Safeguarding called me today regarding DD4

[CC943]

My daughter’s school called me today (she’s 4) she’s been at school two weeks- saying they have a safeguarding concern.

Another child in the playground of the same age (4) said she overheard my daughter saying ‘mummy hurt me’ and told a teacher so the teacher pulled my daughter aside and asked her if mummy hurt her and said yes on the arm- and pointed to her arm. (Nothing on her arm, I have not and would not ever hurt my children)

I completely understand that they have a safeguarding protocol- but AIBU to think it was completely wrong to out wright ask a child ‘did mummy hurt you?’ Because my daughter lives in imagination land 99% of the time- if I asked her if her teddy hurt her and where she would say yes and respond the same way!

I just felt really taken back by the phone call from safeguarding asking me ‘ is there any thing or any reason or event that has taken place for your daughter to say you hurt her and her arm?’

I am not disagreeing about the safe guarding point of view- it’s more the way it was handled in actually asking ‘did mummy hurt you?’ I feel like many kids that age would just waffle on and agree with it.

i feel so worried about it now. I have asked my daughter why she said that and she doesn’t even seem to remember? She’s just waffling on about other things from her day? She never says things like this at home. And it’s made me feel uneasy that a child has brought this information forward that could be untrue as I can’t see her saying that then by asking her like that it has basically put words into her mouth!?

does this mean they are raising a safeguarding concern? I didn’t even think to ask these questions as I was in shock when receiving the phone call. I don’t know what to expect I just feel upset that they didn’t handle it in a different way for a child this age.

she’s moving to a new school Monday (our catchment school she was on the waiting list for called 2 days ago with a last minute placement) which now looks terrible when her report is sent over with this on! I’m really worked up about it I just feel like it was handled wrong. If she said it directly to or infront of an adult I understand, but a child ? Then question directly ‘does mummy hurt you?’ AIBU?

I think they asked her a leading question, lots of children would go along with what they said. It’s good they are taking it seriously but I would be upset with how they asked the question too. Also some children make things up. I remember a little girl in my son’s class going up to another boy saying my son said he was sick to death of him. She’d made it up completely out of nowhere or heard those words somewhere before & just came out with it. I hope you are ok OP, not a nice thing to go through.

But why? I just feel you're making this into a bigger deal than this is, thanks for the correction but another child saying x does matter. Many children don't report their abuse or neglect, they may say things to friends or peers, we should always be teaching children that bad secrets or secrets which might keep someone in danger should be reported.

The teacher shouldn't have asked too much of a leading question, though she is young so sometimes harder to get an answer with a very open question, but still shouldn't have asked the way she did. However on the whole, it's all over, it took a few minutes, maybe next time it will be a child who does need the help. I'd rather prioritise that then you feel hurt over something thinking you could do x (that shows you're a good mother but they can't be certain and so should always check).

The child didn't ask your daughter about where she got her hurt etc, so even if she didn't mention the arm it doesn't mean her saying that to the teacher would be a lie (it is clear you aren't harming her but imagine in a different situation). Would you rather the teacher ignorened it? Or what would you wanted her to do instead? Other than not ask a leading question, as that isn't good practice but about the other stuff, what would you have liked instead?

Thanks everyone.. Part of me wants to leave it be as it feels like added stress when she is starting a new school anyway. I am unsure whether to bring it up with them or just leave it. I understand the safeguarding point of view I just feel like asking her that directly she is bound to say yes and she’s just pointed to a random part of herself so she can carry on playing. I honestly think she would do the same if I asked if her Teddy or dolly hurt her and where!!

The number of times a child has said their parent has hurt them in my direct experience is higher than you’d think. It is very common - most of the time no further investigations are needed other than a conversation with the parent, but sometimes there needs to a Social Services referral.
This incident will be recorded on CPOMS and be transferred to her new school.

What exactly are you trying to say here that's relevant to the OP's concern?

Well you'd have grounds to bring it up with the DSL as the leading questions shouldn't have been how she went about it at all. That's not how you ask about incidents like that, so it could be useful to let the DSL know and then they can follow up on it. But on the overall, the school getting involved etc, that's what we should be expecting and it's good they did.

Yeah. The best mate thing obviously comes from a place of love, but at that age they need pretty strong parenting and guidance. OP can be more 'mates' with her daughter once she's a young adult. And can make her own decisions properly.

This is absolutely correct, the question here was totally out of order and the member of staff needs re-training.

Any questions put to the child need to be in a calm, private environment and be carefully phrased so as not to illicit a particular response.

Yes , agreed, no leading questions.

I don’t disagree. I think I’ve just seen it said too many times on this site and it’s never in the context of a healthy relationship with pre-teens if you see what I mean?

I’m a safeguarding lead. We can’t be sure that the teacher asked that question directly as none of us were there. But the correct protocol is no leading questions. The school can decide whether or not to raise a safeguarding and this largely depends on interpretation. For example a child may say “mummy hurt me with the hairbrush” because they had tangled hair, not because they got hurt intentionally. Teachers are trained to understand children. The process is that whichever teacher heard the disclosure will escalate it to the designated safeguarding lead for advice. The likely outcome is nothing, because you didn’t hurt your child, and when spoken to she will say that. I know it sounds scary but you’d be surprised at what social services actually do get involved with, vs what they don’t. Not many people understand how social services work. Try not to worry

Exactly all this!

She never said it to an adult. A child has said she heard her say it in the playground and then told an adult. Teacher then questioned her. This is why I’m confused. No one heard her say it (so high chance it could have been nothing from her mouth) yes she’s directly asked did mummy do this and where ? So putting words into her mouth! 😔 so in my mind it could have all been completely made up by a child and my daughter was questioned and said yes too and pointed to her arm just to please someone asking in that moment. I feel it could and should have been handled differently

It’s very poor practice to ask a leading question like this, especially with a 4 year old who, as you say, might just agree with whatever was asked. It’s one of the first thing that they tell you in safeguarding training.

People fall over themselves not to ask “leading questions” everyone’s an expert on what to say but sometimes in the situation it doesn’t go to plan. Imagine some poor 4 year old unable to articulate because an adult is too scared to use common sense.

You should never ask leading questions, especially not when they’re so young. YANBU.

It can be upsetting when this happens but they do have to follow it up.
I agree they went about it the wrong way though.
A similar thing happened with my middle daughter when she was 4. She had been messing about with something and caused herself an injury and at school they asked her how she was injured.. she told them my husband did it to her! Presumably because I had told her before not to mess about with this thing (would be outing if I put exact details of what she was doing but she used to try and do it all the time) and so she thought she would get into trouble so made something up.
I knew this to be the case as the mark was very oddly shaped. It could only be made by this item and indeed she had given herself this mark in the past in front of my eyes so I knew for sure it was caused by that.
But it was upsetting for my husband as they rang him to speak with him about what she had said.
Obviously nothing came of it as we could explain.
They do have to investigate this type of thing tho.
Try not to take it personally or be too worried. They will know that often children that young are just saying random things which aren't real.

DC2's preschool reported me to social services twice - once because of 'lots of bruising' and another time because DC2 wasn't properly dressed for winter weather.

I was extremely upset.

The bruising was totally insignificant and no idea why they thought it was significant. The clothing was because DC2 just took off anything they didn't want to wear - so for example they usually removed socks. Ironically they were actually wearing socks that day. We didn't know it then but DC2 is autistic and has sensory issues.

After the second report; I couldn't take the stress any more and moved them to a different preschool.

@dizzydizzydizzy that’s terrible ! Did they warn you of SS? That is what sounds so scary the thought of SS coming to ‘check’ up on my child over something she probably didn’t even say. Makes me instantly feel like they think you are a bad parent or have harmed my daughter. Let it get to me too much I think but I just feel rubbish about how it was handled

DS4 was arguing with nursery staff that girls have willies- because he saw them on our iPad. And proceeding to describe female anatomy. It was labias! They were thinking he'd been exposed to porn!!

I thought and said, the day before I had described seeing something similar on a colleagues screen at work- to my partner in the car when I thought DS was sleeping. Felt implausible but what else could it be?

Awkward safeguarding convo with nursery!

Go home and tell DP about it and he solves the mystery.

DS was obsessed with bones- like scapula, patella, ilium. We have an anatomy app and we'd bring up the skeleton page which speaks the bone names when you select one.

However, the actual entry to the app has other anatomy drawings- eg skeletal, brain, digestive, reproductive, etc. That's what he had seen.

I took a pick and ran back to show them. They were so relieved and knowing DS and his bone interest totally understood.

That was the end of it but it felt horrible and a judgement of our parenting. I hope it gets resolved quickly for you

Pic of app under review- because pics or it didn't happen, right. Stay tuned.

I think they have gone about this the wrong way. If they are concerned they need to look for an injury, have a brief open conversation with the child (is your arm hurt? would be a better start) and then respond accordingly.

Their response is just a good way to rattle families whilst doing nothing effective to safeguard children. Her answer to the question is meaningless because it is a leading question and she's 4. It's obvious that it has served no purpose as despite her responding positively, there's been no action besides the box ticking exercise of giving you the opportunity to fess up over the phone 🙄. As if. Really the only important determinant of the safeguard response here is that there is no injury!

I'd be annoyed by this but I would urge you not to be too upset and not to feel judged. I expect that everyone involved is well aware there's nothing to worry about, they know what 4 year olds are like. She's probably telling her truth because she didn't like the way you put her jumper on or something 🙄.

This is somebody at the school doing what they think is the right/mandatory thing because they're not confident about safeguarding and they've recently sat through the annual safeguarding training and listened all about those awful cases and how teachers could have done more. There's a lot of pressure on professionals not to be under zealous with safeguarding.

I think your daughter is too young to take much away from this experience. Moving school doesn't "look bad" noone will care about this ever because it's obviously a complete non event. (not to belittle your feelings about it which are v understandable)

Embarrassment isn't the term that pops into my head. Anxiety, fear is.

No, it's not a bit silly. This is absolutely what would be advised as a next step from a lower level disclosure like this. The parent's response helps inform the next step.

OP, they will have recorded it, but this does not mean that they think you are abusive, nor that the new school will think you're abusive. They won't be referring to social services unless they've told you that they will be.

Yes, the questioning doesn't sound ideal. But it is very hard to ask the questions to a 4-year-old. The school has done nothing wrong here, although it wasn't perfect.

The teacher should not of asked her a direct question and to be honest im surprised you were called and asked outright as well