Incident with school teacher and children

[HurtingHillary]

AIBU?

long ish story.

My child 1 went out to play one afternoon after school, had been out the house for between 5-10 minutes and had pre arranged to go to B’s house (classmate KS2)

I’d been in A&E and am in a leg brace/ can’t weight bare had been home an hour (just as kids where getting home from school)

my other child 2, school year younger was playing with 2 friends (also pupils) on our garden in eyesight of the front door and are well aware of who Miss X is - Miss X is the TA for child 1 & child B’s class.

Child 2 comes flying into the house shouting ‘mum mum Miss X is here’ (i won’t lie at first I thought I was hallucinating from the medicine given me to earlier)
so I say ‘okay just tell her I’m coming but I’ll be a moment because of my leg’

Miss X’s child is renowned for maliciously commenting on the food/condiments other school pupils are eating from the school lunch hall (causing my child to not eat at school for around 2 weeks and the school to raise their concerns over my child not eating) She has very little friends and there has been previous run in’s between her and my child 1 with both girls being told to stay away from each other. And obviously rumour has is this child does this to numerous children and they all avoid her like the plague.

hobbled to the front door on two crutches to see indeed Miss X and her two children stood outside my front door, she then walks into the kitchen (uninvited!) with her two children and says ‘do you know what this is about?’ With one of her children in what id call melodramatic ‘floods of tears’, I say no?
she goes on to tell me that she won’t have her child bullied ganged up on and sworn at, and that my child 1 has been swearing at her child and tries to show me some voice notes on Snapchat from another child’s account (the child my child 1 has gone to play with) Miss X is then explaining there’s a class Snapchat account and had been an incident the day before with her child being bullied - I call my child 1 and her friend child B to come to my house immediately (they did, 2 doors down 20 second walk) both children (child 1 & child B) look absolutely gobsmacked, I ask them what’s been going on? What is this all about? Neither of them have much of an answer at that time, my child 1 is told to come in by me and that she is now grounded.
Miss X is during this trying to explain the incident the day before involved Child B (so nothing to do with my child) along with other children from the year group and that her child is desperately upset and being bullied and that swearing is wrong and how Miss X checks her children’s phones and social media nightly and that ‘she’s keeping this out of school’, during this my third child and her dad come into the kitchen to see what is going on, Miss X is all sweetness and light towards him, all ‘hiya how are you doing?’ (Fluttery eyelashes/cleavage squeeze)
it ends with myself saying the children need to keep apart, that they clearly don’t get along and not to comment on who’s eating what food or not eating what food and to ignore each other, I tell my child 1 that she is grounded for the swearing and we will talk about this when the others have gone, Miss X flounces off to go to speak to the parent of Child B. I send child B home after Miss X has left my house.

the back story:
it comes out that the day before Miss X’s child was on this Snapchat class group chat ‘being bossy’ and lots of the kids pretty much told her where to go with a boy from the class particularly swearing and name calling.
which then carried on to the next day on leaving the school Miss X’s child and the boy had a spat at the school gates, for then child B and Miss X’s child to get going in a private Snapchat thread which my child’s walked into and joined in literally minutes before Miss X arrived at my house. My child isn’t on the Snapchat group and doesn’t have the contact details of Miss X’s child - my child doesn’t like the girl.

I don’t condone any of the kids behaviour and don’t like bullying either way , however I’m furious about Miss X’s behaviour.
she’s come to my house uninvited.
walked into my house Infront of her two children and 3 other pupils from the school she works in.
she’s come to me first even though this incident is on its second day and my daughter had just become involved minutes earlier and there are between 12-20 other pupils involved.
her remarks about phone checking
her what feels like a threat of ‘keeping this out of school’
i cant even verbalise how angry and what exactly im angry about but im furious and don’t feel Miss X should be working in the same classroom as my child 1 and child B - I just don’t think her behaviour is appropriate nor can she be trusted to fairly support either my child 1 or child B let alone any of these other children on the group chat from the day before.

I did ring the school numerous times as usually there is someone in the office for an hour or so after school but no answer

AIBU to feel this way?

Someone else has said this upthread as well, please don’t copy in the governors. The head needs to deal with this in the first instance. As a governor we only get involved at the appropriate stage in the complaints policy and have to have no prior knowledge.

I would find if you can the staff code of conduct on the website and see if you can quote and relevant parts in your email.

She’s not a teacher though is she? She’s a TA - big difference. Friends of mine have literally walked into these jobs zero training or professional standards.

Kids of that age lack the emotional intelligence to be able to use social media in an appropriate manner, parents need to understand the harm this causes, respect the age restriction and keep
their kids off it. End of.

The TA is, in my opinion, bringing the school into disrepute. The head needs to know and all the kids (and their parents) need to be spoken to about social media and use of phones at that age.

There is no doubt in my mind that the TA’s child will be an antagonist but can’t handle the response. The TA needs to realise, very quickly, that she can’t fight her daughter’s battles for the next few years (and absolutely not cross the threshold of a property uninvited!) and instead direct her energy to raise a resilient, mature, emotionally stable and happy girl who is content and whose default is not to be mean to others - something that all parents need to focus on tbh.

She is a TA, not a teacher. For many that is minimum wage job requiring no experience and no training.

Absolutely not the case within the trust I work in.

You can state to the school the facts (no emotion / judgement) of these two incidents. And the fact that they have happened in school and as a TA she is not keeping the confidential and is coming to you directly and also sharing information about other pupils while crossing professional boundaries. Ask them to objectively observe he doing her role and to confirm their procedures and the assurances that this TAs behaviour is not impacting your child detrimentally. Also ask for their complaints procedure, for reference of course.

Stop engaging with her outside of the classroom- any time she approaches you say that you’ll raise it with the school right now. Share with other parents this is your approach- follow the process and starve her attention seeking of oxygen

good luck with your operation! Let the school know do they can offer support to your child - I’m sure she’ll try to sniff out an opportunity

Whilst I totally agree that she shouldn’t have entered your house uninvited, I do have some sympathy that she was trying to deal with it as a Mum rather than through school.

The particular incident she was addressing, didn’t take place in school, was not due to lack of supervision by school, didn’t involve school staff. My HT has been driven demented in the last fortnight, dealing with online unkindness between pupils (which happens when they are on their phones at home, under the care of their parents) but the repercussions end up affecting learning and behaviour in the classroom.

These children are far too young for this technology, they don’t have the social or emotional maturity to use it responsibly. Parents need to step up. Remove the device, the apps or both.

A TA turned up at your house regarding school matters? Who does she think she is lol.

The TA in your story was unprofessional. You have a legitimate complaint to make to the school. I’d advise following the complaints procedure.

It depends if you knew her in a personal capacity, prior to knowing her as a TA, that determines quite how unprofessional. I.e if you’ve known her years and have always been neighbours, that’s very different to a random TA looking up your address on the school system and walking inside your house.

I can’t work out what the teacher has done, your post title is specifically about a teacher and then you mention nothing. Was the teacher with her?

Neither child should have smartphone or access to WhatsApp. Talk to school and go through the school re your child bullying. Miss x shouldn't have turned up at your door. Especially as you just had surgery. Let the school deal with it and deal with your child's bullying too.

If course unsolicited accounts can use WhatsApp to m stage your dc. It's based on phone numbers.

This is the correct approach. Copying in the safeguarding lead/Chair of Governors is quite a steep escalation. I have experience with this. Parents think it adds clout, it doesn't. It just means those individuals are no longer impartial should the complaint escalate. Which is what they should be.

This is a matter for the Head. You start copying the world and his dog you risk having no escalation point if this isn't resolved.

If your school has a complaints policy, it will outline the various stages of complaints and who should be involved.

I’m sorry this woman invaded your privacy in such an obnoxious way. She’s not a teacher and won’t have had nearly as much training or guidance on professionalism but she has blurred boundaries and acted horribly. I think you would be absolutely within your rights to complain about this and about the conflict of interest. I would go to the headteacher.

If I’m honest I’m shocked you even let your child use WhatsApp. There are lots of well known scams and ways strangers can contact you and it’s 16+. Could you not give her a brick phone and text? It would remove a lot of issues until she is a bit older and more mature to handle SM.

It sounds like a complicated issue but your wording on the girl in question isn’t pleasant either. You also dismiss 9 year olds as not being able to be bullies, kids can bully at any age? I think the school needs to investigate and I don’t understand why the TA wanted it kept out of school.

When school deal with it, and I hope you insist they do, you as a parent also need to educate and support your child through this. I’m surprised at the number of posts on here that seem to put all the emphasis on educating kids about SM onto school. Maybe the class teacher could spend some time discussing the aforementioned issues or an assembly could be held but parents also need to parent. If you give a 9 year old a smart phone, then things like this will happen. Teachers are busy people and should be focusing on education not policing Snapchat conversations.

You need to report the whole thing to the school immediately. A staff member should never assume to handle things like this 'outside of school.' It is completely inappropriate.

If she approaches about it again, tell her you want it to be handled by school and refuse to discuss it.

This is why parents should avoid letting kids use social media so young. Children can be held responsible for things they say through these apps from 10. Also in this day and age any stupid misguided thing these kids say can be recorded and held against them for years. WhatsApp age limit is 16 higher than Snapchat at 13. There is a reason the age guidelines are there. Primary school children should not be on them at all.

She shouldn't have told you anything about the other child either. At school, even if it's a serious incident like a child has been bitten, you don't tell the parent who has bitten their child.

The whole incident is outrageous. I'd wait until this evening to send the email so that it's as calm as possible.

If you as a parent don't understand the ins and outs, then you obviously haven't gone through the security settings and tightened them up for her.
Somebody asked you for help, you could try offering suggestions instead perhaps? Dh works in computers, we keep an eye on things, have limits and security on things, sometimes still all you can do is say ‘hey everyone, family walk or board game, put them away!!’ It’s like a car, you can stay in your lane and then have someone drift over/be unsure etc. better to get screens off them as much as possible

They are if they happened outside of school. What is the school supposed to do?

in your email ask them to explore how she found out your address and the address of other pupils she was doorstepping.

They are if they happened outside of school. What is the school supposed to do?

Schools are constantly dealing with incidents like the one on this thread. The WhatsApp bit, not the coming round to the OPs has part!

Make it very clear in your email that your child does not have a phone or social media.

Please be careful with WhatsApp. My child is older but here's a few things we learned about it:

If they are in a group chat with let's say the year group any of those children can add a contact to the group. So they may be known to that child but a complete stranger/adult to yours.

Links to videos that you may not want them to see can be sent in the group and opened in a browser even if you have blocked the app. We found that even if we blocked the websites the previews would still play in a small window. It seems the block only kick in when you click the preview to full screen. Even then the blocks would sometimes inexplicably fail.

We found that restrictions are only as good as the parent who allows the least restrictions as they pass the devices around or all cried around the child who has YouTube etc.

Email the head now whilst it's fresh (and you have a paper trail) and call first thing Monday morning.

I would stick to the facts - Miss X arrived at X time and walked uninvited into my kitchen, etc etc etc.

I would also raise a query regarding how she got your address, things like SIMS/DOJO etc are traceable.

What do you mean by "unsolicited"? Your child is far more likely to get drawn into unkind situations on WhatSapp from rheir peers rather than from strangers (but this can happen too). Honestly, take the phone away until they are in year 7 or 8.

Just to add on the stranger thing, once they are in the group they can see your child's number and message directly. See for yourself on one of your own groups. You can see the details of people who aren't your contacts and message them directly.

We mediate between the parents and do restorative conversations between the pupils involved. And inevitably very firmly reiterate the school guidance on social media use as well as the apps age guidelines.

We deal with issues like this all the time! I suspect the reason the TA wanted to not involve the school is because she is well aware of school guidelines on social media and how much grief these apps cause schools.

You can't ask for her to be moved.
You can say that you think that as a member of staff she should perhaps have asked the school to intervene instead. The school however will say that it is out of school but that they recommend children do not use social media or that it is heavily supervised.

The question of whose Snapchat it is is a bit if a distraction. Your kid along with others are bring unkind on Snapchat. None of them should be on Snapchat.

All this crap about her coming into the kitchen and you being woozy is a bit of nonsense assuming she didn't wrestle you to the ground. All the nonsense about her kid and your kid prior to this is again just window dressing. Chances are that your kid has been unkind. In all likelihood hers has been in the past. Kids are often nasty to each other. Their parents always think that it is only bullying when someone else's kid does it. Parents always want the school to sort it out even when it happens after school on phones when parents are in charge.

Headline is tell your kid to stay off Snapchat and stop sending or joining on nasty comments.