DS Last one picked in PE

[GoldenLightNights]

AIBU to contact the teacher with regards to this:

DS is 9, he’s a wonderful child, great at all things science and maths related but not so much at sports. He plays football outside of school for one of the lower ability teams and sort of enjoys it, he isn’t forced to play or anything like that.

Anyway today at school he had PE, we’ve never had any issues before but today for some reason the teacher let two boys pick teams and my son was the last to be picked. He is quite upset especially as one of the boys doing the picking is a close friend.
Anyway I find the idea of letting other children pick teams horrendous and if not my son some child will be picked last. I actually thought this method of choosing teams was done away with years ago!
I want to contact the teacher to ask if he would consider adopting a new approach to team selection. My husband says I’m jumping the gun and to wait to see if it happens again…… so what do you think?
He was properly upset this evening 😢

Same types who say 'I was smacked and I turned out fine'. We don't need to listen to those people.

I totally agree with this, being bullied as a child warps some people into thinking being bullied as a child is OK.

Please don't blame his friend though, he got put in the position for picking and seems he went off whom he thought would play best for his team rather than just picking his mates.

We don't need to listen to those people.

Ah well, there's that. Just ignore all the opinions that you don't like. What harm did that strategy ever do in the world, hmmmm....

@lljkk

We don't need to listen to those people.

Ah well, there's that. Just ignore all the opinions that you don't like. What harm did that strategy ever do in the world, hmmmm....

I'm like a modern day dictator for not condoning humiliating children, what a tyrant!

@AlmostAJillSandwich

Please don't blame his friend though, he got put in the position for picking and seems he went off whom he thought would play best for his team rather than just picking his mates.

My hopelessly unsporty ds got chosen to pick teams all day at a sports camp after he had a really difficult day before.

He chose first all the children who normally get left until last because he thought it would be nice for them. Then he was most surprised when his team lost every single game

@sadpapercourtesan

It always amazes me that people still trot out the "toughen up" crap. It shows a fundamental lack of understanding of how resilience is built.

You don't make a child resilient by traumatising or humiliating them. You don't make a child resilient by overloading them with negative experiences they are too young to cope with. Children develop resilience gradually by having their needs met, by being valued and respected and taught that their well-being matters and that they have a right to prioritise it.

It was lazy thinking in the 80s - there's no excuse for it now.

Great post, I completely agree with this.

School put me off team sports for life. My hackles really get aggravated when I hear people saying how wonderful school team sports are for building team work, team spirit, health, fitness etc. Bollocks.

^This, was my experience exactly and I feel the same anger when people who were good at team sports bang on about all the “benefits”

@lljkk

We don't need to listen to those people.

Ah well, there's that. Just ignore all the opinions that you don't like. What harm did that strategy ever do in the world, hmmmm....

Not all opinions are equally valid. It is not about opinions I don't like - I do listen to political opinions I disagree with for example.

But people who think humiliating small children is fine are just not thinking straight, so I do discount them.

We are all allowed to have moral standards, humiliating children is unethical.

@SpiderinaWingMirror

PE teachers do this because, logically, they were likely the first to be picked. That and lack of empathy.

I often think they were last, and this is their vicarious revenge. I expect most PE teachers are only average at sport, and I doubt it’s even possible good at a large number of sports.

I expect most PE teachers are only average at sport, and I doubt it’s even possible good at a large number of sports.

Most PE teachers enjoyed PE.

I haven't read all of the comments but as a PE teacher in a primary school, I wanted to give my stance on things.
I occasionally get children to pick their own teams, not during lessons but during after school clubs. I don't always pick my best players as team captains, I often pick middle or low ability to be captain so they feel that sense of ownership or belonging. Yes, sometimes they are picked last but not always.

Also, I don't often number my children to make teams because I fear accidentally making a strong team and a weak team and having teams win by a landslide. Thus, impacting on the confidence of the lower abilities. I send them off to teams based on ability but I don't always go in ability order. Sometimes the less able are left until last but not always. Someone does go last but not always my weakest player. Sometimes my strongest have to wait until the end. I want my teams to be fair so I have to consciously pick them.
Sometimes, after working in pairs (which I allow them to choose themselves) I ask them to number themselves one and two and split them that way because more often than not they naturally gravitate towards a partner of similar ability.

I guess what I am suggesting is that just because your child comes home once having been picked last, doesn't mean it is a normal occasion and something which is going to happen to him on a weekly basis

@COS2102

Sorry to pounce on just you, but why is PE so far behind all other subjects in terms of how it treats students? It is a source of constant disappointment to parents, we all discuss it all the time - PE lessons make our children feel like shit.

Why can PE not be fun and positive?

If it was me, I wouldn’t ‘complain’ but I absolutely WOULD make the school aware that the consequence of their decision was that you spent all evening comforting a tearful child.

I would send an email along the lines that of course the school have discretion to organise teams as they wish, but you know they are also promoting mental health awareness and, with that in mind, please be aware that allowing children to pick teams inevitably leads to great upset for those picked last and in this instance yiur chikd spent X hours very distraught about it and you are disappointed to see them choose such an old fashioned method (which is routinely portrayed in films as psychologically scarring for the children picked last).

I see people are saying you’re helicoptering. Nonsense. If a teacher’s behaviour makes a child cry, something has gone very wrong. A quiet word from you know could be the difference between the school abandoning this method or using it for decades. So the impact of wherher or not you raise this with the school on many children (and their mothers!) is potentially very significant.

@labyrinthlaziness
The only complaints from the parents at my school are that the waiting lists for my clubs are too long. That there is only one of me and far too many children eager to stay after school to take part in activities with me. Children of all abilities. There are probably more discussions over reading levels and discrepancies over why their children have to leave the classroom to have extra intervention for maths or English.

So where I am, I don't have that. So the we and the us and the parents you are experiencing are not the ones I have on a personal level. Of course there are children who don't enjoy pe but there are also children who complain about the other subjects. The problem I see is that pe can sometimes be seen as more of a choice activity rather than a serious need like other lessons. For example, we had a boy, 10, earlier this week sit at the side of the hall and say we'll no I think this game is stupid, I don't like it and I'm not joining in. Something he wouldn't dream of doing for other subjects which he doesn't enjoy.

PE can be outting I guess. When you are a lower ability in maths, your sheet is different to everyone else's but how many people really know? When you are a lower ability in PE, it isn't something you can keep covered in the book. It's physical, it's there for others to see. It battles with insecurities.

But 'PE lessons make our children feel like shit. Why can PE not be fun and positive?' is a ludicrous comment to me. Our lessons are fun, they are positive, they are engaging, they are challenging, they are differentiated and they produce many, many happy children. If I could invite parents in to see their children in my pe lessons then I am confident that they would leave feeling happy and content that their child has been in a fun and positive environment

If the teacher has such outdated views it makes you wonder just how bad his teaching is

@labyrinthlaziness those of us who don't have academic children often feel the same way , ny ds felt shit when he got the worst result in the class or when he is never picked to represent school in maybe important visits etc or when he was kept in at playtime because he failed his spellings or detention for not getting a high enough grade on a test and all those who didn't name on a board saying they had detention
Why do people single out pe
They are happy to have sets for maths english etc yet in pe think its unfair

I really do not understand why PE teachers can not see how many children feel unhappy about PE. If you try to raise it the teachers say they don't recognise it, but get any group of kids outside school and lots of them will explain why they dislike PE.

[quote worriedatthemoment]@labyrinthlaziness those of us who don't have academic children often feel the same way , ny ds felt shit when he got the worst result in the class or when he is never picked to represent school in maybe important visits etc or when he was kept in at playtime because he failed his spellings or detention for not getting a high enough grade on a test and all those who didn't name on a board saying they had detention
Why do people single out pe
They are happy to have sets for maths english etc yet in pe think its unfair [/quote]
Well being kept in at break time is dreadful too!

And what school gives detentions for low marks? I would complain if that happened too, but my school has never done such a thing to the best of my knowledge.

I single out PE because it is the worst subject, IMO.

[quote worriedatthemoment]@labyrinthlaziness those of us who don't have academic children often feel the same way , ny ds felt shit when he got the worst result in the class or when he is never picked to represent school in maybe important visits etc or when he was kept in at playtime because he failed his spellings or detention for not getting a high enough grade on a test and all those who didn't name on a board saying they had detention
Why do people single out pe
They are happy to have sets for maths english etc yet in pe think its unfair [/quote]
People are ‘singling out’ PE because this thread is about PE. If you started a thread saying ‘my child struggles a bit academically and was kept in all playtime as punishment for not getting his spellings correct’ then I doubt you’d get ‘well tell him not to be a snowflake, he can shine when they play cricket, we can’t all be good at everything and this will build his resilience.’ That’s equally bad practice but bad practice in one area doesn’t justify bad practice in another area.

I’m a primary school teacher and I would not dream of picking teams like this. It’s not what PE should be about. I want all the children in my class to love PE and feel positive about physical activity. Friendly competition is important but that can happen without children feeling inadequate or humiliated.

Don't be so soft!! Honestly

@DPotter

Been here when I was at school and it's awful.

School put me off team sports for life. My hackles really get aggravated when I hear people saying how wonderful school team sports are for building team work, team spirit, health, fitness etc. Bollocks.

Team school sports only do that if you're in the team; for many- school team sports are a lesson in public humiliation. I was not good at school sports, in fact I was considered a lost cause by the PE teachers and my peers too, but I won a national competition in a non-school sport at the age of 14, was knocking on the door of county standard for another and earnt my living in part as a T'ai Chi instructor for 10 yrs or more.

Let your son try lots of other sports until he finds his 'thing'.

This. I hated team sports but liked walking, swimming and riding. Maybe he’d enjoy running?

Have not read all the comments but yeah it’s rotten when it’s ur
child picked last but if you son who is good at maths and science was to pick a team he wouldn’t pick someone who wasn’t strong in that subject
Unfortunately we all can’t be good at everything

We can't all be elite athletes.
But we can learn about our bodies and enjoy the freedom of movement and the need to maintain our fitness. Freedom of our bodies is for everyone.

I also think this is an incredibly outdated way to pick teams.

This method was used every week at my school from yr7 with the confident sportier children choosing the teams. It put me (and a chunk of other children) off team sports for the whole 5 years.

If you want a way to actively disengage children from liking or wanting to take part then let's let them see week in week out how shit their peers think they are at something. Yes, a great way to build children's confidence and enjoyment of a subject.

As someone has pointed out upthread yes, it may also teach a "valuable lesson" to a child about making hard decisions and not choosing their friends HOWEVER why should that be at the expense of another child's self esteem and often repeatedly, week in and week out being picked last.

It just wouldn't happen in another subject such as English or Maths.