Would you have a word with Teacher if...

[Angeliz]

Hi all, this will seem very trivial to some but just wanted to ask for my own peace of mind.

There is a girl in dd's reception class who seems to get her own was all the time. She crys ALOT and also tells all the others that she's going to tell on them or,'is thinking' about telling on them'.
Par for the course and i've always told dd to just call her bluff. (As i presume the Teacher knows what she's like)
This week however dd didn't even want to go to School oneday as she was 'not allowed' to play with certain pepople (this other girls rules) and their break times all seem organised by her!!
Who plays where and with who!
So this morning i had a word with the Teacher who said it's an ongoing problem.
I feel a bit guilty as i see this girls Mum and she's always really freindly, feel like a snitch myself.

Would you have had a word too?

Definitely. I don't think it's trivial either. It happened in my son's reception class and was taken very seriously by the teacher - it has now been resolved and the girls involved are good friends.

Oh good.
I mean my daughters interests will always be my priority but i know they're all drama queens at that age and half thought am i over-reacting.

Definitely. It sounds like this little girl needs some extra input from the school on friendship rules and social behaviour. You now have confirmation that the school are aware and hopefully they will intervene to change this pattern, Angeliz.

As your daughter was sufficiently upset not to want to go to school, you were quite right to have a word with the teacher. I don't think you should feel like a snitch. As it is the teacher who has to deal with the situation, he/she is the appropriate person to talk to.

If the other parents/other pupils just allow matters to slide and do not raise the issue, the teacher may well take the line of least resistance by allowing the girl to continue to get her own way, which is not in anyone's long term interests. I think you are quite right to advise your daughter to call her bluff.

It's bullying, so yes I would speak to the teacher. We've got a couple of pita children in DS2's class who have got lovely Mums, who I'm friendly with, it can be awkward. I just try and keep it separate from my relationship with them.

Thanks all.
It just did not seem appropriate for me to talk to the other Mum as i think she would have gotten understandably very defensive.
Teacher said she'll have a talk with the whole class today so i'll see tonight.

I do know another Mum is having the same problems, her dd is freinds with mine and apparently last week this girl was not allowed to play with anyone in reception and went crying to her big sister.(I didn't find this out till afterwards so that didn't cloud my judgement on my ss)
Infact the more i post the more i'm convinced too that it needs stamping out now and not be left to continue.

I agree with serenity. You can try and distance your relationship with the mum from the whole affair. The mum won't know it's you who has complained and the school have probably spoken to her about her daughter anyway.

this sort of thing is quite common in reception but not to the stage where they are all in tears! I have an old thread about this somewhere as dd has two girls in her class who really can be very horrid and controlling and choose who to exclude from games etc. She is in yr 1 now and this has happened since reception really. It's a control thing - the teacher's keep an eye on the situation to make sure it doesn't get out of hand.

One thing that I found really helped was to invite round children who were similar to dd but who hadn't really been playing with her (who really couldn't care less about controlling the playground!). This helped enormously as these children then played together happily without being 'controlled' by the others.

I don't think you should talk to the girl's mum about the problem. After all, what can she really do about her daughter's behaviour when she's not there? If it's a school problem, the school should deal with it.

yes! IMO you were right to have a word with the teacher.

I think if ANYTHING concerns you enough to even think about having a word with the teacher than have a word anyway and DONT feel guilty about it!

Agree with Hallgerda. What I would do is find out if the school has a playground buddy scheme, or a Friendship Bench/Bus Stop, and also determine where the playground supervisors are when this is happening. They are the people to really chat to I think :)