Heartbroken about DS's teacher

[Bluetie]

DS is a great kid. He's smart, funny, musical and sporty. He is also incredibly polite and has a caring nature. He is always winning awards at school, and is liked by all. DS attends a lovely small school with only 2 year-groups.

His previous teachers were OK but in year 3, he's had the most wonderful teacher, Mr T. Mr T is DS's first male teacher and they also share a hobby. Mr T has really helped DS develop his confidence, pushing him more in academics. DS has had a great year.

DS is now moving to year 4. Mr T is also moving to year 4. But they won't be together. All the classes have been mixed to mix abilities, sexes and SEN.

One morning this week, I went to ask Mr T if this class allocation was final. The head came to join our conversation, and he said he will only move DS for an exceptional reason. The head added that the new teacher has made the best progress in her year group across the whole school. I really want DS to stay with Mr T.

Can anyone think of something?

An important lesson many have to learn at school is you don't always get what you want. For pupils and parents. My sons class were allocated a fab teacher last year that all pupils want - she went off sick 2 weeks into term and the class were taught by a supply teacher until January. You never know what can happen I would leave him in class he has been allocated.

No. He’s not being punished for being good.

Thats a weird leap.

So if you had to move to a different town, or outside catchment area- you would expect your child to remain at the initial school for the rest of his or her education?

My children never, ever had the same teacher for two consecutive years. It's just not the way the system works.

It is not putting your young child at any disadvantage!! OMG!

Did you not go to school yourself?!!

They tend to do pretty well, as most people find it easier just to dodge their sharp elbows by letting them have what they want. In terms of friends, a better description would be hangers-on who wish they too had the shamelessness to go about demanding that the world accommodate their every whim.

One of my kids once had the same teacher two yrs in a row at primary school .... A really rubbish one 🤣🤣

I'd write to the school governors in the first instance OP, highlighting all the good qualities of your ds as in your OP. Explain that despite all your DS's great qualities, he's lacking in confidence and the only elixir for this is Mr T. Tell them that you feel that your DS is being punished for being too good. See what they say. If you are not happy with their response then write to your local MP, and maybe even go as far as the new PM, if your local MP ignores you.

🤣

DS had an excellent teacher who he really gelled with, Mr C. It was a single form entry school, and Mr C taught ds's form for 2 years. He was very popular, but he chose to leave the class after 2 years, because, he said, comolacancy set in after 2 years and he lost respect of the kids. They just got a bit too matey.

And life is like that really... two years on, I still miss the best boss I ever had, but I've had to deal with it.

Some people are being unnecessarily harsh but underneath the bitchyness the points they are making are sound.

In our school they've moved all the 1:1s around so all the SEN kids will be going into new classrooms with new teachers and new 1:1s. That's an awful lot for some of them so yeah, YABU.

I will admit that I had a little crush on my DD's reception teacher 😅 he was nearly young enough to be my son

I think it's the whole caring about your child thing... Plus she started in 2020, so the teachers were having to be extra nurturing.

This is unreal! How do you know won’t like their new teacher even more?!

Your child is not the center of the universe. He’s one of many and not being given priority over others to have the teacher he (or you) like is in no way a punishment.

Do right by your child by expressing excitement about the new teacher and new classmates instead of trying to turn his great experience with a teacher into a reluctance to embrace change and new people. Remind him that he can still visit Mr T, and he gets to take all the things Mr T taught him and his memories and add to them this coming year with the new teacher & class.

Nah, they are fine in jobs- I've worked with a good few. People just avoid them and don't ask them to do anything as it's not worth the drama.

What because he is not going in Mr T's class? Don't be ridiculous you sound like an entitlement brat, god help your kids!

This isn't 'heartbreaking' material. You need to get over it and accept that you can't always get your own way. If your kid is that amazing he will thrive in most settings.

This is the sort of crap teachers have to deal with day in, day out. Resolving the issues of 30 kids, and then the parents. In fact the parents are often worse. Then there are the parents who don't think their their child should be sanctioned for poor behaviour. All parents who behave like this are contributing significantly towards the lowering of standards in our schools. Absolute joke - the entitlement is just astonishing.

Wow, OP, you are getting a very hard time here! I am sorry for that and for your situation. If feels like there a lot of undercurrents with other mumsnetters. There are some teachers who are (a lot) better than others and there is nothing wrong with wanting the best for your child. I wish that I could suggest something apart from sending moral support. Good luck.

I just can't compute helicopter parenting like this, or the automatic assumption that our DC is the most special in the world and that everybody else's can go hang (the real world just doesn't work that way), or that they can do no wrong and anyone claiming otherwise needs 'confronting', or this level of micro-investment in our children's schools. Some of these people behave as though they and not their children are the ones in attendance; who are having to navigate these kinds of nuances, difficulties and arguments every day.

Poor, poor teachers and support staff! I don't know how you stand it.

And before the inevitable responses assume I'm an uninvolved, disinterested parent who couldn't care less about my child's education, I am also an educator. I value education as much as the most dedicated parent or teacher, and I'm trying (as we all are) to raise my child to be an independent, well-adjusted adult. But I'm by no means convinced that helicopter parenting and continual interference in every aspect of my child's life is the way to do it.

This kind of learned helplessness is leaching through into H.E., too. When I was a student, had my parents turned up at university to give my lecturers shit, or to challenge the grades awarded, or to complain about the course in general or plead for special attention for their ultra, uber, special little darling, I'd have thrown my coat over my head then and there and from that point onward never shown my face on campus again!

It is, however, by no means unusual these days to receive emails, phone calls, requests for meetings etc., from parents. Note that these over-18-YO students are technically adults and I barely have sufficient time to devote to them, let alone their parents into the bargain.

These people need to get a clue, or better still, a life of their own that isn't lived vicariously through their now adult kids. I'm completely out of patience with humouring this nonsense.