8 year old reading grim newspaper article at school

[Pearlclutching]

Name changed but have been hanging out around here for almost a decade.

I don't know if I'm overreacting and would like some advice.

DS8 and I were at the shops at the weekend, and he spotted a headline on the local paper. Something along the lines of Sex Offender Convicted of Taplow Lake Murder. He was immediately interested and said he knew all about it, rattling off accurate, detailed information about the case and the previous offences of the man responsible. He told me he'd read a big article about it on a sheet of newspaper being used to cover the table in an art class. He asked me what a sex offender is and why someone would bind and gag a woman before killing them. We haven't had a talk about sex and I really don't want his first knowledge of it to be violent and negative.

When I told my husband, he was horrified and said I should let the school know. Not so much a complaint as a heads-up.

This morning, I told the head of lower school what happened but didn't make any requests or give any opinion - just stated the facts. He chuckled, said my son will do well on the crime round at pub quizzes in future, and praised his curiosity.

Is it reasonable to expect a school to make some effort to shield lower school pupils from the details of sex crimes and sexually-motivated murder or is the head of lower school right to chuckle and say it's fine? My husband thinks I should go to the headmaster, but I'm not sure.

Really interested to know what people think.

@Pixiedust1234 he has a book in his hand almost all the time. Reading age of 15, according to school, but emotional age more like 6. Definitely doesn't need help accessing or enjoying books, just avoiding inappropriate material.

No teacher would actively decide to put a newspaper with a disturbing headline/article on an art table.
You pointed it out. Next time the teacher will be more careful.

You do need to start exposing your son to the outside world though. Newsround etc. If you continue to shelter him in this way by the time he gets to senior school he'll be very immature compared to the others. And the minute he gets a phone he'll be googling all sorts.

This morning, I told the head of lower school what happened but didn't make any requests or give any opinion - just stated the facts. He chuckled, said my son will do well on the crime round at pub quizzes in future, and praised his curiosity.

Of course your husband is right - go to the head & push an escalation.

Firstly - that newspaper clipping should never have made it as far as the art table. Somebody failed to pay attention.
Secondly - it's not fucking laughing matter. Looking at you, Mr Head of Lower Year 👀
Thirdly - oh ffs i just can't. SAFEGUARDING for crying out loud.
He laughed about your 8 year old reading gruesome content about ... well, no need to repeat it again.
He needs a disciplinary, & some refresher training AT THE VERY LEAST.

Actually - I'm not with your husband after all now.
Why is he telling YOU to chase this up?
Is he unable to take time off to progress this himself?
I would be up in fucking ARMS about this. Why isn't he knocking on the Head's door already?
Also ... why did you need to ask here, OP? Why are you not up in arms too?
The fact that is happened is pretty awful, but mistakes happen.
That teacher LAUGHING about it? Like it's a joke? Like it won't give your boy nightmares?

WHAT?

This man sounds like a danger to children.
Seriously.
Get him reported, pronto.

I remember page three girls on the newspapers covering tables in art class when I was at school.

Every. Fucking. Time.

YANBVU but one of those things. Newspaper readership is so low these days that soon they'll be protecting the table with iPads.

I genuinely don't really know what you want from this.

Oh let me take a wild stab at it @Pixiedust1234

A teacher who doesn't chuckle in an indulgent "well, sex killers will be sex killers, what can you do eh?" way about seriously disturbing content being laid out for 8 year olds to read in detail?

A teacher who doesn't brush off parental concern with "I don't need to censor material that 8 year old children will see"?

A teacher who doesn't display blatant contempt for the most basic of Safeguarding practices?

Yes.

They don't need to "read every article" @maddy68
The headlines will show them what to bin before displaying it for 8 year olds to read.

Oh & btw WTF is "it's there to keep the paint off" about?
We know that.
How does that excuse the total lack of Safeguardiing, or even just basic human decency going on here?

It's not ideal but it's also not the end of the world. Some very OTT reactions in the replies.

Schools have used newspapers to cover the tables for art lessons for decades. Newspapers have always included stories with grim content. The sky has not fallen in. A teacher cannot possibly scan every page that gets laid out on a table to check none of the stories are inappropriate. Newspapers are not age-restricted in any way. Your child could read a story like that just by glancing at the front pages one day in WHSmith.

Nobody wants to have to have these sorts of conversations with their children, and of course it's horrible when you have to do so. But it's not the school's fault. You can't protect your child from every single thing all the time.

FFS - it's the CHILD's fault now?

Do you also remind women who get cat called/groped in the street that they are only outside to get to work/gym/shops/bar - not be catcalled/groped, @PandaOrLion?

Because you know - just being there - it's obviously THEIR fault too, if you reckon an 8 year old child is responsible for what his teacher puts under his nose.

I thought teachers & TAs always scanned the paper used to cover tables, I know I always did. This must have been a full page article for your DS to read in such detail and the headline would have been pretty big.
Attitude of the teacher you spoke to was unprofessional and inappropriate, I’d definitely speak to the HT about him.

As a teacher I've absolutely censored newspapers used for things like this, even with KS3 students. Some things may well be out there in the world but having it put right under your nose for a full lesson is just unnecessary. I've taught Media lessons using newspapers (tabloid vs broadsheet) but chose the tabloid v carefully. And even recently doing the layout of newspaper front covers with sixth form I chose a different day after looking up the day's papers and realising Arthur Labinjo-Hughes was all over the front of them - I just thought it was too upsetting to sit and look at his poor little face while banging on about headlines and mastheads.

No teacher would actively decide to put a newspaper with a disturbing headline/article on an art table.
You pointed it out. Next time the teacher will be more careful.

No he won't @PAFMO
He thinks it;s funny.
He told OP he has "no need to censor" the material he puts out for 8 year old kids.

I used to read newspapers at his age and I’ve turned out fine, presumably you also don’t watch the news when he’s around as well? What about if you’re walking around shops and he sees headlines on the newspapers there? Or hears something on the radio? I think you’re being a bit OTT, tbh, yes it’s not ideal, but he’s going to be exposed to this kind of stuff eventually, you can’t hide it from him for much longer when he’s 8 and can read and is curious.

OP I don’t think YABU to feel upset, especially about the teacher’s response.

8 yo DD quite often comes home with snippets of horrible things she’s read in the newspaper in the same circumstances. Thus far those things have been things that I’ve been really happy to talk to her about and are things that would come up anyway in the fiction she accesses eg murder. But what your DS read is something on a whole other scale of unpleasantness.

I’m with you OP and the teacher’s response is very revealing, and very worrying.

As a primary school teacher I made sure to check newspapers I was putting out for this very reason. Absolutely not appropriate for an 8 year old to be reading about. It takes 30 seconds as you're putting them out to scan them. I'd be mortified if a parent came to me and told me this.

That said - please do talk to him about sex now. He will hear things from peers soon enough.

Exactly @redcream

I can't understand why PP are minimising it with "but he could see headlines anywhere" & "but it didn't do ME any harm".

It's the teacher's attitude that is worrying.
And the blatant flouting of Safeguarding practice & principles.

Also worrying that you associate a brutal murder with "sex education".

The 2 things could not be further apart, & the reasons why are not something any 8 year old needs to be parsing.

Brings back memories - I remember when my parents found the p3 pages I discovered in primary school art class in the newspaper pile and smuggled home. I was probably about 9 or 10 at the time.

At least it opened up a healthy conversation with my parents about pornography long before, if ever, we would have had that conversation otherwise.

Much of my early reading material was the Daily Mirror.

I can understand your concern and it seems like an oversight however I have always thought that if a child is old enough to read, understand and ask questions about what they’ve read then they are old enough to understand and are trying to take that step. You say he has a higher than expected reading age and is reading newspaper articles so I would expect that he will continue to do this wherever he can. You say that he is not as developed emotionally and perhaps is sheltered - is this something that you could work on to ensure he is emotionally ready for the things he will be reading (is already).

Honestly I think it's fine. If your child had been upset or disturbed by it then you might have a point, but he's just show inquisitiveness about a world event and has been inspired to learn more about the subject.

Your connection between sexual offences and his first knowledge of sex is unfounded. Sex offences are not normal sexual activity by definition. You still need to have the appropriate conversations with him when the time is right, which may be soon.

@PAFMO he watches Newsround and reads First News and the Week Junior. None of them covered this story, obviously.

I think the head of year's attitude was off and he sounds wrong for his role tbh and I don't think you are wrong to take it to the headteacher.

Without equating sex education to a horrific misogynistic torture and murder (which rereading my posts it may have seemed like that), I think that by arming him with age appropriate information about sex you have more control in his first exposure to the subject.