My child is being assaulted at school

[AmberHiker]

The title might sound extreme but looking at his injury tonight that is what this is. I have a 8 year old child in year 3. He enjoys school for the most part and has some lovely peers in his class for which I’m thankful.

however there have been a increase of incidents in the last couple of months. He’s been excluded from games, told fo fuck off, screamed at, told he’s a loser told he’s stupid and so on. These have been mainly by one person and I’ve contacted the school on this child and he was made to apologise .

last week the same behaviour from the child I reported in with my child being told to fuck off and he’s a loser. I emailed that I was becoming worried about my child’s over all wellbeing / mood and included this email to the senco and teachers. Teachers didn’t respond but senco did about a completely different subject

this week on Monday he was elbowed in the stomach in the classroom ( by a different child ) Wednesday he was called ugly by a different child at after school club and this same child today has thrown a scooter at him which has hit his ankle bone and caused swelling and pain this evening.

when I collected him I was told ‘ oh there’s been a incident ‘and it grates on my nerves that schools will always not even name the other child involved in order to protect them yet my child can basically be assaulted. ‘ she’s apologised ‘ followed by ‘ there’s no mark’ this evening his ankle is swollen and red and I suspect will be bruised in the morning.

im just so sick of kids acting this way im sick of schools being quick to brush it all under the rug im sick of my child being the one who’s hurt. He’s very resilient to brush of name calling despite the fact he’s Asperger’s so has his own difficulties navigating friendships and never and would never hurt another child. He’s a rule follower so when I say stand up for yourself he feels he can’t

I want to email the headteacher after half term and explain what a week under his school my son has had. I’m just so sick of what he is subjected too. The language and names these kids are even coming out with at 8 is not only vile but sad this is what they know at this young age .

im thinking this incident should have been logged / recorded. What can I ask the headteacher for. I don’t know but it hurts me as a parent to see him in pain because of another child. ‘ she’s apologised / he’s apologised ‘ is that even enough when it’s becoming hands on stuff ?

Take pics of any injuries.

Ask to meet with HT and senco and possibly class teacher too.

Take in a note of what's happened, where and by which kids. Plus pics.

Ask for a plan of action.

Email a confirmation of your understanding of what was said in the meeting plus plan of action. Confirm that you will be monitoring your son's experience of how well the plan is going.

If it's not being put in place or not working - back in for a meeting.

Make noises about going to the school govners if no joy.

Sorry this is short - good luck

Oh - and get yourself familiar with - maybe print off - the schools specific anti-bullying policy and take it in with you.

This is bullying. You should describe it as such in your meeting/correspondence.
Ask for a copy of the anti bullying policy. Ask if it is being followed and what the results have been. Then ask how they intend to escalate matters if that doesn't work
(Sadly I had to do this for my dc who also has Aspergers)

Email them and ask for a meeting. Unfortunately I’ve had to do this as a parent. Email about each individual incident so there is a trail of evidence. I’m also a teacher so am aware of the difficulties but no child should have to put up with this. They are only young once and deserve better.

See a F2F meeting

I will photograph his ankle and luckily for me all communication about previous things have been on email. Looking back on this week alone I’m just sad for him.

It’s absolutely heartbreaking. Kids can be awful. Doesn’t mean it’s acceptable. A good school will work with you

Safeguarding policy; bullying policy - both should be on the school website and can be brought to the governors' attention. Your child has to feel safe in school - it is a basic requirement.

It may be that the school has a different side to the story - but they should be discussing this with you. You should not find yourself in a situation where your child is not safe and the school are not engaging with you on the subject.

You need to document it & physically meet with the highest person possible.

When this was happening to DS, it was brushed off 'and dealt with' by teachers, who were only talking about unacceptable behaviour in their behaviour chats in class.

I made an appointment with the principal & listed the events (she'd already accessed the emails) & told her how my child was being assaulted (hit around the head). The boy's parents hadn't even been told. The principal had no idea also. It stopped (parents were horrified).

It's been happening again with this & another child (yr 6 now) & since the school knows I'll be onto it, it's been dealt with quickly.

And people wonder why I won't send my DS to the public high school with these kids!!!

I would not be sending him back in until you have had a face to face meeting about this. (I kept my son off school for nearly a year with similar issues and then moved him to another school).

Also if each incident has been dealt with by different staff no-one will have joined the dots and seen a pattern of bullying.
You will need to do that for them.

I honestly think a lot of schools are so overwhelmed with bad behaviour that they probably struggle to deal with it all. So many badly behaved kids, products of lazy parenting, thst the school probably get loads of reports like yours. But the loudest and most persistent parent will eventually be listened to. Take pics, email the HT. Every day if you have to. Children should not have to put up with this, and should be protected in school.

Didn't have time last night to say the rest of what i wanted to say.

It'll be ok OP. Be determined and it will get sorted.

Recently i had to do this for my DD. I went in and had the meeting. DD opted to join in.

They told us the plan of action - this included among other things speaking to the bully child's parents. It also included better supervision of the places in which it was occuring at break. (wooded area) plus talking to the child and making sure both class teachers were well aware of the situation.

It got sorted almost immediately. I heard through the grapevine that the bully's parents were horrified about what the girl had been doing to my DD.

A week or two later the class teacher offered a meditaion between DD and bully. It went well.

Move schools.

No amount of asking ‘what the school will do to keep him safe’ means they actually can. They can’t prevent all contact between children in the same room, essentially. It’s not realistic.

I would have a careful look around for a nicer school with a stronger discipline policy. It’s gutting but after a few months he will be much happier.

Kids like the ones you mention are ruining education for everyone.

School is clearly limiting the incidents as no big deal. We had this with my DD and DS, both were repeatedly assaulted, threatened and abused by a gang of vile little things. Like your DC, mine are rule followers and also wouldn't hit back, in both their cases the three little thugs were huge kids so twice the size of mine.

You must, immediately, log all incidents and take photos of any injuries. Log dates and times and get DC to write down or tell you what happened, stick to names, facts, which teacher it was reported to by DC, what teacher tou spoke to and how they classed the assault.

May seem a bit OTT but in the end we went to the police, who acted against school because of their attitude of no big deal. They kept blaming my DCs saying they needed to be resilient! Even when the ringleader walked passed me in the playground when coming back from afternoon assembly and in front of the deputy head called me a slag and a whore. Police acted because in our case threats were classed as coming under the prevent umbrella and assaults against my DCs and others were seen as racially motivated.

Make sure you take detailed images. If school continue to ignore, take it further. All schools have a police liaison officer-we has no idea of this until the DCs went through hell and out of desperation I rang the non emergency line for advice after DS was punched to ground in front of me and school refused to intervene because the bell had rung! Yet when I said to the cretin to apologise and told him to show me where his useless mother was I received a warning of being banned from picking my DCs up!

Your child should be safe at school, the ring leader sounds like he is putting a little gang together, it took my two a year to get over what happened and we were so let down by school we removed them. DD needed counselling!

Your child is being bullied and it needs to be dealt with by the school.

I would be refusing to send him in until you have a face to face meeting with the head and class teacher.

1 or 2 incidents may be overlooked (especially in secondary where there are multiple teachers) but it sounds like the teachers are aware that this is happening and it’s been more than once.

I would be absolutely raging that the school is allowing this to carry on happening.

They’re not allowing it; but ultimately they are powerless as we have centred the education system around perpetrators and their ‘needs’ and well behaved children are an acceptable price to pay to enable them.

I’m sure the school would love to get rid of the little shits but can’t. That’s why changing schools seems to be the only answer at this stage. I feel for you OP, DD is in a similar situation, 2 kids who don’t have it in for her but hit all of the children and pick on another girl in particular. It’s awful

It's shit. Absolutely agree with @MaryMaryVeryContrary it's all dealt to favour the assaulter (if that's a word!)
'Oh it's because....'reasons'
Your child needs to be more observant and stay out of their way.
Do you think they might be triggering it?
X is having a hard time
We can't confirm it's X who's doing this...
Would you like us to move your child to a different class?
We could keep your child in at lunch/breaks..'
I did find some teachers would appear frustrated and powerless, others only seemed to worry about what would be the fall-out if the attacks were addressed and the child admonished.
After dc was sat on and punched in the eye, he hit back, which apparently was far worse...🤨 as he should 'know violence isn't the answer' it was as never was targeted again!

Should be our primary website never gets updated I'm looking at stuff from 2016. Governors list dream on. Head teacher would back staff and never lets the governors know anything. My neighbour was one she and others quit because of the lack of information passed on.

Enrages me when self defence is called violence. My kids have my full blessing to hit back as hard as they feel is necessary.

Have a conversation about where the issues happen and ask the school to investigate for any patterns, areas of the school, lack of supervision, etc.

Your son knows the child or children who did this. You don't need the school to give you a name

If you have an issue and do not take it further the issue is seen as being completed to your satisfaction.

The governors do not deal with complaints unless they follow the procedures. This means allowing the Head to deal with them first. Any complaints that pass the Head must be sent back to the Head. The only exception is if your complaint is about the Head.

Governors are only informed a complaint has been received that may go to a panel. No names, information, details are shared with any governor at any meeting ever. Governors do not discuss the complaint with each other. It is on a need to know basis only.

The complaint policy must be on the website.
I would refer to the behaviour policy, bullying policy and peer or peer abuse which will be in the safeguarding policy.

It is the job of Governors to ask for information from the Head that they need to do the job. Not the other way round.

Think about what you want the outcome to be and if it goes wrong again please do not leave it before reporting any resurgence.

Incidents should be logged on CPoms or other system if the staff are aware of them. While you can not see these records you may wish to ask what categories are being recorded, what information is shared with the board and when. You can ask for the minutes of this board meeting to see if the board have questioned the information and any increase in reports.

Their job is to question the data, the context behind it, and what has been put in place to address any issues. You may wish to ask what training the board has undertaken to understand data, if they have all completed their yearly, if they understand the impact of bullying on children, have a yearly safeguarding update as a minimum, have complaints training, bullying, SEND training and when they last reviewed and questioned the appropriate policies.

If the board is not skilled in questioning the Head how can provision improve?