Police and CPS waiting at pre school..

[workingonitagain]

so yesterday i went to pick up ds1 3 yo started pre school in sept and does 1and a half days. i was called in a room where 2 woman introduced themselves one was from the police and the other one from CPS.
ds had a black bruise under his eye as fell at the wknd and my little "angle" told the teacher when they asked him that it was mummy?!!! so they called CPS when the came to ask him he said he fell off the bike so asked me what happened and told them it happened in a public play area. so they asked me if registered which i didn't even think about.
i asked them if they wanted me to ask him there and then and they said yes so i started step by step trying to get him to remember where we went and where he played and what happened. After a lot of nothing he did admit where he went and what happened....
Ds never ever in his life been smacked so im shocked that he came out with this but recenctly hei has been making up a lot of shock statements like he is homsick or he's eaten a toy.
after a lot of questions they said they are satisfied that this is what happened and that it the future it'd be worth reporting it with the place it happens and also tell pre school when he arrives in the morning.
i feel deeply embarassed by this and as i was leaving head of pre school looked at me very unconfortably and said im so sorry.
i said you just did what you had to do it's fine.
So is this really what they always have to do or do they sometimes give you the benefit of the doubt and talk to you first before they call CPS.
as he only started in sept, we don't know each other very much so probably that could also be the reason
My parents said i should tell him how serious this kind of things are and that he got mummy into trouble.
Should i really do this?
i feel he is too young to understand the consequences and he might realise that "wow this could be another shock effect i can have on people" and would start doing it more?

So far i've already been taken aside as he showed his winky to others on the 2 occasions and also last week i've been told he hits and we also agreed that we follow the same reward chart +naughty chair discipline method.
his dad and i are fairly strict with him and don't tolarete any kind of violence towards his brother and i would say it's excessive at home but does happen.
he is a very interlligent boy but seems that he's taking his time adusting to pre school although he spent all his life going to playgroups so he knows what its like being amongs loads of other kids

any advice would be appreciated

Hey I'm so sorry for u and the awful situation u found urself in today , however, working in nursery myself it is something that we have to act on ! If a child discloses something like that, true or untrue we have a duty of care ! I would explain to ur DS that he should always tell the truth because lies can hurt people ! I always maintain that to react to a statement a child says is better than missing even one child who isn't lucky to have a safe home life x

File 13.

Don't sweat it. Kids do this all the time, but if they tell someone at nursery that mummy gave them a black eye, then nursery have to act.

It is far more sensible, by the way, to pre-empt this bollocks, by speaking to the keyworker when you drop him off, and saying 'ds fell off his bike and has a black eye'. Sometimes they ask you to sign it off - this is partially so that you can't accuse nursery of giving your kid a black eye etc!!

Moral of the story - always explain injuries, marks and bruising to childcare staff at drop off. Then it is not 'unexplained', and they can ask ds if he fell his bike. Reduces all sorts of complications.

Are you sure they were from the police and CPS? I thought disclosure was made to social services, I only have indirect experience of this but was involved on the edge of a similar situation and the police certainly weren't the first port of call.

Have you had previous contact with SS which has now been escalated to involve the police? I'm now very worried that I could end up in the same situation as my DC aften go to school with bruises.

Hmmmm - seems highly unlikely police and CPS would attend. where were Social Services in all of this? CPS certainly wouldn't rush to the pre-school on the very same day it was reported and be waiting for you!

I think the OP means Child Protection, not Crown Prosecution.

By cps I think she means child protection services not crown prosecution services.

Good to know they follow upon such things although horrid for you. My dd had a black eye from falling while chasing a friend, I sent a note in with her to school explaining what had happened.

givemeaclue that makes a lot more sense. OP, if this happened as you describe I sugggest you have a huge glass of wine tonight, be grateful for the fact that your pre-school care so much about the children in their care and try to put it behind you. I certainly don't think you should be trying to make your Ds feel guilty about it.

My DS has done this a few times, little bugger

The first time wasn't really his fault, I used to take him to Nursery and explain every bruise, my mum took him and forgot, he said I threw him across the floor and he landed on his eye.

What happened was, he locked me out of the kitchen by putting the bin against it, I panicked as the cooker was on, took and run and jumped and kind-of karate kicked the door, he was behind the bin, behind the door, I threw the door open, he landed beneath the bin...

The second time, I have no idea why he said this but he said 'my mum was furious last night because of parents evening, I got the biggest smack ever', so the Teachers took him aside asked about the smack, where it was etc, he came home, told me I had been talking to school about him, told me the story about Teacher checking him for smack, I phoned the school furious and once again, it was him!

He still does it to me, I can be taking him to bed, sometimes I shout on my 12 year old to take him as if I have to touch he him he will say 'you're throwing/punching/pulling/pushing/dragging me'....

He was getting changed tonight whilst a school friend was waiting and accused me of kicking him, thankfully, everyone could see I didn't move!

I agree it is humiliating and embarrassing but people have to act on what the DC say, some are being truthful!

Yes sorry i thought CPS was for Child Protection Services and no i have never ever been involved either with the police or CPS in my life.
Yes i agree that it's definitely worth making sure as it happens so much nowdays and don't blame school for it all. im sure they just followed their guidlines and this was part of it.
They only thing that makes me think a bit that last week when i took ds to school and discussed the chart and naughty chair process, i did say to her that dp is away a lot(working) nowdays and i do get a bit overwhelmed by the two of them...
when the police woman was questionning me they said that we've heard that dp is away a lot and was questionning me about how i cope with the kids and it just made it obvious that nursery reasoned with this when they called them as one of the possibly reason why i could have hurt my ds...
although i trust them to look after my son and to do a good job now i know never to get too deep in the conversation with them again...

I'm really shocked by this. I have 3 ds's and they have often gone to nursery or school with cuts and bruises. No one has ever mentioned it to me. Perhaps they have given a plausible explanation.

Ds3 fell off a chair at nursery cutting his chin and, having heard of people being questioned about their children's injuries in a&e, I took the nursery accident report with me. No one was the least bit interested.

Definitely always explain the bruises

Have a big glass of wine tonight too

Definitely always explain the bruises

Have a big glass of wine tonight too

Seems a bit over the top. DS once fell in the bath and cut his chin. The next day at nursery DH took him and explained. When I went to collect him, I was headed off at the door and taken to a separate room by the manager and senior nursery nurse. THey asked me what had happened. I told them. It tallied with DH's account. Apparently in the day DS had told someone his Dad had hit him. We got DS in the room with us and I asked him again. He told us that had fallen over in the bath. So, what we had said. Nursery were satisified and nothing else happened. DS could never explain why he lied.

I'd be more worried about a nursery using "naughty" chair discipline methods. Time out yes but you should never call a child naughty only the behaviour.

Picturesinthefirelight sorry that's my mistake they have made the point of it being called time out chair and not naughty chair.
i know i shouldn't keep thinking about it but the more i do and the more i talk to other people, they tell me how over the top they think their reaction was and i agree why they couldn't just call me in to ask instead of alerting everyone??? it's obviously not about me and it doesn't matter how i feel it's about ds safety i understand that
however as i' ve never had dealings with child protection or police before now i've started worry what this would mean to me. does this record go under my name and son's? when he moves school or if we move, will everyone read about this?? what about my future chances of getting a job? will it affect it?
sorry this might be a silly question to those who know about these procedure but i haven't got a clue what all this means to us in the future?

I have never heard of police and social services being called to a nursery over one unexplained bruise.

Is any other further action being taken?

Working, I'm a childminder and I can give you the perspective of someone who had to report this kind of disclosure to Social Services. The advice is that if a child tells you something of this nature you shouldn't discuss it with the parents- if they WERE being abused then you could make the situation worse for them. And really what can they say? They're bound to deny it and you're no closer to working out whether what was said was true. We are advised NOT to attempt to investigate in any way ourselves but to hand it over to people who are qualified i.e. Social Serices. It's not about the nursery being sure you DID do it but not being sure that you didn't.

Of course people who know you are telling you it's over the top - they know that what your child said was untrue so they are looking at it from a very different perspective. I feel the nursery did nothing wrong by reporting it but police and social services turning up at nursery does sound like a heavy handed response...when I reported something similar Social Services took a much gentler approach.

If you've been told nothing further will happen then, no, there's no need for schools or future employer's to find out about it. I would assume it'll remain on file somewhere at Social Services but only in case something else gets reported.

LingDILong thanks for that yes i completely see what you are saying about people feeling sorry for me because they can only see things from my point of view (and probably imagining themselves in my shoes)
in regards to them turning up at nursery i wouldn't have felt any better or worse if they'd turned up in my house.
they said that they are satisfied that what i said was what had happened and said that i'd be a good idea to report incidents with pre school in the morning when we arrive which i'll sure be doing from now on.
i guess it's just one of those things i've had to learn the hard way on the route of being a parent hope the rest of if won't be this difficult

You've had brilliant advice and I just thought I'd say we have an incident form which we have to fill in of DD hurts herself when not at nursery. It's worth doing to protect yourself from 'imaginative stories'