AIBU regarding PE teacher, DD and her period?

[Tink2007]

My DD is nearly 13. She’s been having periods for 8/9 months. She came on yesterday. She said it was quite heavy and she didn’t feel comfortable doing PE today as she was worried about leaks and it being so heavy just left her feeling uncomfortable.

She’s never missed a PE lesson, she has done PE whilst on her period but it has always coincided with the end so has always been lighter. I said it was fine and I would jot a note in her student diary (as required) especially seeing as it was the first time she has come to me and said “‘Mum, I don’t feel comfortable with this today.”

So imagine my surprise when she came home from school and told me how PE went today. Her actual PE teacher was fine with her not doing PE but said the final decision was with the head of PE.

Now given she didn’t have her PE kit, she had a note and expressed her discomfort with doing PE I wa surprised that the head of PE tried all manner of ways to make her do PE, telling her a period couldn’t be “that bad”, she wouldn’t accept it as a reason again. Then said if she had a spare PE kit she would have made her do it, asked the other PE teacher to make her do it in her school uniform (which the other teacher refused to do) and pulled her by the arm to a standing position to bat a shuttlecock back and forth towards the end of the lesson. She simply couldn’t accept she wasn’t doing it this lesson.

AIBU reasonable for being annoyed? In an age where we are supposed to be empowering young women to have their voices heard, be confident in what they feel comfortable and uncomfortable with and voicing that but yet this teacher seems happy to ignore it and physically pull my DD to her feet.

I should add I do know the teacher in question - she was my PE teacher 22 years ago and it does sound just like her to be honest.

Nerfballs

I agree that there is definitely an argument for changing how PE is delivered.

Zumba was looked at in my dds school and it was viewed to be too expensive - they felt that they had to buy in an instructor which obviously had to be paid for. Not sure how youtube etc would work - how do the students watch it?

Obviously zumba is only one option and with 7 classes per year x 2 sessions of PE per week you need to offer more than zumba but what I have no idea.

From my view the ideal would be almost a gym set up with multiple classes running and the students pick individually what they want to do but I am realistic to know that this is impractical within a school.

No idea what the answer is. At school I hated PE with a passion and it did put me off of doing sport and affected my confidence because I was rubbish at it. As an adult I do yoga and pilates and love it but that took a long time of trying different things until I found what I like. How do you facilitate this in school?

I get what you're saying op. I agree some people will pretend and that's a pity. However, the school should help remove the barriers that prevent girls doing pe. For some, periods are a barrier and that's should be accepted. But if kids can't be persuaded, bit like benefits bashing, I'd rather swallow the small and inevitable percentage taking the piss so I don't penalise those who need it.

So op I have been in a similar position where my mum, doctor and chirp wrote a note that I was not allowed to do certain pe lessons due to a severe whiplash injury.

The head of pe yelled at me and forced me to do the lesson when my normal teacher was off and I ended up with an injury that I still have left over symptoms from. I was only 12 at the time and was threatened with being sent to the head of year.

My mum went in for a meeting and told them she didn't want to sue the school but if they did anything like this again she would (she didn't want my education messed with and felt it would).

I would definitely talk to the head of year again with an action plan for what your daughter should say if this situation were to happen again, even if it is "you'll need to call head of year now about this or I'll go myself"

I didn't need to do this in the end as they were so nervous about being sued that I never had to come through the action plan (having my arm in a sling for 6 months and constantly missing school for therapy helped too).

There does need to be a clear protocol though for this situation - we still shouldn't be ignoring young ladies who are going through this and not being respected. To have parental notes ignored too is not acceptable. Being physically handled should be immediately investigated.

As someone who also has ademyosis, my period pains and level of heavy bleeding was ignored. Lucky for my though my arm and back were so bad that it wasn't a problem to miss class or school as I had out fee health problems. I have been sent home though from work from it since from being so pale and in pain to standing up and despite all the best towels and tampons still bleeding so much that it was a considerable leak. It is a medical condition and can cause so much pain and bleeding.

There are lots of stories coming out at the moment around this topic that are causing schools issues an he backlash. Stand your ground on getting a long term solution and process so ladies are not put on this situation again. Highlight that PE as it advances is more than just doing the sport but learning more about the history, rules, health and safety, umpire skills and more. If students can't take part due to one reason or another, they will still have to learn.

This is what my first school did (before I moved to the school that injured me) and they found it worked better to put off the lazy students but also gave those eager to learn more.

I couldn't horse ride for years after the whiplash and arm injury. Rather than not going to lessons at the weekends, I still went and trained to be an instructors assistant. It helped when I started riding again both for my own riding but also for my exams.

Good for you standing by your daughter by the way.

Weetabix it's really not that hard. They managed an engaging program for the seniors in our school so why the junior classes were so crap is beyond me. It's also not hard to equip the gym with a TV connected to the internet and protected by a cage, so as to access programs online and broaden the curriculum.

Start the year with some basic physiology and health lessons, followed by individual fitness level testing. Help them set some goals. Add a few popular fitness classes like zumba, yoga, body combat, self defense etc to the usual suspects - cricket, rugby, soccer, netball, hockey, badminton, swimming, track & field - and spend a few lessons on each rather than a whole term on one.

Cycle through so each lesson is different, making it more likely most kids will enjoy at least one lesson that week. Start with 10-15 mins calisthenics every lesson to warm up properly and give those likely to stand on the field talking at least some exercise. 15 mins learning skills, 15 mins game time, 5-10 mins cool down. Instead of a short run to warm up, zero skill training or assessment, and 40-50 mins of games. You'll find most kids will do something they don't like if it a) doesn't last very long, b) they actually have help to improve rather than just left to it and c) it's only a few lessons. Finish each term with individual fitness testing so students can track improvement in their health and learn to take responsibility for their health longterm.

Have no PE uniform - let kids decide what they're comfortable in for exercise (with parameters - have to be suitable for purpose ie no mini skirts.) The current craze for active wear means most teens will have suitable clothes already, and there's room for those wanting to cover up a bit more or have pockets. Give access to the toilets through the lesson if need be.

And like I said, make it boring for those sitting out. Assign them PE written work which is graded, send them to the library for supervised study, make them write out school rules etc. Gives the option of sitting the lesson out if unwell but it's not an attractive one for those looking to skive.

PE teachers have university qualifications, designing an engaging program for kids should be part of their skill set. What needs to change is PE designed for sports stars and everyone else forced to try keep up. It's attitude really - focus on empowering all students for overall health management and PE will start to change. Change the goals and method, give some flexibility to work with the body rather than against it and I'd bet the participation rates would rise.

PE is a waste of valuable teaching time anyway. My children were all removed from year 7. I would lodge a complaint, putting her hands on your dd could be construed as assault. As a teenager my periods flooded my clothes and I was always off school because of it. I would go in and make your feelings known.

Nerfballs

Get where you are coming from but having done yoga and Pilates for years I would be very reluctant to let children do yoga or body combat by watching youtube. Even our instructors won't teach outside of their specific training because of the risk of injury.

The programme of sports does sound good though. Hopefully PE teachers will start to be trained in sports like these.

And that's different from PE teachers getting kids to do gymnastics when they're not gymnastics coaches nor are the kids inadequately warmed up? Happens in schools all the time with numerous sports in PE - teachers are generalists and arguably not qualified to teach any sport if that's the case.

It also doesn't have to be YouTube - there are many qualified instructors offering decent programs online fairly relatively cheaply. The alternative is investing in training their teachers, or scrapping PE - like I said, they're not qualified to teach a lot of what they do in PE already.

*adequately

Or maybe schools could work in partnership with local gyms where instructors come in for a few lessons to offer samplers of classes, teach a few skills and offer student rates/discounts on memberships. Schools benefit, gyms contribute to the community which is good PR and good advertising. There are ways and means of doing it. Saying it's too hard to do anything different is rubbish. PE is failing for a lot of people. Change it or allow kids to opt out.

YANBU! Exercise often makes my craps and flow worse, despite everything you read telling you the opposite. Wearing a towel while doing so would be very difficult.

@Nerfballs pretty much has solved many of the problems with one post.
All of those are achievable aims, none is onerous.
To add, there are plenty of specialists in various sports and self defence. All of whom would do a lesson (for a fee) the schools in an area could band together and as is usual if enough is booked it's generally cheaper.

Flooffloof
It just isn't that simple.

How do schools band together? One school has to travel to another? Travel time there, travel time back and fit a lesson in as well is well over the 60 minutes available and yes, you can buy an instructor in but at £20+ an hour x however many lessons per week is very expensive when schools literally have no money.

Sigh - I was thinking gym instructors could offer a couple classes free (so in a school maybe 10 classes all up) or for an honorarium. It's excellent PR and advertising for them, and contributes to their wider community.

We have an arborist company in our area that picks up and mulches Christmas trees for free. Takes them a week or so, but they do it because when people need an arborist they think "oh yeah, those guys who took our Christmas tree do this sort of stuff, let's call them". Which is exactly what we did when we had a tree needed taking down. Community interaction and engagement works - it'll work for the gyms, it works for the schools.

Failing that, there are online classes as mentioned. I've been injured plenty while playing sports foisted on me, but never while following videos at home. Certainly they're no more dangerous than the current PE curriculum being taught by generalist teachers.

As per usual though it comes down to "change is too hard, girls aren't worth it, we'll force them and who cares what the results are". In which case PE should be offered as an elective only. Or schools should accept excuses as part and parcel of a crap subject. And not force girls who are unwell to do something that potentially will harm them.

As per usual though it comes down to "change is too hard, girls aren't worth it, we'll force them and who cares what the results are".

No it really isn't. I'm speaking from 1 experience - maybe there are instructors willing to work for free (as an PTA chair I have never had that experience - no company ever provided their services for free in exchange for advertising, a small donation or raffle prize but not their services). All I know is from our school that the PE teachers said they weren't qualified to teach zumba, school found an instructor and asked parents to pay a voluntary contribution towards the cost.

With regards the rest of your post - I have no idea if they can do it by watching a video, it doesn't seem very safe to me but who knows? My instructors are always correcting us in poses so we don't injure ourselves.

Something needs to change, though.

Reading OP's post took me back to the day in primary school when my 9 year-old friend was punched and slapped by our male headmaster for refusing to come out of the pool changing room. Her period had started on the way to the pool and she was understandably upset.

None of us knew what was happening to her, everyone was trying to see into the changing room to see what was happening after I'd gone to tell him she wouldn't come out. I'd followed him back in or I'd have never believed what was happening.

It took several years for most of us to catch her up and we all then remembered and understood her refusal even though it meant a beating for her.

While not a real comparison, this bullying is so wrong and that teacher needs to be reported.

As for those who don't suffer with terrible cramps and flooding (about 80% apparently), the 20% of us who do would appreciate you walking a mile in our shoes before scoffing.

We're not all the same physically or mentally. Some young girls would take the embarrassment of a bleed-through with a shrug of their shoulders. Others are traumatised and find it difficult to cope with it.

I can't believe we haven't moved forward much in the 40 years since my friend's pool incident.

Schools would be better off phasing out traditional PE teachers entirely and having sport and exercise covered by people with a fitness, coaching and/or youth work background.

How do schools band together? One school has to travel to another?

Uh no, they club together and book say, top of my head 30 lessons between 15 schools.
The specialist then knows that the time is fixed, the income is fixed, so they can charge a few quid less.
The more schools involved, the more the specialist knows the income is fixed. The specialist travels to the schools.

Or maybe just scrap pe. It was shit in the 70s and 80s and seems shit now.

Uh no, they club together and book say, top of my head 30 lessons between 15 schools.

So 2 lessons per school? What use is that to man or beast?

It would be good to hear from experts what the barriers to restructuring PE actually are.

As for scrapping it, PE is a compulsory subject under the national curriculum so the Dept of Ed would need to change that.

West I think your pretending to not understand.
Nerf put
Start the year with some basic physiology and health lessons
followed by individual fitness level testing. Help them set some goals. Add a few popular fitness classes like zumba, yoga, body combat, self defense etc to the usual suspects - cricket, rugby, soccer, netball, hockey, badminton, swimming, track & field - and spend a few lessons on each rather than a whole term on one

Schools are open around 38 weeks a year. Some pe lessons will be missed due to other closures so I will say 34 weeks to fill with pe. I see minimum 18 lessons filled above in nerfs post. Am sure the people in chargecan think of some other sports, fitness classes, etc to fill the other 18 lessons.

But you are seeing that for only 1 class, our school split boys and girls and then combined 2 classes of girls, so 30 girls.

In a 6 form entry school that is 3 classes x 2 sessions of PE per week x 5 year groups

3 x 2 x 5 = 30 sessions per week.

Your example above of 34 sessions is 1 session, for 1 class over the year.

And your other suggestion of banding together with other schools provided 2 sessions in total, if you can find an instructor to give up their time for free.

Why am I pretending not to understand? I don't understand because your proposals don't add up.

I had a quick check and Zumba is actually a trade name and instructors teaching it have to be certified by the company, which I suppose explains why PE teachers can't just teach it.

Sigh

Here is wiki on ZUMBA
Zumba is an exercise fitness program created by Colombian dancer and choreographer Alberto "Beto" Perez during the 1990s. Zumba involves dance and aerobic movements performed to energetic music.

So any generic dance and aerobics will do. So also a workout video/YouTube would be similar.

Ok so the maths is wrong in my last post (probably cos my kids went to small schools) but the idea is sound.