Child Abuse, should teachers be asking some stuff and getting the right answers?

[MrsCrafty]

I have been thinking about abuse and how it effects children.

Do you think that teachers, whom have 6 hours per day to ask, check etc, should have routine questions that they ask each child in their care.

My sons class has 4 assistants, I would have no problems with them talking about the bath, getting undressed, bedtime and who touches who and general stuff with regards to this.

Discuss?

Routine questions would very soon elicit routine answers from children, abused or not, (they soon learn what you want/expect/hope they'll say) and everyone would just end up in a farce of arse-covering.

Are you assuming that, because classroom assistants are CRB checked, they're not dodgy round children? How would you feel if a genuine paedo (but not yet caught - so could be a classroom assistant/police officer/your child's father) was routinely asking your children these questions?

Sorry (genuinely) if that sounds aggressive, it's late, I'm tired and about to go to bed.

Other parents would have issues about this, and the accusations of inappropriate conversations would fly. It's a rather naive idea that could damage a delicate situation beyond redemption.
Every school has a child protection policy that is discussed, implemented and reviewed regularly. Safeguarding is also on the training schedule.
There are very specific procedures to follow, from first suspicions to involving SS, police and the rest.
MC, your intentions are good, but it's a lot more complicate and tricky than simply asking a possible victim 20 questions and acting on the results.

the idea of this shocks and horrifies me!!
for one we have enough of a nanny state without further unwarranted intervention.

two, there is such athing as the right to privacy and family life.

three, what makes you think teachers and classroom assistants are anyway equipped to deal with such issues?

At what age would you ask these questions? DD (age 4) tells her teachers most days that I wouldn't let her get to sleep because I was playing with our pet dragon!

She has also explained bite marks (done my ds2) as having been done by adults she hasn't seen for a few months.

Yesterday she gave me a detailed breakdown of what she did at school on Thursday. She has been ill and not at school at all this week.

Oh, and it wasn't her that ate the chocolate, it was the dog .

I can see problems.

No.

Absolutely not.

I work in a school in a support role and we have been specifically told that if a child tells us something that leads us to have concerns about abuse, we should not ask any questions, but report it immediately to the person in charge of Safeguarding.

We do observe and question and make informal and formal notes. We do ask our CP lead teacher for opinions. It's done discretely and carefully without kneejerk reactions to answers that in the first instance are either shocking or are camouflaging incidents.
If it was as easy as 'Does x touch your bottom?' then it would be very easy to identify and prevent.

But we all have different ideas of what abuse is. Social Services would be inundated with a pile of CAF forms for trivial reasons such as child A says she hasn't had a bath for a week, or Child B says his parents shout at him all the time.
The true cases of abuse would be overlooked and these children would be failed.

Some of the most horrendous miscarriages of justice have arisen because adults asked leading questions and put ideas into children's head. It is well known that those children ended up traumatised by the interrogation process.

This would be a carte blanche to any teacher with paedophilic tendencies that may be out there to indulge in inappropriate conversations and feeding their own addiction without arousing suspicion.

And if abuse had happened, it would be impossible to make it stand up in court after it became known that the teacher was routinely asking questions: a defence barrister would seize on that to suggest (perfectly reasonably) that the teacher was putting words into children's mouths.

And how would you expect children to grow up with a healthy attitude towards bodies and sexuality if they were constantly asked prurient questions at school?

YABU, it is intrusion into family life and really creating a nanny state. Some kids might lie about it or tell untruths if they are angry at their parents at being grounded, told off etc. This has actually happened, it was in the papers a while ago.

why not put some social services esponsability ono teachers, as well as your regular education which they are supposed to provide, healthy eating, and any other govt diktat that gets pushed through schools, hell why not stick a bed in there and just hand over parental responsabiliy altogether

I really appreciate all of your answers. The reason I think this might weed out children being abused is because most abuse is within the family. It may be the Grandad, Nanny, Father etc. If every child were to state how it was in their household, everyday abuse might be picked up.

It was just a thought.

Custy, that wasn't my intention. I think that schools provide an awful lot already.

Sadly, though, people are not psychologically tested before they have children, so loads of people are bound to not hit the 'not fit for purpose as a parent' part.

no

No... no-one should ask leading questions.

There are child protection policies for this, where unusual behaviours, comments or situations are reported. Children should also be taught about what is appropriate and what is not acceptable and what they can do to protect/ help themselves stay safe.

NO, absolutely not.

For all the reasons stated above and also because from the age of about 4 or 5 (ie school age) I knew not to mention what happened at home or I would get a beating.

No, definately not.

How are these people supposed to differentiate between a normal family and a abuse situation. If a child says 'dady/mummy shouted/smacked me last night and scared me'. It could be a child that is abused on a daily basis or it could simply be a parent who lost their temper once.

Also, parenting involves touching children in areas that could be deemed inappropriate - how do you know which are okay situations and which are abuse. Would it be acceptable if it was mummy but a red flag is it was grandad??

"Sadly, though, people are not psychologically tested before they have children, so loads of people are bound to not hit the 'not fit for purpose as a parent' part."

Who decides what 'fit for purpose' means?

You could try them out with a puppy for a year.

I can see your reason, it's a valid idea in principle but very naive, I don't think it'd work.

Just reminded me when I used to hate PE and try to get out of it all the time. My teacher asked me if the problem was getting changed in front of others. And it was - I'd been abused. I wish I'd said yes, I don't like being seen by others - could've got the abuse sorted a lot sooner if the teacher had followed it up.

Sorry for waffling but my point is, I knew the answer that was expected of me, so I denied that there was a problem.

Teachers get 6 hours a day to teach not monitor for abuse, although they do this anyway I agree with custy, can't expect schools to put everything right

very risky idea. my ds is starting school in september and has never been hit, however, the other day, dh accidentally swung his arm back while opening the door and ds ran around saying daddy had hit him etc. We lnew the events and how it happened but if he were talking to a teacher, they would assume he had been hit on purpose. Same with sexual buse I would imagine. Kids can quickly give answers to get attention and often make stuff up not realising the seriousness of what they say. Teachers are there to teach, not check up on parents.

No. Teachers are not trained to do that and mistakes would be made.

God God. NO! No, no, no, no, no.

Why ask every child so that children who are having perfectly normal children wonder WHY they are being asked? Bonkers.

And teachers are not ALLOWED to ask questions, even if they suspect something because that could be seen to be leading children into particular answers.

Teachers are there to TEACH, not to be social workers and certainly not to assume that every child is potentially abused unless their answers suggest otherwise.

I hope to goodness that nobody in power ever thinks this is a good idea. It is so wrong, on so many levels, that it is making me inarticulate.