Hi,
I am hoping to get some advice. My daughter is 9 years old and over the last 2 school years has repeatedly come home from school very distressed about one girls behaviour, attitude and actions towards her. They include things like name calling, not allowing her to play with other girls in the class, putting her down, there was even an incident two years ago where she bit her. My daughter to begin with complained that this child dominated all aspects of play. Now my daughter is left out, ridiculed and the child says very hurtful things to my daughter. I have witnessed the blanking bitchy like manner that this girls often behaves with towards my daughter. My daughter has no reason to lie to me about the nature of what occurs at school, she is a very honest child.
i thought my daughter was the only child affected by this until recently i discovered that this same child had been upsetting two other children in the class.
up to this point I had been to complain and bring to the attention my concerns with the headteacher and was lead to believe that it was being monitored, but my daughter continued to come home upset. the other girls have been as upset as my daughter - and one child has left the school. the class sizes are very small and as such there is not much choice for escaping a strong character. she appears manipulative and behaves in this way in a way that is under the radar of teachers.
the school have finally discussed the issue with the parent and have suggested a round table approach to addressing occurrences in the school playground. already this approach appears to benefit the child who has been getting away with nasty bullying behaviour for two or more years - this child is manipulative and quick to find a solution rather than get told off. instead my daughter and the others are being grouped with the child that is being the bully and being forced to "discuss" occurrences when they are clearly feeling anxious about it and distressed. We are in the summer holidays and my child is so upset still, even though she has not seen this child for a few weeks. She cries when we talk about it. she gets on well with all the other children in the class. i feel at the end of my tether and dont know if i should change her school - but she says she will 'give this child a chance' every day to be nice rather than change school. She loves the familiarity and everything else about school - but this child is leaving a black cloud over it. What should I do??