Omg my child’s class WhatsApp group is so annoying. Would I be unreasonable to leave it?

[Waterwaterwater1]

There is major fury on it absolutely all the time about anything.

If anyone says anything against the fury, they get shouted down.

It’s a really annoying group and is making me like the parents less.

If I left, people would notice. Politically, that feels a bit bold.

Would you leave?

(Silencing WhatsApp doesn’t work out for me. I’m someone who has to tidy away unread notifications or unread emails etc. It would drive me mad to see loads of messages unread there.)

You should know that when you leave a WhatsApp group it says “op left the group” so there’s no way of hiding it. I have done it when our work one got silly, others followed and it was liberating.

Absolutely leave - I think the advice to wait until there's another bunfight is a good suggestion. they won't notice and if they do, so what! See you all in September! have a great summer everyone!!

If you mute a conversation you won't even get notifications. Once that has been dealt with maybe take some time to work on assertiveness

It's such a terrible feature of WhatsApp that you can't mute a group and it then disappears from your feed.

I left WhatsApp group the moment lockdown started - I just couldn't cope with it and got really stressed with all timetables being shared & the "let's do group online activities like a shared diary" arghhh. Then everyone passive aggressively policing each other.

They can be helpful - I'd have missed 100s of school things without the reminders but god, that all comes at a price.

As a teacher the though of parents' class WhatsApp groups make me feel a little vulnerable and worried. Most I'm sure are fine but just the thought of personal ridicule really make me feel sad 🙈 some parents don't hold back on Facebook so I'm sure WhatsApp groups can be ruthless. Like 'Tattle' for teachers 😅

(I'm not saying they all are but some are as parents on here have said).

I had this exact problem, It was getting completely ridiculous and it was really getting me down so I changed my number and didn't tell them 🙊

Drastic, I know! But I'd had the same mobile number for well over 10 years and I'd noticed a massive upsurge in the amount of spam, marketing and scam calls and texts I was getting, and along with the constant WhatsApp barrage, my phone was just going off the charts some days - so changing it turned out to be not such a bad thing at all.

If you want to do it what you need to do is stop WhatsApp backing up to the cloud, delete any WhatsApp data that's already in the cloud, don't remove yourself from any groups or anything, just delete the app from your phone, then swap your sim, re-download WhatsApp and carry on as if you've never had it before and set it up as a new account so it doesn't link to your old one. It works! I just sent the dc friends parents a simple "this is my new number" message and changed my new settings so that only certain contacts could add me to groups.
I asked a trusted friend what it looked like from the groups point of view and she said you couldn't tell unless you actually pressed on each sent message to see who from the group had read it and my name was always at the bottom with "not delivered/not read" which made it appear that my phone was perhaps switched off for the last six months straight lol and I simply hadn't read it.

I am the world’s biggest people pleaser and can’t stand any conflict confused blush

The most annoying sentence on Mumsnet.

I couldn't be in a class whatsapl group. My DC's classes have a facebook groups and I left my older DC's for the same reason. The younger DC's class have really nice parents who just talk about class stuff, but recently I disactivated facebook (for different reasons) and found that all the information I was getting from the group was in the newsletters All the Mums who may want to contact me have my number anyway because we have already had the all class parties. It feels quite liberating.

@Saoirse7, I obviously can only speak for the WhatsApp group I am part of and people are nothing but complimentary about the teachers personally. There are complaints about specific indecents, from some vocal people, but they never get personal about the teachers. If they did I would tell them massively to fuck themselves, (I actually would and would be a pariah forever probably. Sounds like me ).

OP please time your leaving comedically:

Billy's Mum: I heard from Mrs. Teacher than they think someone's stealing pencils from the Year 5 art room.

"Waterwaterwater1 has left the group"

Lily's Mum: Who's turn is it to buy the snacks for sports day?

"Waterwaterwater1 has left the group"

Daniel Mum: Christ, apparently the head teacher is having a lesbian affair with one of the parents?!

"Waterwaterwater1 has left the group"

Hangingover

I get you, but I've used it to stamp out bullying in our class - the teachers were brilliant but parents all backing it up at home, basically saying don't get involved and stick up for the person being bullied was amazing. I'll be honest and didn't know what response I would get - but nearly the whole parent group backed my child up and I'm not a overly involved year 6 parent on the social side. Also handy for things you might miss and our main form for the class reps to send out info.

I am actually quite glad that there were no such things as WhatsApp groups when my children were at primary school. I think they would have driven me spare and I would have ended up either leaving or ignoring them.

Ours is amazing. Sometimes there are proper pub fights where people are in the wings holding the leaders shirts. It makes me laugh, I have been known to share it with the children as an example of how not to conduct yourself in group chat. Just enjoy it - it’s performance throated ans non of these people will be in your life for long.

I didn't vote but wouldn't blame you if you were absent for a while. I'd go awol. If anyone asked why I'd say I was busy with other things. I'd fill the dishwasher, bathe the dog (if I had one), and paint my nails to make it true; or at any rate not a lie.

Class WhatsApp group? Is this a thing now then? Thank Christ mine is in late secondary and such things didn’t exist back then. The parents bitching in the playground and the park after school was more than enough....

@LadyPrigsbottom

Thank you! ☺️ I try not to think about it but I have heard some real horror stories from other teachers.

@ AlternativePerspective

Yes it’s thing and most of us find it a political obstacle as essentially from my humble experience 90% on the class WhatsApp is junk 9% useful/interesting and 1% vital info.

You are lucky you missed this boat as some olde school things still work best!

Lots of extreme sensitive types these days and nothing like the no nonsense robust older generations! Also so many waiting to point score owing to boredom or wishing to peacock! Think of your little child’s playground and now picture a class of parents not always behaving and playing nicely online! My child is fortunate to be in a so called highly respected top school but despite most families in the school community from a select (privileged) professional background there is still occasional drama! Naturally and sadly because of the levelling up in school demographics (good idea but does not always work as planned) - some families feel excluded despite best integration goodwill, non condescending, open and respectful approaches. Basically can’t win on school class WhatsApp groups - not that you should aim to “win” but just steer a steady course with minimal collateral damage!

@Saoirse7

I am amazed you were able to understand my previous post at all with all the typos . I am using a crap, old phone!

Talking about old phones I recall in a PTA meeting with a bunch of class reps that one mum insisted for coms old school style as she claimed not to be tech enabled! Another said sure, but I am not on WhatsApp and don’t want to disclose mobile no.! In this scenario given the natural digital native ecosystem are all otherwise stuck in - are we still supposed to draft emails or even old school off grid “did you get the (posted hard copy) memo!“

www.channelnewsasia.com/news/cnainsider/low-down-parents-whatsapp-group-chats-are-they-becoming-toxic-12231172

I've used it to stamp out bullying in our class

This is why I left my group. When parent's started unsubtly singling out kids who has done stuff wrong, I felt this was inappropriate. Imagine being the parent of the bully and being whatsapp-shamed!

Sorry for the typos

I left the one for my child. It was at the start of corona and they were all panicking, panicking, etc, really whipping up hysteria. I said (politely, I thought) that it really wasn't helping my own mental health as I was having to continue to work and could we just kept it to the original goal but was totally shot down. So I said my goodbyes (again, I hope politely) and left. I feel sad about it as it was useful for knowing school dates and so on but it was really getting me down.

Just turn off notifications in your settings, the group can just roll on, you don't have to read anything & they can bitch away to their hearts content.