I find it really hard..

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.. to tell mums that their children have been misbehaving. There is one after-schooler that I have and her behaviour is really troubling me. It is her attitude to me and my children how do I tell her mum that I am concerned?? She is 8 and has always been a bit of a madam but the past 2 week she has done some really nasty things to my kids and I am not happy.

What sort of nasty things are you talking about? Physical? What discipline do you use with her?

I would log every incident as soon as it happens, and see what the triggers are. Then assess as if you were not involved, and see what the options are for correcting the behaviour. After doing this, ask the parent for a meeting to discuss things. Show her your observations and the options you think may be possible and see what she thinks.

i think with bad behaviour you just have to bite the bullet, i work in a nursery so it may be a bit different, especially age wise, however i think it is important to keep the parents fully aware, i always start the conversation with a positive

i posted that with out finishing whoops talk about their day and then mention the behaviour and what we did about it, most of the time parents intrupt me and we go of on a tagent conversation, but the main points tend to be put across, i usually end with a posistive to.

It really doesn depend on what the behaviour is. I wouldn't expect to be informed of every misdemenour by my children at after school club, because dealing with low level behaviour things is part of their remit I think. Any serious incidents, I would expect to be informed. As a teacher, that's how I deal with things. If I reported every reprimand to parents I'd never be off the phone.

I wonder if the fact that your own children are involved makes it harder to be objective. I don't mean that to be arsey. I think I would struggle with objectivity if my own children were to attend my school.

Not not objective about whether it was bad behaviour BTW, I don't mean that. I mean objective as to whether you should deal with it or refer on to parents.

If I have to do this I kind of sandwich in between a couple of nicer things to tell them. It's not often something would be such an issue that it warrants "a talk", small stuff that's been dealt with is dealt with.

Or perhaps I will say I will talk to them later that night on the phone, I find that a lot of parents will start giving out to the child there and then which makes it feel like tattle taleing and also the child may well have forgotten what it was about, plus it would have been dealt with at the time, not fair to be disciplined twice over.

It does the parent and the child no favours to withold negative information but I know it's not nice to tell them about it.

Mousey84 - I agree that's the way to go.

TFM - I get what you say about the practicalities of discussing every little issue, but at the ASC I oversee (don't work with the children but manage the overall organisation) we find that it is necessary to at least log persistent low level stuff, any triggers and how it's been dealt with, because by the time it's escalted to the child being a complete PITA their parents say "well they can't be that bad otherwise you would have said anything to me before and we could have dealt with it". At least then we can show that we have tried to deal with it ourselves and point out that we need their help to get on top of unacceptable behavour.

Although, without wishing to stereotype you can bet that 9 out of 10 times the parents don't believe their child is anything other than sweetness and light and trot out the old chestnut "I know my child's no angel but he/she wouldn't lie to me and if he/she says they haven't done it then they haven't"

Hope you get it sorted quickly.

Hi thanks for replies, it is hard as I feel it is my little girls house and when she tells me what mindee has said to her I feel very protective and I am subjecting her to this because of my job. If mindee said she would push your DD in road how would you feel?? She has said she would throw a few things of my DD in road. She has told me DD gets on her nerves, she is 2 years younger than mindee.

Hi sorry forgot to add, do you think I should write everything down, it is just she is very sneaky about things and I have to take my DD word.

What have you actually seen for yourself? Is it all hearsay from what your DD has said? Could it be your DD stretching the truth somewhat? Jealous of having to share her Mum?

Just things to think about