Non traditional bullying

[ShockingStateOfAffairs]

I will try to keep this brief but hoping for some feedback from parents whose children have been the victims of ‘non traditional’ bullying and how their child’s school has dealt with it. Long story short my 5 year old daughters life is being made a misery by a very controlling child who for want of a better description is showing obsessive tendencies towards her. It is apparent that the school do not know how to deal with this child as she is not adhering to the steps that they have put in place to protect my child so it seems that they are changing tactics now and insinuating that my child and I are the problem. At first they were saying that they could not follow up any problems unless my daughter reported everything at the time. My daughter has been reporting all issues and last week was told twice by various staff to basically stop telling tales! I first reported these issues before Christmas and this child is still mentally pecking away at my daughter. The latest thing the school want to try is sending my child on a course to teach her strategies on how to cope with what the child is doing to her! I have refused these on the basis that they are simply looking for an easy way out rather than dealing with the behavior this child is showing. The child has not physically attacked my child however she has attacked other children who try and sit next to or play with my child. AIBU for expecting the school to stop putting all of the onus on my child to ‘fix’ the issue? Any advice appreciated!

This sounds so so similar to what my little girl is going through! I actually used to encourage the friendship until my daughter innocently said to me one day X is so nice infront of the teachers and the mummy’s but she’s not nice when we’re on our own and that’s when I started noticing other things and encouraging my child to tell me more about the ‘friendship’. It gives me hope that your daughter came through the other side and started sticking up for herself. My child is still too scared of ‘getting into trouble’ so she is not at that stage yet

I had a similar situation when my DC was the same age, and the school responded similarly. They were also really quick to notice times when my child was friendly to the other child and then they used that to minimise the issue. As you are finding, they were happy to put a lot of responsibility on the shoulders of my four year old (but not the on the other four year old to change her behaviour). The mum in the situation was similar to yours - she kind of laughed it off as a silly quirk of her daughters character and didn’t seem to care that this “quirk” was ruining my DC opportunities in school to make friends and have a nice time. I persevered annd anrrwnged loads of play dates with other kids, drummed it into my DC not to have contact with the other (which actually was really hard on her and I think quite a damaging responsibility in hindsight ) and after a year or so it improved. However, a few years later, some different girls started directly bullying my DC. The school were equally rubbish and minimised it all and then eventually put all the blame on my DC for “not being able to cope with it”. It’s like the nasty behaviour was seen as normal
and acceptable, but being upset by it or sensitive to it is abnormal and should be changed.

long story short, I ended up
moving her to a new school recently. In hindsight, the school attitude to the Reception issue foreshadowed their appalling attitude to serious bullying later on, and I wish I’d seen it for the red flag it was.

Yes at the beginning I was told the girls kept gravitating towards each other and were having a lovely game of running that day….. this was after the head teacher had told the other girl she wasn’t allowed to play with my child so I’m unsure as to why they sat back and watched this. When I asked my child if she had played with the girl that day she told me the girl kept chasing her and she was running away from her because she didn’t want to get in trouble for breaking the headteachers rule! So much for a lovely game of ‘running’!

Sorry to her your dd went through this. It’s coercive control even at that age. It makes you feel like you can’t move or breathe. These types don’t change. They just use different methods when they’re older. Glad it finally worked out for you x

@ShockingStateOfAffairs
My daughter is now 20 and at Uni studying to be a Vet. It does seem ages ago but it was so stressful at the time.

Reading about your daughter brought it all back.

Like your daughter I raised mine to be kind. She was just too naive to realise that children would be so controlling. As I said she was just 4 years old, a complete baby.

I do think arranging lots of play dates helped. I did confide in some mum friends and we made sure that my daughter was able to make friendships out of school as she was being prevented from doing that at school. At the time it was all consuming but honestly if I asked my daughter about it now, she would barely remember it. She’s grown up into a confident young woman who doesn’t take any crap.

Whether it’s because she had to toughen up at such a young age, I’ll never know. I really hope your situation improves.

Your story gives me so much hope- Your daughter sounds amazing! It really is so consuming because unless your child has been through this situation people don’t really understand the impact it has on them

Teacher dd to be vocal at the time. If the other girl is saying unkind things then teach dd to use her big voice (and practise it) saying 'girls name stop being mean' very very loudly
If she gets in her space, arms straight out infront and a loud 'girl name leave me alone'

Same if girl follows dd - very loud voice 'girls name you are not allowed to follow me to the toilet'

The one time my daughter plucked up the courage and tried this she was shut down very quickly by a boy in the class who’s mum is very friendly with the other girls mum.

So role play it with dd. You be dd and get her to do what the boy did and teach dd not to be shot down by giving her the words or actions to respond.

Oh my daughter is great at role playing it in the house and has an answer for every scenario and then as soon as something happens in the school involving this child it’s as if she freezes and says I told the teacher because that’s what they said I have to do so I don’t want to get in trouble. In one of the meetings when they were saying they can’t pursue it as bullying I said it seems to me you have a child who has absolutely no regard for the rules and regulations you have put in place to deal with this situation and then my child who is showing too much regard at her own detriment. The boy in question she was quite fearful of before any of this happened as he can be quite a handful from what I’ve seen and heard.

So to be fair to the school, they are actually acting - the other child moved into a position to cause a problem and a member of staff responded before she did. How have they responded to the following to the toilet issue?

Request a meeting with the staff member who is the Designated Safeguarding Lead, explain the impact on your daughter and be clear that it's the school's responsibility to safeguard her by managing the other child's behaviour effectively.

If you are not satisfied with their response, go to the school governors. There will be one governor who will be called the safeguarding governor, or safeguarding link governor. They are the person responsible for the school's safeguarding framework, for ensuring that staff have had the appropriate training and for ensuring the school is compliant with safeguarding law and best practice.

when I told them she had taken to following her into the toilets the teacher said “right, ok that’s something new we need to keep our eye on then” reading between the lines there are a few members of staff there who can see what the child is doing but obviously don’t want to say too much as the verdict from the headteacher is they can’t pursue it as ‘bullying’

This is really useful advice- thankyou

We had this with my son, we kept complaining and was told the other boy had SEN, when I pointed out so has mine, it made no difference. It got to the point where my son would move away and keep out of the other child's way so the other child started hitting him and hurting him. It only stopped after we demanded our son was moved to another class and the playground was split, if the other boy went into my sons part the staff dealt with it swiftly. Eventually the boy left the school, red the schools bullying policy as point out that they are not safe guarding your child's right to education free from harm and bullying.

Difficult and rather common problem. Horrible for your dd. What would happen if you dd said to her "go away you're not my friend, I don't like you, you're mean. You pretend to be my friend but friends are kind and you are not."

Something similar- kids a bit older though and the 'mum' was on the PTA and then started to accuse my dd and some others of 'bullying' (when they had moved away from playing with this child as they were quite controlling and difficult). School were initially hopeless and tried to get the dc's to talk as a group and be inclusive. I had to go in several times and talk them thorough safeguarding and relational bullying and the emotional impacts.
https://www.brightheart.co.uk/relational-aggression-advice-for-parents/

I’m sorry your son went through that. On paper it the school put so many measures in place to stop what the child is doing but have almost hit a brick wall with it as it’s not stopping the child so they want to shift the narrative to my child having to effectively learning how to cope with it! As I mentioned previously someone close to the family works at the school and as much as I would like to think that isn’t playing any part something just doesn’t seem right in the situation. They told me they wouldn’t pursue it as bullying when I had never even used that word my original concerns were that she was being very controlling of my daughter

Have you spoken to the safeguarding lead?

The other child needs to be given a friend group and taught how to play with a group things like duck duck goose hopefully she will then not be focused on your child

My honest answer to that is I don’t know what would happen now. At the beginning when my daughter was starting to break away from the friendship the other girl would ‘stomp away’ in my daughter’s words and cause a scene. This escalated to the child giving my daughter ‘looks’ in the playground at drop off and pick up which is when I said to the parents I could sense some tension and could we try and resolve it but that didn’t go to plan!

Really feel for you and your daughter op!

That’s a really useful link thankyou so much for posting it

I'm sorry, but is it a problem that the other child was being comforted? She was crying. Why are you so angry about the other child being comforted when crying? I know your daughter is only 5 years old ... but so is the other child as well. Just because she obviously has a lot to learn doesn't mean she shouldn't be looked after if upset.