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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

DS Last one picked in PE

483 replies

GoldenLightNights · 09/02/2022 22:32

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 😢

OP posts:
Shoxfordian · 10/02/2022 08:02

I was last to be picked because I have no hand eye co-ordination but I’m 36, I’m over it

Yabu

Clymene · 10/02/2022 08:03

It's poor educational practice, that's why she should contact the school.

Peaseblossum22 · 10/02/2022 08:03

I was always one of the last , it’s a horrible practice and humiliating . I thought it was outdated too and so might mention it. Sadly however these things do happen in life and you do have to learn to deal with rejection. If your ds was picking a team for a maths competition would he pick the people best at maths or his friend? I would try to help him to see that it’s not about friendship but about choosing people with the right skills , that might not be him for football but it might be for maths. Still horrid though .

AndAnotherNewOne · 10/02/2022 08:07

@JustDanceAddict

It bloody well is.

Don't be ridiculous. PE teachers have done far worse.

gannett · 10/02/2022 08:16

I was always last to be picked. Never bothered me, I was academic and had no desire to be on any teams with the jolly hockey sticks girls.

In my 20s I thought "last to be picked" was a hallmark of the kids who grow up to be the coolest adults, but in an unexpected plot twist I became very sporty in my 30s. Not the team sports we were forced to do at school, individual ones I actually like. Made me realise that the way PE is taught in school is really messed up, and actually stuff like being picked last is at the heart of it.

Kids should be taught that exercise is beneficial, enjoyable, and so diverse that there's something out there for everyone, even the klutzes with no hand-eye coordination or team ability. Instead they're divided into "good at sport" and "crap at sport" and no effort is made to actually encourage the latter. And whether the kid cares about it or not at the time, they internalise that identity. It took me until my late 20s to have a healthy relationship with exercise and it blows my mind that I could have been enjoying it all the time.

SartresSoul · 10/02/2022 08:23

It’s a silly old fashioned way to pick teams, I’m surprised any teacher still uses this especially at primary school. I’d contact if it happens again.

lljkk · 10/02/2022 08:25

I was always chosen last or next last. Which was fair enough, I was generally lousy (weak, slow, uncoordinated). It didn't scar me for life, didn't even put me off team sport.

I was bullied badly in other ways for existing , didn't really care about what they thought of me at sport.

I don't think yabu to ask teacher to consider a different selection method, but ... you never cared about this before your son was affected. So maybe frame it as kinder to ALL the children, not just your own.

gingerhills · 10/02/2022 08:27

It sucks. I'm dyspraxic and had undiagnosed bad eyesight so was always the last to be picked. Weekly humiliation. If ever the nice girl got to pick and chose me half way through, the ones she'd already picked would huff and eye roll and complain to her. Once the teacher let me pick and they all ran away not wanting to be on my team. I hated sport, hated anything to do with fitness until my twenties when I discovered it didn't have to be like that!

tiktokontheclock · 10/02/2022 08:29

Talk to the school.

AssignedBlobbyAtBirth · 10/02/2022 08:30

It wouldn't be acceptable to shame someone who struggles academically in this way so why is it acceptable in sport? Its a horrible way to treat children and those who justify it are those who were good at sports. How would they like to be the last one standing in a maths class to demonstrate how poor they were at maths?
I had poorly controlled asthma at school and struggled with sport. School managed to put me off team exercise for life, is that really what we want to teach?

StopStartStop · 10/02/2022 08:32

Give it a go. But also build him up so it's only a tiny part of his life. I was always last to be picked. I survived.

RedBeetroot12 · 10/02/2022 08:34

Oh you need to get a grip, there are going to be worse things your son will face in the world! Rather than putting your effort into complaining to the school, spend time talking to your child and teaching him to be more resilient!

AngelinaFibres · 10/02/2022 08:34

@ShavingTheBadger

That’s awful. I was always the last one picked - our school only ever did rounders or netball for girls and I have really bad hand-eye co-ordination so can’t catch, throw, bat or shoot. It just made me even more introverted and shy than I already was.
Me too. I was short and the only left handed child in my class and had poor gross motor control. PE was purgatory. We used to play a game where there were 2 teams .They were selected in the way the Op is complaining about , and then one team got to hurl balls at the other team .If the ball hit you you were out.It was like lions taking out a wounded zebra in my case. Once out you got to stand in a freezing, muddy field until the other 15 were out. My mother's view was that secondary school was something to survive. Put me off team stuff for life.
AngelinaFibres · 10/02/2022 08:37

@gingerhills

It sucks. I'm dyspraxic and had undiagnosed bad eyesight so was always the last to be picked. Weekly humiliation. If ever the nice girl got to pick and chose me half way through, the ones she'd already picked would huff and eye roll and complain to her. Once the teacher let me pick and they all ran away not wanting to be on my team. I hated sport, hated anything to do with fitness until my twenties when I discovered it didn't have to be like that!
I had forgotten these extra ways of humiliating the non sporty kid at school.The eye rolling. The 'oh god not her' comments. I had buried it . It was bloody awful.
LefttoherownDevizes · 10/02/2022 08:39

It happened to me every single time, I was rubbish at PE and I knew it.

It is life though, and has made me more resilient, something our children really need.

Agree with the PP about PE being the only time some get to shine, so let them have it. Same as it really riles me when school used to cancel PE cos class were misbehaving but they'd never cancel Maths for the same reason. That PE lesson could be the only thing that some kids enjoyed or were good at at school.

AssignedBlobbyAtBirth · 10/02/2022 08:44

The kids who are good at sport can still shine. Everyone knows who they are, it shouldn't mean humiliating those who are not good at a sport
I'm sure the parents of sporty kids would be complaining if the same methods were used in academic subjects

Spookytooth · 10/02/2022 08:45

All the young star gymnasts/ tennis players/ any sport, or almost all, had really supportive parents helping them, who started them early.

I'm not saying get them on the golf course at three but Can you get DS to go running with you, go to the park to throw or kick a ball, tennis? Kids pick things up so quickly.

I think it's important socially growing up to be able to play a sport whatever that is. And the issue is that no one gets good at sport without going through the tedious, annoying tricky bit of learning it iin the first place.

lljkk · 10/02/2022 08:50

It is life though, and has made me more resilient, something our children really need.

That, at least for some of us. People do learn resilience from the difficult moments, they literally learn how to get thru unpleasant things. How to deal with fact that life is intrinsically unfair & not always kind.

Feel bad for the kids who aren't good at anything - not sport, not academics, not pretty, not making friends, nothing. This truly sucks.

CecilyP · 10/02/2022 08:50

For a once off, I would say nothing ~ after all, someone has to be picked last. If it persists, then it would be OK to complain. Not a great way to pick teams but very common when I was at school. And PE teachers never ever thought to ask the least likely to be picked to be the picker - it was always the popular kids.

DuchessAndThePea · 10/02/2022 08:52

@AndAnotherNewOne

It is unfair but I think you are massively over reacting. "Ritual humiliation"? No, it really isn't, just poor practice.
If you're on the pointy end of this practice and are always picked last then it is a regular ritual of humiliation. Trust me.
Rosieposie101 · 10/02/2022 08:54

Seriously? We always picked teams at school! I thought all schools did this Confused Someone has to be last? And surely he needs to learn to be okay with being last? Especially as it's not something he's even a hobby or interest of his.

princesspenny · 10/02/2022 08:54

Definitely not BU. I left a women's rugby team for this reason. I didn't expect it to bother me so much at my age but I was fighting back the tears sometimes when we had to pick teams.

Logical me knows it's probably because I was new, no one knew how fit and strong I was or just didn't remember my name but the kid in me was always devastated. I left after 5 weeks

Toddlerteaplease · 10/02/2022 08:55

He's lucky it only happened once. Only once in my entire school career was I not last.

Gowithme · 10/02/2022 08:55

@Petsop

Think you are helicoptering here. When you are academically bright as it sounds like your son is, he gets to be great in the classroom several times a week. Top set. Great grades. Better life prospects. Other kids in his class will spend all their time in the classroom not being the bright ones - and don’t they know it. Streamed into the bottom set, never getting more than a C even with their biggest effort. Being made fun of for being the ‘thick ones.’

On the sports pitch, sometimes this is those kids time to shine. And your sons turn to feel what it’s like to not be the best and how to treat others. Needs to work both ways.

From someone who was shit academically but a natural sportswoman :)

But they can still shine on the sports pitch without the OP's son having to be picked last. Picking teams a different way doesn't prevent the sporty kids from shining.

IMO sports day is nothing like science or maths because when you come bottom in science or maths you don't have the whole school and all the parents watching you. My ds is autistic and dyspraxic and sports day was awful for him, he hates sport now. The sporty kids shine every single break and lunchtime when they play football and as a result they are often also the popular kids.

THisbackwithavengeance · 10/02/2022 08:56

@sadpapercourtesan

Surely anyone with half a brain knows that this is appalling practice Shock

None of the teachers I trained with/know would even consider doing this. It's completely outdated and for very good reason.

Ignore the "suck it up" brigade, you could post that your child had had his legs sawn off as part of a Maths demonstration and they would say the same.

Developing your son's resilience, while useful in its own right, isn't the point here. It's not his responsibility to be able to tolerate humiliating, shoddy practice without getting upset. I would certainly complain to the school about this happening during PE lessons and I would expect them to put a stop to it. Whole generations of kids have negative associations with sport and exercise because of this sort of nonsense.

Well said.

Stupid, bullying bullshit. Can't believe it still goes on. I think some teachers either must get off on humiliating kids or are spectacularly thick. Why on earth would they do this?

Complain.

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