Talking to the school tomorrow...

[sparklins]

Hi, I'm hoping for an outside opinion as I have never dealt with a situation like this before and don't want to be ''that parent''.

All the kids involved are primary age.

My DS (7) got into an altercation today after school at the community playground. He was playing football with a mixed year group and at one point a couple of older boys from his school started tripping him up and pushing him over. He said he tried to stand up for himself and one of the boys strangled him/put his hands around his throat and the other hit him in the face hard enough to make him fall over and apparently he got up and hit one of them back at which point they got broken up by another boy and then dispersed to go home.

DS is fine, he did have a red mark on his face but it is now faded. He was at the park with a DGP who at the time was supervising a younger sibling at the playpark so had his back to DS and did not see the altercation take place.
As far as I am aware the other parents did not see anything as the football pitch is a little off to the side and parents are generally supervising the little ones on the playground.

I do not know the parents of the other boys although I do know who the boys are. DS seems to think this happened because he tackled them a couple of times whilst playing football.

I feel like this is something I should bring to the attention of the school since they all attend there and I do not want anything further to happen between DS and them. I feel no matter what happened it is unacceptable for older boys to hit someone younger than them and I would like to get to the bottom of what exactly happened however I do not know how to approach this in the best way.

I definitely do not want to approach the parents directly but I also don't want to go in and cause drama with the headteacher.

I feel rather out of my depth and don't know how to word what I am trying to get across.
Would anyone be kind enough to give me a bit of advice on the best course of action?

You can mention it so the school remind children to show good behaviour, but that won't go any further.

"older boys", so they are 9 or 10. Kids are forever fighting about football.

he tackled them a couple of times he tried to stand up for himself will be translated very differently from the others point of view.

one of the boys strangled him - it's extremely difficult to go to the bottom of this after the facts.

I am not blaming your son at all, but realistically, it will be one boy pushing the other and the other pushing back, it's unlikely the older boy will put his hands up and say "yes, I strangled him".

“Attempt on his life” “call the police” this thread is nuts!

This is not a school matter, it is a failure of parent/care supervision.

By all means mention it to the class teacher but it sounds like your son is absolutely fine following a small scuffle in the park.

I agree its not your job amd as a parent I wouldn't expect the school to reprimand the children, but I would still let the school know incase something related to it kicks off in school (same goes for online stuff).

This is ridiculous. Someone actually said “attempt on his life”. Seriously? If he was strangled he’d have marks on his neck. He’s very likely exaggerating here. Are you sure it couldn’t have been a headlock type situation as opposed to two hands around throat?
Definitely not a school matter, at best you could just warn them to keep an eye in the playground but kids this age don’t generally continue these things like they would in secondary.
Absolutely not a police matter.
Your only option would be to talk to the parents but that seems pointless over an argument over football. This is so common in these scenarios so a 7 yr old should be playing with them unsupervised. I’ve stopped mine playing in the park pitch with mixed age groups and abilities because it always ends badly.

Definitely mention to class teacher, either at drop off or send in an email. Phrase it in terms of you would like the staff to be aware and that you wanted to mention it in case things spill over into school grounds.

If DS can point out the kids on the school run, I would probably take a minute to speak to their parent(s). Not in a confrontational way, just in a "do you mind if I have a quick word? My son was in the park yesterday and said that there was an incident with your child. I wasn't there so don't know what happened. Appreciate there are 2 sides to the story, this is what my child said... Did your child mention anything yesterday?"

If yes, get their side. If no, "perhaps you could speak to your child and find out their side of things so I can get a better understanding of what happened and we can clear the air so nothing else happens in future."

I'd tell the school safeguarding lead, in case it's a pattern of behaviour from the boys. At just 7 though, you really need someone supervising your son. If the grandparent can't manage two, just send one at a time?

Freshstarts23
I was suggesting this to a previous poster. I think everyone knows that kids exaggerate. Strangling is a very emotive word which is flung around by kids and parents fairly regularly. If someone genuinely thought someone had attempted to strangle their child they would contact the police.

Where were you? My 7 year old wouldn’t be playing out unsupervised. I would inform the school just so they can keep an eye on the children involved in case something happens during school hours.

normal response should be:

why do you leave your 7 year old unsupervised? Keep an eye on him, then you won't need to "clear the air".

Sorry just realised your dc was with a grandparent.

There was a boy in my kids' school who kept being violent to other children and the parents of one child who got hurt reported it to the police and the police just said they couldn't do anything because the violent boy was under 10.

I would talk to the school and just say I know what happened was outside of school and not your responsibility but I'm just letting you know in case it carries on in school.

sparklins
Why are you focusing on why other adults in the park were not noticing? Your 7 year old was unsupervised by his grandparent! The person you need to speak to is the person looking after your child who seems to have seen nothing at all! A 7 year old tackling a group of boys in an unsupervised game of football is a recipe for disaster. Kids constantly fall out over football. A 7 year old is not old enough to deal with this on his own.

Don’t speak to the safeguarding lead, you will definitely be that parent.

@KipferlandCroissant did you read my post properly? Because if you did you would have seen that DS was with a grandparent whom up until this point has been perfectly competent.

@cansu I am not discussing the grandparent on this thread as it is nothing to do with my original question and don't want this derailing.

My child was not the only 7 year old playing football. It was a mixed age group of 7 to 10 year olds from what I have gathered.

I think it is important to tell the school so they can keep half an eye out to make sure that these older boys do not continue the bullying in school. It is always helpful for them to know these things - being aware makes it easier for them to safeguard him.

But it is not down to them to deal with the situation that arose out of school; that will be your task and it is, I know, hard to know how best to tackle this.

There is no bullying and throwing that sort of language around is really unhelpful

OK. By not discussing the supervision of your 7 year old, you are in fact ignoring the main point. Your child was not being supervised by the school. He was playing out after school. He was in your care. You delegated this to his grandparent who didn't pay attention. Your child was hit, pushed and in your own words 'strangled'. You are annoyed enough to ask the school to find out exactly what happened. You are being utterly ridiculous. Take responsibility for your own child.

Thank you to the helpful PPs. I will definitely bring it up to the school as I know football gets played at breaks too so I think it would be beneficial to make them aware of what happened so an eye can be kept just in case something happens again.
As I really do not know the kids or the parents I do not know if I feel comfortable enough to try and speak to them direct, our school and the parents within it tend to be fairly nice in general however I am not very good at getting my point across (hence asking for pointers on this thread) and would be worried I'd come across the wrong way without meaning to.

did you read my post properly? Because if you did you would have seen that DS was with a grandparent whom up until this point has been perfectly competent.

but did not witness anything, so obviously wasn't supervising.

So you coming to other parents to "clear the air" about a football scuffle that no one has seen would reasonably make them roll their eyes.

I absolutely agree it's not up to the school to sort out this particular altercation. But surely you'd want to know if any of your pupils had been behaving this violently towards a younger child? Just so staff are aware (something like this could lead to the younger child avoiding the toilets at lunchtime etc), and quite possibly to add to an already growing picture of the older child. I'm a teacher as well, and I would want to know (but I'd be very 🙄 if it were framed as a complaint, or as something that I should "deal with")

In the nicest possible way, the school
don’t need to be reminded to ‘keep an eye’ on children when they are playing football. They do that already that’s why there are staff on playground duty. Either you need to ‘keep an eye’ on your child or you need to remind the grandparent in question.

As I said in previous posts I haven't got a problem with being told and keeping an eye on the situation.
As a Primary School we hand children over to the care of an adult at the end of the day.I certainly don't expect to be responsible for what they get up to on the way home.
I realise you indicated that it probably wasn't relevant for Primary .As far as I am aware I am definitely not responsible for sanctioning children for inappropriate behaviour out of school.
That said, we obviously take note of issues between particular children incase it spills over into school.
Though we generally just get told one side of what allegedly happened.
Online issues can definitely cause so many problems.Education in this area and if necessary a visit from a Police Officer to have a general conversation about the seriousness of Online bullying can help.

I think I have said in two different posts that I would want to know .I am also aware that we don't always get the full story.

You have confused the fact that schools can sanction for out of school behaviour with schools being responsible for the behaviour of pupils outside of school. The former is true, the latter not so much!

@sparklins " I am not very good at getting my point across (hence asking for pointers on this thread) and would be worried I'd come across the wrong way without meaning to."

It's ok to say that ☝️. Ie "sorry, this is awkward and I'm not very good at getting my point across and I'm not really sure if I have a point to make as such or if I just wanted to mention it. This is the first time anything like this has happened so I don't know what the protocol is for this, but I know I would want to know, so I just wanted to let you know too in case your kid had mentioned anything or had been upset etc"

I think 99.99% of parents would be happy to speak with you because the chances are that their kid has told them their side and they will be glad to get a better idea of what happened/who was involved.