Teacher pulled my daughter's hair, do I take it further?

[RingsLikeTinnitis]

So yesterday my daughter (14 year old. In year 10 at school) came home and told me the PE teacher pulled her hair. It was a supply teacher and is covering short term because the usual teacher has had surgery. Apparently she was "using my daughter as an example" of why they needed to put their hair up for PE. She had said something along the lines of "what happens if someone goes like this?" And then fully yanked my daughter's hair. It wasn't a gentle pull, it hurt her and she was quite upset about it.

Anyway I was picking her up early at 10 this morning for an appointment so I spoke to someone about it at the same time. The person I spoke to was the safeguarding lead and already knew about the incident because my daughter had reported it to another teacher and a few of the other students had also said something to other teachers too. She said that she will be having a strong word with this supply teacher and my daughter should come straight to her if she has any more concerns/problems with her. She's probably going to be teaching for the next couple of weeks.

Do you think you'd be happy with the schools response to this?

How about the teacher apologising to the OP's daughter.

This
If your daughter and her friends have reported it, then it will be logged and reviewed by the DSL and if necessary investigated. Whilst your daughter's narrative is that her friends might have backed up her story, other students present may have given a different version of events.

This ^^ people on Mumsnet are so ridiculous. Especially on AIBU. Shall we just bring back the cane?

What the teacher did is assault.

A teacher at my daughter’s school pulled a child’s hair and she was sacked for it. And rightly so.

No wonder she’s a supply teacher. Easier to get away with this shit.

I think it’s because this is AIBU. Where people just want to be argumentative for the sake of it.

@RingsLikeTinnitisI would post in education. You will get more intelligent responses. My advice would be to report to Ofsted. I’d complain in writing to the school. They will need to come up with a response.

Next time you go to work and your boss pulls your hair for not doing your job properly, I’m sure you’d be fine with it.

You clearly know nothing at all about safeguarding.

AIBU isn’t a great place to post, but I’m not entirely sure Education would have been either ..

A teacher at my daughter’s school pulled a child’s hair and she was sacked for it. And rightly so.
... And the school shared all this with you?

You should absolutely suggest this. They should have done so already. Don't know what's wrong with some of the posters on here. Bizarre!

It probably would have been better… No normal person tries to defend an adult pulling a child’s hair (or anyone’s) and the teacher is a freak if this is true. Only on AIBU do you get these stupid responses.

How is this remotely relevant? You may as well have asked what she ate for lunch.

This thread really just shows women's part in rape culture. "Girls exaggerate" "she probably did something to deserve it" "you can't believe girls" "she's just being dramatic" "it didn't hurt" "it was one mistake get over it" honestly listen to yourselves. It's not even about whether it was wrong or whether the teachers consequences were valid. You are blaming the child. You are calling the child a liar.

How on earth do we expect these girls to then come forward and tell you the popular boy at school raped her? Her teacher is grooming her? A man tried to kidnap her?

You are teaching girls that if someone hurts them they won't be believed and they will be blamed. Not by men. Not by police. Or judges. By YOU.

Well the safeguarding lead said "several students reported it to several members of staff", she only has a couple of her friends in her PE class so I think it was more than just her friends.

We've been told by the school a few times that X teacher is "no longer with the school with immediate effect". Very different to the nice messages of wishing them well etc. when one leaves of their own accord.

Not hard to connect the dots when you hear of a teacher doing something outrageous then all of a sudden you get a message like that or they just disappear.

They can if there is a safeguarding concern.

Don’t rise the bait OP.

You know your daughter. You know what happened. Ignore the rage baiting.

@RingsLikeTinnitis I've read your OP again this morning and want to mention something relevant that I should have spotted yesterday. The school should be managing this incident proactively. They are not doing so. You should have been informed by the school on the day of what had happened and what action was going to be taken. Instead, you hear first from your DD, and have a conversation with the safeguarding lead the following day, and this only because you happened to be in school. What's missing is a sense of urgency and ownership by the school.

In view of this, I would escalate today, starting with the head of year. I would also keep a log of your interactions so you have a record if you need it later eg if you escalate further to a formal complaint. It would be sensible for you to have a clear view of what you would consider to be a successful outcome - eg evidence of the LADO being informed within 24 hours of the incident as is required, employing agency informed, you having a conversation with the PE teacher etc.

No I wouldn't. But that isn't a comparable situation.

The teacher didn't pull a child's hair randomly, she was demonstrating, poorly I grant you, why it's important to tie hair back.

I grew up before a lot of modern safety features, and getting long hair entangled in household fans for example was not unheard of and with disastrous results.

With all the health and safety now in place it can be easy to take our safety for granted. It must be hard as a teenager to picture something happening if it's never been a problem or crossed their minds it could happen.

i learnt most of my life lessons from my own close shaves or seeing others do something that had unexpected consequences.

If what the teacher did is now classed as assault and is a sackable offence then she will have to take the consequences. but I still feel she just did a poor demonstration.

Maybe she walked out after she heard of all the gossiping parents making shit up?
Its very hard to just sack a teacher without following due process and very easy to get another job in most areas.

Right. 🙄
I wasn't criticizing a typo. 😂

If you don't see the connection and the harm of your advice I don't know what to tell you.

Did she single your daughter out as she didn’t have her hair tied back in PE? if her hair had been tied back she couldn’t have demonstrated on her.

The school have reacted in the correct manner as they are speaking to the teacher however, I do think the teacher should apologise to your daughter. But I’m not sure what else you expect?

Definitely an ill judged demonstration by PE teacher. Teacher was in the wrong here. She will be spoken to by management, so surely that is the issue dealt with? If it were me, I’d be advising my daughter to ask for an apology from the PE teacher, if this doesn’t automatically follow from the teachers reprimand.

Unless there is evidence of repeated similar incidents with this particular teacher, it is unlikely she will lose her job. It may be recorded on her employment record in any event. Incase anyone hasn’t noticed, not many people want to be teachers any more and baying for her to be dismissed seems a little disproportionate.

Ask the school if they have reported to LADO. They are obliged to do this if there is an allegation of harm or a risk of harm.

It is right that you follow it up, to ask what action has been taken. Reporting to Ofsted etc seems a long way off at this point, but it remains an option if you are dissatisfied, after you have followed the complaints procedure. It is more likely that matters can be resolved without you needing all this hassle though.

I believe it’s a bad idea to punish your daughter by withdrawing her from PE. It is important that you remain calm and measured, as a hysterical approach and increased drama will not help your daughter at school. It seems you are approaching it in a level headed way, so this will help.

Some interesting vocabulary on here suggests that people don’t understand the context, or perhaps people are assuming there was more to it, than the daughter herself has reported. ‘Attack,’ ‘Teacher her a lesson,’ etc is suggesting the teacher had a motive other than what the daughter claims. The daughter has not alleged this, as far as I know?

It is not unheard of for teachers to use pupils to demonstrate teaching points. It’s probably used in PE lessons more than others. They rarely have physical contact but it does happen, usually with consent. She shouldn’t have tugged the daughter’s hair hard. If she wanted to touch her at all, she should have sought consent to help the teacher demonstrate. She perhaps thought that the daughter, being a model pupil, would be happy to oblige and assumed consent, but the teacher horribly misjudged it. I’m sure the teacher will be happy to acknowledge her error and apologise. The daughter has not alleged some vendetta by the teacher. She is generally well behaved, so the evil teacher won’t have any reason to single her out and make an example of her.

This should be done and dusted by tomorrow lunchtime so that your daughter and the teacher can get on with their weekend.

Rude!

People on here are trying to guide and help you. They all have differing opinions. I was merely stating mine. You've dealt with it. The teacher will probably be reprimanded and will be reminded that she shouldn't touch a pupil or pull their hair. End of.

Move on.

'Criticising' is the Anglicised (sp English) spelling. The 'z' is an Americanism.

I previously said that I would remove my child from PE lessons but not to punish her, to safeguard her if the teacher remained in that lesson. I don't believe that is hysterical at all.