To think this is inappropriate homework for an 11 year old? **MNHQ adding content warning for CSA**

Someone posted the whole story upthread. It doesn’t get more appropriate for an 11 year old, I’m afraid.

This is what struck me. The normalisation of the idea of helpful, secret rituals that will protect a loved one, marked by a person in authority who gets to see how dozens of innocent children interpret it.

Safeguarding is a serious, sensitive and important area for children. This story could be something a predator would enjoy, I think that is the point. It is confusing for a child who might read it and think secrets are OK. It is quite creepy. This is not part of a careful, evidence based and sensitive safeguarding lesson, it is a big error and could open up all kinds of feelings of shame or confusing for kids reading it, with no adequate expert follow up.

The rest of the book isn't any better, if I can remember rightly the other stories include quite graphic stories of being a refugee in a camp and crossing the border, a trans story about having body parts removed, a story on FGM etc. There is no guarantee that this was chosen by an individual teacher, it's probably the same task set by the English department for all classes. Or like my school, a-okayed by the multi academy Trust bigwigs and enforced on the staff.

How the hell can Amnesty International get away with printing that? I
There is nothing wrong with the story which is by a good author
What is wrong is giving it to an 11 year old.

Yup. With the implied threat of more abuse for the baby when it is old enough.

Awful. Totally inappropriate for 11.

17-year-old here. I read this entire collection, which also deals with sex trafficking, fgm, suicide, death of parents etc when I was 12. Obviously the stories were disturbing, but I suffered no ill effects. (However I was probably a bit old for my age - I also read things like Sue Lloyd-Roberts THe War on Women and Gloria Steinem texts, both of which had disturbing bits which I just turned the page on, but probably did mean my disturbance threshold was higher).

However, I appreciate that some children would not be ready for that sort of material at all, and Y7 is too young. Schools can discuss really tough books like The Bluest Eye, and school should be a safe place to discuss these issues, but not that young.

Actually at the end of the book Damien takes the stand and gives evidence to protect his little brother and it makes reference to another abuser being jailed too. I still find the reading quite troubling but at least its a nod in the right direction.
Still wholly unsuitable for a year 7 or 8 child.

The story is troubling because it's for a human rights collection and wants to portray the brutality of abuse. I think it should be troubling. It is completely clear the abuse is wrong-much more so when you know the context of the anthology. I think if you have a story when the abuse is not acknowledged as wrong, it shouldn't be read as promoting abuse necessarily, it could be showing how people can be groomed and remain trapped. But that would not be appropriate for many 11-year-olds to read, and there is the worry that a creepy teacher would give such a story for alterior reasons.. There are support materials on the Amnesty website for this collection further acknowledging the abuse as wrong. These issues should be discussed, but age and the way the teacher does it is important.

WOW this was hard to read! OP, please please update on the school's response! Makes me terrified to send my children to school!

@beatrice14 if it didn't have a negative impact on you that's great but statistically there will be students in your class living very similar circumnstances that have experienced SA that will have a very negative impact on them.

We will have to disagree. I think there is everything wrong with that story. It doesn't do enough to demonstrate that abuse is wrong. It isn't a social story designed to open discussion about consent and abuse etc. It's creepy as fuck and as a single short story serves zero purpose apart from to shock and disgust

Totally inappropriate for an 11 year old. My DD is 12 and I'm fairly sure the meaning of that story would go entirely over her head TBH.

I think it’s inappropriate to set as a self guided task for kids that age as they won’t understand what it means but I absolutely think that kids should be taught about predators and what tactics they may use. Avoiding the subject altogether and pretending they don’t exist put them at more risk of abuse.

Even if it was a mistake by the teacher who had not read it in advance, it could still potentially cause harm to the children reading it. It doesn’t have to be grooming to be safeguarding- it’s failing to protect children from harm. This teacher’s possible lack of care/ attention to the text is neglecting their safeguarding duties

I don't think anyone on here is saying kids shouldn't learn about SA in an age appropriate manner.

This story is absolutely not that.

Daily mail probably getting a headline ready...

It sounds to me like a mistake. It's an entirely appropriate boon for young adults-just not for year 7s. Talk to the school and get it sorted out.

I’d like MN HQ to comment on this thread to assure they have no concerns about the OP. Their silence is deafening.

I don't think the content is adult- I think it's for older teenagers. I read other books at school which dealt with difficult issues -e.g. After The Fire, which was about a cult, or The Color Purple which dealt with sexual abuse. I think these books should be read by older students, learning to confront about the worst aspects of the world should be part of education.

Maybe there is going to be a discussion at school about what the children think it means and why the character may have been using the emotive subject of her fathers death in order to manipulate alongside advice about how children can keep themselves safe? Who knows. I would hope it wouldn’t just be set as homework and left at that. That would be inappropriate.
I would also hope there would have been some prior warning before the subject matter was taught. It could be sensitive for a number of reasons for children who have been victims of abuse or suffered the loss of a relative.
But I’m getting the sense from a lot of the replies that the subject matter should be off limits altogether for this age group?

Yes, I agree that a child may have experienced SA and it could be triggering -that's part of the reason it shouldn't be given to younger children, but older teens. But should all difficult issues not be discussed in case of that? Or just some especially awful ones like SA? I think maybe such issues are better discussed without fictional material. They certainly shouldn;t be set as homework.

It does at least have a positive ending.