Teacher questioned over attempted murder of pupil

[Frasersmum123]

This happened near to me

Tambajam: They were singing "I'm staring at the psycho in the mirror" to the tune of Man in the mirror and rapping their rulers, and refused to stop - after haranging him since he returned from sick leave and saying they hoped he had another stroke

ALLEGEDLY according to stuff they wrote on some internet wall or other

Of course there is no excuse for violence, but it is still possible to understand why that violence might have occurred

horrid horrid painful situation all round

Dumbledoresgirl, we don't actually know, do we, what this particular boy had or had not said. Perhaps the class was being horrible in the way described, but it's only rumour so far. And we don't know how far this particular child was implicated.

Dh's initial response when we heard about this on the news last night was:

"I wonder what level of abuse that teacher had been putting up with and for how long?" It comes as no surprise to me that the child attacked was no angel.

It amazes me that people have so much to say about the rights of children not to be touched or shouted at or abused, and yet teachers appear to be free targets.

None of which means I condone the teacher's violence, but it does sound as though he acted out of character and I do know that strokes can alter personalities.

Cory, no you are right, we don't know. But my point remains that respect is a 2 way road.

I have left teaching because I refuse to accept the level of abuse thrown at teachers by children and parents alike.

Well that'll teach the kid, won't it?

I absolutely agree that respect is a two way road- (and every teacher who has had to deal with my two has remarked on how pleasant and polite they are, so I think I practise what I preach).

My point was that it is not respectful to condemn somebody unheard merely because they are 14. To me, this smacks of a judge assuming that a raped woman must have been asking for it. Maybe this boy did ask for it. But then that will be about what he actually did, not about countless anecdotes from teachers in other schools about how horrible their pupils are.

As you so rightly say- respect is a two way road.

Agree completely.

I think I am just thinking about the wider picture at the moment (I have personal circumstances at the moment which mean I am thinking more about behaviour in schools generally than this specific case).

I do find it hard to imagine that a respected teacher would lash out at an innocent child though, but of course, that is entirely possible.

And he can't be not innocent enough to have been asking for that can he?

Of course there are wider issues about respect and behaviour in schools, but isn't it the same argument as saying nagging, grumpy women deserve to be battered by their partners?

Where did anyone say he was asking for it / deserved it?

tbh I have known some extremely strange teachers in my day

the truth is: teachers are people, they are prone to the same problems and weaknesses as the rest of us; it is to their credit that most of them manage to stay professional most of the time

but the 'I can't imagine a teacher lashing out at an innocent child'- argument seems a bit odd

I can't imagine any doctor I've met murdering innocent women- but Harold Shipman did

I believe there probably was provocation in the present case, and I have a lot of sympathy with the teacher who seems to have been in poor health, but we don't know how much, or how much this particular boy was involved

if he snapped, then he may not have been able to tell exactly who was guilty of what; we've all known of situations surely where the teacher got the wrong culprit

we dont' have to take sides, do we- it's possible to express sympathy and regret all round

The thing is, people are prone to extrapolate from their own experiences. So if you have had experience of horrible brats yourself, you're more likely to assume that this will be another case of what you know so well.

In my case, the experience has been of a particularly horrible headteacher. I'm not sure it's a reasonable response to assume in any given school case that the fault must lie with the headteacher "because I know what they're like".

No, you're right, actually, MP, they weren't.

I overreacted to 'can't imagine a teacher would lash out at an innocent child'.

It's shit for all concerned.

I agree that this sounds like a sorry story for both parties.

The stories from some posters on here reminds me of why when DH said he wanted to continue teaching in senior schools in the UK when he moved he I told him not to. I just knew that if he ended up at some of the senior schools in this country (particularly the ones in the area were going to be living) his life would have been a living hell. He was used to the sort of respect for teachers that I'm sure most of us had to follow when we were at school - where the abuse that teachers have to put up with now would rarely occur.

Am totally shocked that some people on here seem to b drifting towards 'maybe the kid deserved it'

Its disgusting that a grown adult, a teacher, a figure of aurthority would beat a childs head with a weight!!!

I don't care how provocative this child was being, the teacher always had the option to walk away.

And as for this child we do not know what he did, said, or his background.

OK, he has been described as 'no angel' but isn't that a fitting description of 95% of 14 yr old boys??

I am truelly shocked.

I'm not condoning what the teacher did, but I can understand how it came to pass. Most teachers, of secondary school level and older will have been insulted, threatened, abused and/or (in surprisingly large numbers) physically assulted.

I've been there, I've had endless abuse, a known gangster threatening my child and demonstrating that he knew exactly where I lived, I've had chairs, books and fists thrown at me. My experience, while possibly a bit on the extreme side (serves me right for teaching in a very deprived area ) is by no means unusual.

I can't condone what he did, but Oh! I so understand how he got to that point.

did he beat it with a weight - has that been confirmed - I can only see "weapon"

I don't see that many people on this thread saying the boy deserved.

More questions about the mental and physical well being of the teacher involved.

If he had a stroke he may have had personality change/anger management problems secondary to that

or "disinhibition" ~where higher reasoning doesn't take over to control and modify behaviour

I honestly can't see anywhere on this thread that anyone has said that this boy was asking for it. I see some possible sympathy for the teacher in question, supposing that he was having a really hard time of it with these children/this child.

There should be a degree of at least empathy for teachers who do lash out at children who drive them up the wall. When people are the subject of sustained campaigns of domestic abuse, people do tend to sympathise when the victim reaches a point where they react violently. I can imagine that a teacher being given a sustained hard time, being consistently threatened, verbally, even physically abused, might snap in the same manner. Of course it can't be condoned, but we can understand this, can't we? I can.

Police and prison officers are under enormous strain too. Deaths in police custody 'understandable'? Do we 'understand' when a prison officer lashes out at a prisoner who has been verbally abusive?
How would we feel if a boy in a youth detention centre was bludgeoned by an employee there?

Teachers have a duty of care. If the class were singing the song as described and there had been weeks of abuse I still don't understand it. The teachers walks out of the room and gets a colleague.

I agree with the suggestion he had some sort of personality shift after the stroke.

I am frankly terrified by the notion that people believe other teachers are close to acting this way themselves and thinking 'there but for the grace of God'. There are dozens of teachers right now being subjected to abuse and threats in classrooms up and down the country and they are light years away from behaving violently towards the pupils under their care.

Anyway, I probably don't know enough of the facts to keep on at this but I do find the tone of several posts on this thread pretty shocking. Glad I'm not the only one.

I had a primary teacher who used to lose his temper in a scary way. It was like a switch had been flipped. A few years after I'd left, apparently he went too far - never found out what exactly happened, but he took early retirement. I heard later that he'd been a prisoner on the Burmese Railway and suffered from nightmares and flashbacks, so that sort of made sense. Really sad as he was terrifying, but a fantastic teacher in lots of ways.

FFS! If that is true mp I'm not surprised he 'snapped. Why/where do children learn to be so lacking in basic empathy and concern for others.

Hope the child recovers.

Tambajam - prison officers both in adult population and youth offender centres are given support/training and equipped to deal with that kind of behaviour. It doesn't seem to me there is similar ongoing training and support for teachers to deal with this kind of behaviour from students.
If you go to work in a prison i think you expect a certain level of abuse is going to be directed at you. You do not go into teaching expecting to deal with that on a daily basis.

I'm a secondary school teacher, and while I'm horrified (but not hugely surprised, sadly) by what's happened, it's heartening to see that people on Mumsnet have some empathy for the teacher.

I use a teachers' forum and I've just come from there, with some trepidation (I didn't imagine the reactions over here would be so sympathetic) where the event is being discussed at length - the prevailing attitude being, 'There but for the grace of God...'

I've worked in a couple of schools where some of the pupils are off the wall, behaviour-wise. Sadly, we live in a time and society where some children fear nothing - teachers have very little power over pupils anymore. Force of personality is often the only thing teachers have to handle certain volatile situations.

The teacher involved was very well thought of, but had been off for some time with a stress-induced stroke - going back into that kind of environment after an ilness of that nature must have been dreadful. What I'm trying to say, is that dealing with certain types of behaviour from pupils when you're confident, on top of things, and generally in a good place is hard enough. This man was ill, very ill. He shouldn't have been in the classroom.

Saying all this, I obviously hope the lad pulls through. What a dreadful thing to happen to him. What a horrific trauma for ALL involved.

Mind you, Tamba, there ARE always threads after a death like the Jean Charles de Menezes case, or where a police officer lashes out at someone, where it is vociferously argued by posters on MN that either (a) they are under a lot of strain in a responsible job and ought to be cut some slack, or (b) the person in question must have deserved it. And in those cases those points of view are put forward far, FAR more strongly than anything anyone has said on this thread, which hasn't really strayed beyond the fact that it's terribly sad and a tragedy for all involved that a dedicated teacher wound up in the mental situation (whether through ongoing stress or the side-effects of stroke) where he was back at work when (with the benefit of hindsight) he shouldn't have been and wasn't able to cope with the (sadly routine) stress of the job.