To be really worried about this?

[Turtleyturtles]

My DD (10) has been off school since last Thursday last week. She's off because other kids were making fun of her and she refused to go in. We (me and DD) went into school on Tuesday morning and met her teacher who was very supportive and she seemed happy to go back as normal with a range of supportive measures on Wednesday. However as soon as we left school she said that all the supportive measures would make things worse. She didn't dare say this in front of the teacher.

Since then she has been to school on Wed and Thurs afternoons. She said half days would be less overwhelming. It was either that or her crying and refusing to get out of bed or go to school at all. I'm pretty sure she will go back as normal after half term. She says everyone will have forgotten about the issue they were making fun of her about by then.

I'm just so worried this will carry on though on and off. I don't want her to think as soon as she is struggling with something the answer is to not go to school. She's having some counselling for self-esteem/sticking up for herself which is helping but it's once a week and won't fix everything immediately.

Has anyone else been through this and come out the other side? Any tips? I'm so worried and feel so alone with it.

What were the other kids doing/saying?

They were all chanting 'block her' while about to go into a class because she posted something on an app by mistake from Google Classroom with the names of some kids from her class. She doesn't have any social media accounts and I control her phone, it was a genuine mistake. Once she realised she deleted it straight away and told me about it. The teacher knows about it and talked to these kids about it. So I think/hope it has blown over. But she is saying now everyone is mean to her in general.

The teacher knows about it and talked to these kids about it. So I think/hope it has blown over.

I think I’d want something a bit more structured from the school than just “talking to” and hoping it will blow over. I’d want a discussion of their bullying policy, how it’s implemented, what stages there are which they’ll use to address the bullying if it continues - particularly in the sense of how they’ll keep oversight of and aim to tackle insidious bullying, which isn’t necessarily easy to pick up on unless teachers are paying attention: what you certainly don’t want is DD’s self esteem and trust in her teachers to be further damaged by them saying they haven’t seen any mean behaviour and she’s overreacting, if she knows it’s still happening, or even if she’s just feeling a bit sensitive. She needs to have that faith in order to not just see school refusal as her only defence against it.

Thank you, yes, that's a good point. DD doesn't want me to talk to her teacher again, says it will make it worse etc, but I'll just have to if it carries on. Her teacher was really good in the meeting and reassured her that if they carry on after he has told them off, he will tell them off again and there will be serious consquences. He is ringing me after school the first day back which is good.

I have a really good relationship with DD, she tells me everything and I want her to continue to. The last time I told the teacher she was being bullied a few years ago at a different school she vowed never to tell me anything again and I had ruined her life. However, typing this I realise me telling the teacher helped and she is still telling me things 😀.