What would you do about this teacher

[Samcj02]

Hi,
what would you do in this situation? My daughter has struggled through high school, they think she has adhd but we don’t really have any issues with her at home. They say it’s because she’s a girl and that I and primary school have missed the signs.
anyway today I had a phone call from the school saying she’d had a bad day with a teacher and she needed to be collected right away, this was at 2.50pm her bus gets there at 3.30pm. I explained that I’d had to pick up her younger sibling from school this morning as he’d been sick and couldn’t leave my house with him. Her dad was over an hr away working also, anyway they did allow her to stay in the office and wait for her bus.
she arrived home absolutely distraught and sobbing saying this teacher had been really horrible to her. She accidentally spilt her water on the table and the teacher accused her of throwing it on purpose.
she was struggling with the work and asked for help, the teacher refused and then put her in isolation for not finishing the work which she couldn’t because she didn’t understand. This teacher also taught her brother and tells her all of the time he misbehaved and was horrible to teach, which I don’t know what has to do with DD And feel like she doesn’t like her because of her brother 🤦‍♀️
she then shouted at her that she didn’t want to see her on Monday and tried to suspend her after being in isolation for a while and taking her to the office for myself to be called!
i am worried it’s gcse year and she’s not learning anything 🤦‍♀️

I’ve had no correspondence from the school regarding suspension so I assume she’s not been. But AIBU to think this has been blown out of proportion? And the teacher should’ve helped her? 🙈

Yes thank you! They always tell me she has these problems at school and the last time I met with her head of SEN she told
me that she’s not badly behaved but things do trigger her and they were working on it. but nothing seems to be done IMO.

I will be taking this further the school actually was an outstanding school but now is RI. 🥲

I wonder if the school follow a behaviour policy called « Ready to Learn ». In this, if a pupil is isolated due to behaviour in a lesson then they also stay in isolation the next lesson. This would explain why your DD was upset as she may not have wanted to miss the next lesson.

You did get a phone call on Friday.

It wasn’t a lesson as such, she had dropped history GCSE and she helps out in P.E lessons with teachers to help her with her P.E gcse which is something she enjoys doing hence the defiance

From a member of the office saying I needed to collect her? Nothing from any teacher or nothing to say she was going to be suspended, it was my daughter who told me the teacher didn’t want to see her Monday and that she thinks she might be suspended. I’ve had to chase her poor head of year up on a weekend for clarification if she was or was not allowed in school tomorrow, she’s then had to chase it up with seniors as she wasn’t aware of the situation

Presumably there were discussions on Friday evening and over the weekend about what should happen, hence the e-mail today. I doubt if the decision was made on Friday so not possible to call you then.

What does your daughter want to do in September? Stay on? Go to college? I suggest she focuses on the subjects she really needs - maybe an English tutor would help? Most courses post-16 require an English pass.

She wants to go to a sports college and do a football scholarship, something she’s very talented in 😊

Has she applied? What does she need?

Even write that down In Chronological order

16th October 2023 - Mrs x admitted there are triggers and that things would be put in place.

It may seem a bit much but I’ve seen a similar situation and the parents evidence of schools not doing the things they should (and not having any evidence themselves) stopped her being excluded. She was actually moved by the parent in the end (without the black mark) to a school who did respond to her needs.

She’s year ten at the moment! Probably wasn’t clear! though the work she’s doing is still gcse work 😊

Ahh, ok, you said 'it's gcse year' so that suggested she's in Y11 and doing her GCSEs this year. In that case, speak to the SENCO asap and push for a diagnosis of ADHD.

Thank you! Im
hoping to arrange a meeting with her asap!

Thank you! I’ll do this and I’m hoping to have a meeting with her SENCO asap, I’m hoping she’ll agree to see me 🤔😊

The SENCO even admitted to me that by sanctioning my dd in lessons for fidgeting etc wasn’t the right way to go about it and she was trying to get teachers on board to deal with her in different ways, something she found very difficult for teachers to get on board with… 🤷‍♀️

Your DD has been permanently removed from History.

A senior member of staff had to remove her from an English lesson, following which, she was defiant.

They want to remove her from PE (her best subject) and send her to college instead.

Following Friday’s behaviour, she is now excluded Monday.

I would suggest, gently, that the school have made it very clear that they are not able to teach your DD and her behaviour is impacting everyone around her.

She’s not been excluded from history or P.E she dropped history because she was struggling and the school thought it would be a good idea for her to replace this with helping the p.e teachers teach ks3 children. They don’t want to remove her from
p.e they want her to do one day a week at college as they don’t think she’s getting much out of being at school, their words not mine! However they struggled to find a college as her behaviour is usually okay, her attendance is good and up until now she’s never been suspended 🤷‍♀️

None of this makes any sense at all.
I'm a KS4 Pastoral Head and this is all very irregular.
The removal from History and getting her to help in PE, among all the other actions, is also something generally not permitted.
Where are you and what kind of school is it?
You can pm me for advice if you feel that some details are outing.

So she's got good behaviour, good attendance, but they've already modified the timetable (sounds a bit questionable) and they've suggested a college place for one day a week but can't find one?
That's a very expensive route for the school to take. Have they explained why?

I’ll DM you 😊

’Removed’ or ‘excluded’ from history equates to the same thing. Y10 students aren’t generally allowed to ‘drop’ a subject because there is nowhere for them to go; therefore there must have been an extreme reason for them to do so. Being unlikely to achieve a good grade, is not enough of a reason to take them off timetable.

You also mention an older brother who is known to the senior member of staff as having behavioural problems.

Given all the information you have provided, it seems unlikely that behaviour has not been an ongoing problem.

She did drop history and she was allowed to do so! It’s nothing to do with her behaviour! I know of a few pupils who in year ten have also dropped lessons! 🤷‍♀️ there is somewhere for her to go she was allowed to drop this subject on the agreement she helps with p.e lessons. They allowed her to drop the lesson very easily.

Her older brother was never suspended from school or I wouldn’t say had behaviour problems, more like he liked to show off in front of his mates and mess around!

The things she does are quite subtle at school, fidgeting, doodling on herself all day, not good eye contact. Just a few of the things they’ve noted. She also plays football but she’s passionate about that. She was just so distraught and has it in her head this teacher hates her. She could me my Autistic DD right down to the doodling on herself, the love of football and the intense emotions.

I genuinely think she has trouble retaining information. working memory issues are fairly common in Autistic kids, I don't know as much about ADHD. There is a lot of crossover, but personally Id be considering Autism as well as ADHD,. especially with the lack of eye contact.

This is how it escalated. I do expect my dd emotions got the better of her and she said the teacher then said she’d call me to collect her as dd kept telling her she shouldn’t be in there again as she needed to go to her lesson. Struggling with change of routine, feeling outrage at injustices, feeling very strongly must be in the right place at right time which in her mind is the classroom she should be in for her lesson. Lots of flags for Autism. Does she struggle with transitions? Things like changing activities, moving into and out of things, being ready to learn after changing between classes in different rooms? ASD can present very differently in girls and its not unusual for it to start causing problems in highschool as increasingly complex social communications can't be mimicked or hidden by masking.

Sorry, but those are behaviour problems.

And I’m not saying that dropping a subject doesn’t ever happen, but it isn’t generally done easily as it’s a timetabling nightmare.

They let her and I know some of her friends have dropped subjects too! Seems quite the Norm at her school!