 05/12/2018 16:06

the OP is not in the UK so it's possible the supply teachers in her country don't have to be qualified

Supply teachers in this country don't have to be qualified.

Malwoddy · 05/12/2018 16:54

I'm going to get the terminology wrong here because I don't really know how teachers become qualified.

Back when I was 9 or 10, we had a TA in our class, an American chap who was looking to become a teacher in the UK. We quite liked him and we're generally a pretty good class.

One day he was leading the class and there was some sort of assessor there overseeing him, as part of the qualification process.

For whatever reason, the whole class was unusually unruly, poorly behaved and he had a harder time keeping control.

The assessor left the room at one point and the teacher-to-be had a mini-breakdown. I don't remember all of it but he definitely opened with 'what are you doing to me?'

We all realized as a class that we were letting down this guy we liked and possibly hurting his career. We behaved much better from then on and, iirc, he ultimately qualified.

It stayed with me a bit, not that I was very unruly myself, but it impressed that teachers were just people trying to do their best and bad behaviour by students genuinely affected them.

I don't think what the assistant head said was ideal but, if the class were particularly badly behaved, I don't think they're too young to feel guilty about it. Hopefully their behaviour will improve:

Jeanclaudejackety · 05/12/2018 16:57

Why do people go into teaching if they can't control a class of 9 year olds effectively

CaptainsYuleLog · 05/12/2018 17:26

Why do people go into teaching if they can't control a class of 9 year olds effectively

Why do parents have children if they aren't going to teach them how to behave in an acceptable manner? This sort of behaviour begins at home - let's put the blame where it lies.

Teachers are there to teach not do crowd control.

BoneyBackJefferson · 05/12/2018 17:40

Gileswithachainsaw

My point (thought badly made) is that children have targeted substitute teachers for (probably) as long as there have been schools.

Yet schools have done very little to support substitute teachers.
It shouldn't be a right of passage and it shouldn't be something to be proud of.

Schools should be able to come down hard on these pupils and that should be respected (by parents) as the correct response.

Scabetty · 05/12/2018 17:43

They children know the class rules and ste not little children. They took liberties with a supply teacher. I do PPA and NQT cover and can assure you these kids played him like a fiddle. One year 5 class I visit started a petition to fire my colleague for being strict Shock

SnuggyBuggy · 05/12/2018 17:47

If there aren't proper enforced sanctions for bad behaviour a teacher as an individual can only do so much

SilverApples · 05/12/2018 18:08

Jean Claude, how would you control them?
You can’t touch them, can’t shout at them, can’t impose a sanction and know that it will be carried out...you may not know who has s n and different rules. If a class choose to run wild, options for a supply are limited. I’m experienced and my behaviour management is good, but I’ve been pushed a few times.

Clawdy · 05/12/2018 18:14

Someone said supply teachers in this country don't have to be qualified. I was a supply teacher for many years and never met or heard of a supply teacher not being qualified. Unless we are talking about private schools, possibly.

MaisyPops · 05/12/2018 18:20

Why do people go into teaching if they can't control a class of 9 year olds effectively
I don't control my students. They choose to make positive or negative choices. The vast vast majority of the time they make positive choices because they choose to be polite, funny, engaging, insightful, curious, willing to learn, cooperative etc.

(Not specific to previous poster) I find it quite sad there are adults who have a limited view of student agency. Student does something positive = praise the student for being hard working, diligent, kind, considerate (child is given agency). Student chooses to be rude, not get on with work, disruptive = argue the teacher should have controlled them better (child has agency removed). It's a very unusual world view which encourages students not to take responsibility (e.g. it's not DC's fault they did badly, it was Timmy distracting / it's not DC's fault they got a detention for not doing their homework, the teacher didn't tell them specifically that they personally had to do it etc)
Either children have agency and choice or they don't. Taking the view of they have agency when it's positive but it's someone else's fault if it's negative makes no sense.

BoneyBackJefferson · 05/12/2018 18:32

Jeanclaudejackety

you're funny, goady, but funny.

MozzieMagnet · 05/12/2018 19:25

My own moment of supply teacher misbehaviour was daring to write silly names on the class list

Annette Curtain
Theresa Green
Ben Dover
Phil McCrakin
Joanne Card (d'ya wank 'ard...Bolton accent)
Declan Swan (claims direct advert guy 2 decades ago)
Ivor Bigun
Mickey Mouse
etc

Seen one, seen 'em all Wink

MilkyCuppa · 05/12/2018 20:17

You can’t touch them, can’t shout at them, can’t impose a sanction and know that it will be carried out
Yep. You say “Stop” but they say no. You try to reason with them but they don’t care. You threaten to call parents or the principal and they say go ahead. You tell them to get out of the classroom but they say no. You give them detention and they refuse to attend. What other recourse do you have? Literally the only thing you can do is call parents and hope they’re sympathetic and will punish at home in order to discourage future bad behaviour.

A few years ago when Game of Thrones was on tv I heard about a teacher who controlled the class by threatening to write spoilers on the board every time someone misbehaved. I aspired to that level of discipline!

Princesspeachy0 · 05/12/2018 21:00

How did you get on OP?

lifetothefull · 05/12/2018 21:16

A child should not be given the idea that they have that kind of power to get someone fired.

DarlingNikita · 06/12/2018 17:27

I think YANBU. It's totally unprofessional to tell the children a teacher isn't coming back – as you say, it's an issue of confidentiality – plus, while the behaviour was bad and the class need a teacher to discuss that with them, they should not be given the 'firing' of a teacher as a consequence of their behaviour. I'd take it as high as possible, personally.

BeckyBec · 06/12/2018 17:33

The behaviour and choices of the school staff are wrong on so many levels!!

Hadehahaha · 06/12/2018 17:35

Literally all through school I was told teachers had left because of my class’ bad behaviour! It was par for the course. Once I wrote an apology letter and passed it through another staff member! I don’t think it’s brilliant, but I would go into talk to the head about it either. I would have just reassured my child.

greenpop21 · 06/12/2018 17:41

Be aware that your daughter may have changed the wording used. Supply teachers don't get fired, they just don't continue to work at that school but that's what supply work is about.Other chn might've used the word fired(The Apprentice jargon is very topical)and your DD may have repeated it. I do agree that whole class punishments are not on. I wouldn't be going into the school about it though, you've made your point.

bubblegumunicorn · 06/12/2018 17:42

Tell your daughter not to worry about him because supply teachers are not employed by the school but by an agency so he’s not been fired he’s just going to work at different schools. The head really stretched the truth there really!

ohreallyohreallyoh · 06/12/2018 17:47

Someone said supply teachers in this country don't have to be qualified. I was a supply teacher for many years and never met or heard of a supply teacher not being qualified

I know plenty of people with degrees or just TA qualifications who are covering for teachers under the guise of ‘cover supervisor’ or in primary, increasingly we are seeing HLTAs and TAs covering teacher absence. I know of a local school who used a non-qualified TA to cover a 2 week absence recently in reception. No disrespect to TAs and HLTAs but parents do need to realise that there is now the very real possibility their children are being regularly ‘taught’ by people without QTS. There is therefore no requirement for ‘supply’, as a generic term, to be qualified. It is happening. It should be causing outrage. For reasons beyond me, it isn’t.

Singlenotsingle · 06/12/2018 17:49

Who would be a teacher? Especially a supply teacher? That poor supply teacher must have been in despair, absolutely mortified! And these are primary school children!

As others have pointed out, there is no way of disciplining children these days. And it's up to parents to back up the teachers in trying to control the children in whatever way is left. If telling them it's their behaviour that has resulted in the supply teacher losing his/her job, so be it. Maybe it'll make them think! (Maybe not)!