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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

to be seething and planning to complain to ds2's teacher tomorrow?

175 replies

Greensleeves · 17/09/2009 17:36

ds2 (aged 5 and just started Y1) has come home today with a library book - the children are taken to the library to choose a book once a week

he has come home with a huge hardbacked tome entitled "The Readers Digest Illustrated History of World War II"

I have flicked through it and it is full of photos of tanks, machine guns, people standing outside their bombed-out houses etc

I am FURIOUS

ds1 had this teacher last year and she is excellent, I think very highly of her and am VERY surprised to find that she has allowed this to happen

I really don't want to antagonise her (not only have I liked and respected her for more than a year, she's a bit scary) but I really feel I have to say something!

I have taken the book away from ds2 and told him that is isn't suitable for a 5yo - he is now crying in the living room

AIBU to be really fucked off?

OP posts:

Hando · 17/09/2009 20:46

No Cadmum - I was saying that a 5yr old learning about ww2 by flicking through graphic and distubing images of concerntration camps is inappropriate as showing them a porn film to teach them about sex. We KNOW the truth and the gory ikky bits, but it doesn;t mean they have to know all the details until they are older and emotionally capable of processing all these awful images.

Btw - What is Woodfolk??? Makes me think of elves and pixies.

pigletmania · 17/09/2009 20:47

totally agree ginger you took the words right outta my mouth. Yes the op has a right to be concerned about the book and she should therefore keep hold of it and give it to the teacher herself, but to be seething that is very ott, everyone makes mistakes. Gosh if thats what makes one seeth than you need to chill.

SoupDragon · 17/09/2009 20:47

"...and says there was another book he liked."

Yes and I bet it was the school's copy of the Kama Sutra

francagoestohollywood · 17/09/2009 20:59

I think that the teacher might have missed this one.
YANBU
My ds is 7 and last yr he was obsessed by ww2. Not because he was smart enough to understand the enormity of the event or the political stance of Hitler. He was interest in the "war", the tanks, who won, who didn't.

I bought him a gorgeous picture book from Amazon. It's a beautiful book, but I haven't given it to him yet. It's too early for him to understand the tragedy of what happened.

I keep answering to his question though, and I mostly talk to him about partisans, who helped to free Italy...

TheApprentice · 17/09/2009 21:00

I'm a teacher and I do think that the book is not appropriate to a primary school library. (not because it is about the war but because of the traumatic images you mention). So I think YANBU to ask the school to have it removed from their library.

However, please give that poor teacher a break! Chances are she didnt even see the book your ds chose, let alone vetted it. We are very busy people during school time, there are never enough minutes to do all the myriad of tasks we need to do all at once, and its very hard to keep your eyes on everything each child of the class does all of the time.

My bet is that if she'd really known what was in the book she might have encouraged your ds to choose something else.

LynetteScavo · 17/09/2009 21:05

YANBU - I'm too tired to argue why you are not, but any way,
YANBU.

Northernlurker · 17/09/2009 21:06

Mila - your children have never seen the news? I think that's hugely irresponsible actually. How are you going to raise responsible pro-active citizens when you have basically shut your kids in some pink tinted bubble? Do you think aged 10 they'll just be able to wake up and cope with everything the world throws at us?

There is a huge difference between still black and white photographs of the aftermath of violence and showing acts of violence on tv btw. I'm dismayed to see you are a teacher - jolly well hope it's not at my dcs school!

pigletmania · 17/09/2009 21:07

No when i was 7 I did not understand the enormity of it, especially what happend in the holocaust but it was fascinating from the home front perpective, the rationting day to day life and the blitz which i did understand a bit about. I dont feel that i was too young to learn a bit about it, it was only when i was 15 that i learned the graphic parts. It is all part of history so as long as its age appropriate there is nothing wrong with it.

pigletmania · 17/09/2009 21:09

I do agree northernlurker, my dd is 2.6 would like to watch the news and how clean is your house but she demands night garden and runs out when news come on lol

kateGB · 17/09/2009 21:11

I think you should have a quiet word with the teacher who will probably be horrified if she sees some of the pictures. I think it probably just slipped though the net.

I do think it's an opportunity to sit down with your DS and gently explain 'mans inhumanity to man'.

He probably saw the Tanks and thought it looked cool.

I think you should show him edited 'highlights' to pacify the desire for the book.

My DD1 is very sheltered, I dont have the news on when she is here and it is CBeebies and nick junior only. It is intentional as there are things on the news that no 5 year old should have to worry about but gradually they need to be introduced to the horrible things in order to protect themselves and so that truly horible things are learnt by the next generation and so never happen again.

But there's a time and a place.

I think you are right to be upset as all parents want to protect their kids, I do think however that going into school ranting and raving is the wrong tactic.

Tell the teacher and show her the pictures and let her apologise!

groundhogs · 17/09/2009 21:58

What the hell are some of you going on about? he's FIVE FGS!

OP, I'm sure he just got excited about the tanks etc, I know my DS would do.

YANBU, at all, IMHO. Perhaps explain to him that there are some things in the book that he needs to be a little bit older to understand properly, but, if it's tanks, for example, he likes, that you will look for a book all about them, and leave the big book till a little later. Dunno if that'll work with yours, it works with my DS.

I worry about the future when some people not only think it's perfectly OK for a 5yo to be reading such adult material, but think it's OK to round and attack someone for at least questioning the issue.

Exposure to violence and/or inappropriate images at too early an age does have a profound affect.

And as for the posieparker comment about if DS is watching any PG movies... at 5??? surely you still have to be careful... U films OK, but PG at 5....? Depends.

pigletmania · 17/09/2009 22:08

groundhogs I dont think people are diagreeing with the op about the book being inappropriate, its the way she was going to go about complaining to the teacher which was a bit ott, like seething and being furious which are a bit heavy. The poor teacher made a mistake, she propbably has a class size of about 30 so some go though the net.

Goblinchild · 17/09/2009 22:10

There are very few PG films about the Holocaust, I'm struggling to think of one.

gingernutlover · 17/09/2009 22:14

the diary of anne frank

gingernutlover · 17/09/2009 22:15

still unsuitable for a 5 year old but is a PG on dvd from amazon

sorry but I was interested

MilaMae · 17/09/2009 22:15

NL I am raising very pro-active citizens as we errr talk to our kids, read suitable books,take them places etc etc. So far they know about how we have to look after the planet and animals are becoming extint. They know some people don't have enough to eat and they know some people try to hurt each other and wars are wrecking some countries. That is enough for 4 and 5 year olds. I will up the stakes gradually.

It is possible to raise pro-active citizens without tv,tv is just one tool. I'm not anti TV, far from it my dc watch plenty but it's tv suitable for 4 and 5 year olds not the news which is pitched for adults. To stick a 4 or 5 year old in front of footage of Afghanistan, or descriptions of children being beaten and tortured is totally and utterly irresponsible.

My sister and I had no TV until we were older than my kids are now. We never watched the news at such a young age. My parents did a pretty good job with us.My sister is one of the most pro-active citizens you could ever meet. I won't list her achievements but she's spent her whole life working and battling for those with disabilities and is very successful in her field having written 2 books on her subject.

Oh and by the way there is a lot more to being a good teacher than allowing your kids to be traumatised by pictures of concentration camps and footage of war on TV-at the ripe old age of 5.

gingernutlover · 17/09/2009 22:16

the boy in the striped pyjamas is a 12 though - understandably

womblingfreedom · 17/09/2009 22:18

I'm a primary school teacher and think you need to give the teacher a break! In KS2, Year 4/5 children will study WW2 and they love it. It is relevant and you can have some amazing chats with Grandparents and Great grandparents who were evacuated or lived through it. 30 children, free choice for a library book, it's not the reading scheme for goodness sake put it down to a genuine mistake.....

edam · 17/09/2009 22:47

Year 4/5 v. v. v. different to Year 1 though.

Goblinchild · 17/09/2009 23:05

Does the film of Anne Frank's Diary cover her time in Bergen-Belsen in detail?
Or does it just end with the Nasty Bad Men taking her and her family away?

TheFallenMadonna · 17/09/2009 23:10

Of course it's a ridiculous book for a 5 yo. A 5 yo.

I wouldn't be seething, but I would ask that they brought home a book they could actually get something from. And I don't think that's unreasonable.

EyeballsintheSky · 18/09/2009 08:58

Goblin as far as I can remember the diary gets left behind when she is taken and it just briefly states at the end what happened to her.

seeker · 18/09/2009 09:17

I wouldn't be pleased either. My ds came home with a book by David Almond when he was in year 1 that started with a graphic description of a circus performer piercing his face with spikes.

I didn't make a huge fuss -I just told ds he had picked up the wrong book by mistake thentold the teacher, who was very apologetic and said it was actually a senior library book (for years 5 and 6) and shouldn't have been in the junior library at all.

It does sound like a mistake - have a word with the teacher about it.

Smithagain · 18/09/2009 09:20

Have been thinking about this overnight.

For those of you who think the book is fine, because it is "right for children to learn about war", can you please explain why you think that has to happen at 5, as opposed to, say, waiting till they are 8 or 9?

I don't think anyone is advocating keeping children in a bubble until they are adults. But it seems to me that there is no need to rush into telling very small children about the most horrible bits of life when they are so young that they are (a) likely to be frightened that it might happen to them and (b) completely powerless to do anything about it.

Childhood goes past quickly, but not so quickly that you have to educate them about absolutely everything all at once. Once they are a few years older, they are much more able to understand that there is no immediate danger of similar happening to them right here and right now - and hopefully better equipped to think through the issues properly.

And yes, I know that there are 5yos in the world who are going through war right now. And that is terrible. But it doesn't make it appropriate to expose our own, thankfully safe, children to the same things.

Original poster

Greensleeves · 18/09/2009 09:35

I took the book back this morning
I spoke to ds2's teacher and just said "could ds2 change his library book?" and handed it to her

she looked at it and said "oh no, what is he doing with that? I didn't see him take it"

the TA said that she had seen it and had tried to talk him out of it but that he had been adamant - I agreed that he is as stubborn as a mule and just said "but it has concentration camp pictures in it and I'd really rather he didn't have it"

they were fine about it

thanks for all the advice!

OP posts:

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