School's punishment of all boys in year 6

[htdt]

My son is in Year 6 and has done SATS this week, today was meant to be a fun day for them as they've finished all the papers.

But my son came back from school really upset as the teachers had separated the girls and boys and he says the girls got to do fun activities and given treats but the boys got told off and given a lesson on respect.

He's taken this badly and has said things like 'I must be bad because I'm a boy'.

It's such a shame because he's worked really hard and was otherwise enjoying SATS week, but now feels horrible about himself, the teachers who told them off and the girls getting rewarded when all the boys were punished.

I feel like I need to speak to the school next week and find out what's gone on and why. I also feel like making a complaint. But I'm not sure what they are going to do to make things better even if they did agree with me that it was not a great way to deal with some boy's bad behaviour and also very bad timing so should I just forget about it...?

I could totally see my 16 year olds saying something like that with a bitter tone - the meaning being less that they think they are inherently bad for that reason but they think society thinks this of them and it hurts.

"They" but who is "They"? Yes punish any child who has done something wrong, but are you saying you agree with collective punishment?

I'd be fuming, especially as you've had it confirmed that he hadn't done anything wrong. That's so awful. I'd ask to receive a phone call with an explanation as to why your son was unjustly punished and let them know that your son is having the day off on Monday to go and do something fun to celebrate his hard work in his SATS and his good behaviour, even though the teachers were too busy handing out sexist punishments.

Most likely the TA was sent out to appease you in the hope you calm down over the weekend and don’t pursue it any further. My TA is amazing and 99.9% of the time has a brilliant way of explaining situations to parents. (Mostly first aid things! Plus she’s the first aider). Perhaps they hoped if she explained your son wasn’t one of the tricky ones it would make you feel better about it.

If I were you I’d ask for a meeting with head of year/teacher/headteacher. As someone said, give it a ‘tell me what happened approach.’ If it’s not a reasonable response then explain what the TA said. I’d then explain that perhaps a movie afternoon/similar for the nice boys only as an apology!

Not what the OP was asking but all this will likely do is create more animosity from the boys towards the girls.

Yep, I had a feeling it would be boys treating girls like crap just based on the OP. The only time this happened at my school it was for the same reason. When one of the boys complained that he hadn’t been involved the teacher told him that he hadn’t been part of the solution so that made him part of the problem. The only two boys that were excluded from the punishment were the ones that had actively intervened and gone to the teachers.

I also agree with the poster that said to challenge the self-pity talk of “that means I’m bad because I’m a boy.” That’s the same rhetoric of the misogynists that wail online about “demonizing men” (i.e. holding them accountable for their actions). You don’t want him going down that route.

Yes, that was exactly it.

Nothing annoys me more than collective punishment, apart from being unfair it also is pointless as it creates such anger and shows kids that they might as well misbehave with the rest if they are getting equally punished.

My DS hates the boys in his class, there is a core group of messers, he hasn't been punished as such but gets upset when the teacher has to berate 'the boys'. He is not going to secondary school where his brother goes because they are mostly going there and he doesn't want to associate or be associated with these boys any more. It's very tough

I definitely didn't need appeasing, I wasn't complaining at all, my first response was just to find out what had happened as at that stage I'd only heard my son's side of the story

Exactly, he feels resentful that the girls all got a treat and he got a telling off

I wonder if in schools girls are always held responsible for the behaviour of other girls? I wonder if mothers of girls would be happy with collective punishment of their dds?

The TA has behaved quite unprofessionally and shouldn't have said what she did. She should have referred you to the class teacher or Head.

On the whole though I think this is mountain and molehill stuff. Kids need to become quite resilient to cope with secondary school.
Building resilience in children to deal with unfair situations is valuable rather than fussing about it. Help him take it on the chin & shrug it off even if you do take further action & investigate further yourself.

I imagine what actually happened is that the boys have been displaying misogynistic behaviour towards the girls so were given a PHSE lesson which was applicable to just boys while the girls did things elsewhere, kind of like with a sex ed lesson.

As I say, minimise it with him, it's not exactly the end of the world. Once you find out more you can explain it to him

I am a teacher and hate this kind of punishment too. My son is 11 and all the boys were banned from playing in a particular part of the playground that he really likes because the boys' toilet was a mess 🤦🏼‍♀️.

I don't think anyone should be punished for something they didn't do.

one of the things which absolutely used to make my blood boil was collective punishment

i would absolutely be on to the school about this. The same thing happened to my son regarding an incident in the loos and I was so angry about it.

I would put money on that never happening with girls... based on my experience.

Pretty sure a 10 year old wouldn’t say “I must be bad because I’m a boy”….

I have seen quite a bit on MN in past years about schools having girl only sessions where they tell the girls they need to be, basically, not "bitchy" to each others and are drilled in not having "toxic" friendships that sound somewhat similar, though about their behaviour to each other rather than to an external group.

Some parents thought it was good and others were not happy.

I'm sort of in two minds about this.

I think the boys who did something wrong are the ones who should have the punishment.

However, I think they definitely should give boys lessons on respectful relationships. We have a huge problem with misogyny and domestic abuse in this country so educating boys about this stuff is very important, as is teaching them to be in touch with their feelings and helping them build a positive male self image rather than a toxic one.

However, that should not be a punishment! Teaching about respect for girls is part of teaching about how to have happy and fulfilling relationships and friendships, really. It should be a positive thing!

Our school has a policy of no group punishments, so this is something I would complain about. The school still do it quite a lot though 🙄 but normally fairly minor - this one sounds bad enough to me to ask for an explanation and take it from there.

I have always taken the approach of supporting schools in any punishment they handed out (thankfully only once or twice over many years).

BUT, I don't agree with whole class punishments. It is not fair on those children who have done nothing wrong, and I still don't understand what is to be gained from doing this. If anything, the perpetrators would probably be quite pleased with themselves, knowing their actions have secured punishment for the rest of their classmates too.

IMHO it would have been far better to reprimand those responsible, whilst their (innocent) peers got on with having a fun day.

Agree. Whole class punishments went out with the ark and if your DC has done nothing wrong, what a rubbish day he’s been forced to have!

Because advocating for our children is our job. Did you even read where a TA explained to OP that they knew her son didn't do it?

My dd went to one of these 'friendship' groups in primary - it was definitely not seen as a punishment by any of the girls involved.

This case is different due the significance many schools place on SATs rightly or wrong. I think from the sounds of it the school have handled this very badly.

OP be careful in my experience schools don't like to admit wrong doing and will often get defensive and dig in when they feel criticised.

In the extremely unlikely event that were true, it's still a really appalling approach to the issue. How is punishing boys for something they may not even have been aware had happened going to encourage them to stand up for girls? Particularly when the punishment is unrelated to the thing that happened and not explained to them?

Collective punishment is the resort of lazy, incompetent teachers. It achieves nothing except making the decently behaved children think "sod this, if I'm going to get punished for things I don't do, I might as well behave badly". It's up there with making the well-behaved girls babysit the badly behaved boys in the lexicon of crap teaching strategies.

Of course not..they wouldn't believe it was possible, not some of the DD mum's on MN anyhow. If they did something bad it would be because they are oh so vulnerable and it's soooo hard being a teenage girl.

Punishing boys and pitting girls v boys can only result in animosity and contributes towards misogyny. It's unfair and morally questionable.