DD - trouble at school

[youvegottobekidding]

DD Is nearly 13. She's an articulate, beautiful, caring, funny, sarcastic, moody girl! I love her to bits.

In the last 4 weeks, I have had two phone calls from her form tutor informing me of her receiving 'behaviour' points on a dangerous level. One was for pulling a chair out from underneath another girl & the other for throwing a water bottle across the room.

The first phone call, I was in absolute shock. I would never of thought I'd ever get a call about DD's behaviour! She's too smart to behave dumb, at least that's what I've always thought. The form tutor said himself this doesn't sound like 'xxxx'. I obviously asked her what had happened & she told me, a group of girls in the same table had began teasing her - she'd had enough & as she walked pasted pulled the chair out from under one of the girls. She admitted it was a stupid & potentially dangerous thing to do & regretted doing it & apologised. I asked her what the teacher was doing while the girls were teasing her in a lesson - she said sorting the boys who were messing around (that could be a whole other thread about the school) so she didn't see what was happening with on her table.

Fast forward 4 weeks. 2nd phone call from form tutor. DD has thrown water bottle from one end of the room to another to try & land it in the bin. Both of these are obviously H&S risks so this is why I'm getting a phone call. Again, I'm taken aback, I ask form tutor to confirm it's definitely my daughter & who reported her. A different teacher, who saw her do it. I talk to, well no I raised my voice at DD & ask her what's going on, she's never ever, ever been in trouble, I've never had a teacher say one wrong, bad, word about her. She shrugs her shoulders, doesn't really have an answer. I tell her I just don't get it, is it the people she hangs about with at school. I tell her she's letting herself down, me down.

She seems ok, she comes in from school fine - if there's a problem - she'll tell me more or less straight away. She's quite forthcoming. I don't know why she's behaving like this all of a sudden at school, I wonder if it's worth a trip down there.

I think that your DD needs reinforcement at home that her behaviour at school is poor. Throwing a bottle across the classroom? Why couldn't she hold onto it until lesson had finished and she could throw it in the bin? She could have hit someone.
Pulling out a chair from underneath someone? I know two instances in the school where I work that the child who ended up on the floor fractured their coccyx. She could have just walked past and not reacted in a violent manner

First one sounds like she was at the end of her tether, second one sounds like she was giddy. If she's usually sensible, she knows herself that it was idiotic and probably feels silly and embarrassed.

People messing around generally in the classroom will have an effect on the rest of the students - I remember being thrown out of class once when I was about 14 for poking the student in front of me or something silly, and I was generally very well behaved, but the whole class was a bit hyper that day. It is infectious.

I'd chat with her about how things are generally at school and see if there is a deterioration in whole-class behaviour, and how she can manage to stay out of it. I wonder is she trying to join in/impress anyone? I'd be very very serious without being very cross.

Pulling a chair out is really stupid. Someone did this to dd1 about five years ago and she hurt her back and coccyx really badly.

Now you've got over the shock and realised that this is how she's behaving, you need to put your foot down. No phone until the weekend!

There has been issues about class disruption on the whole, since DD started at secondary school, she mentioned about some of the pupils who were disruptive in classes & the teachers inability to deal with them (we had this confirmed by another parent). DD expressed it was difficult to concentrate at times & we did bring this up with her form tutor at a parents evening & he basically said it's hard to keep track on specific classes with there being so many supply teachers covering classes at the time. Ofstead report was diabolical- headteacher 'left' with immediate effect. Que new structure of the school, headteacher, but what changes are to be made, have been made, remains to be seen. We don't get any info! My view was that there wasn't really an authoritative figure there for the pupils to 'respect' - teachers weren't coping with the unruly kids. Perhaps this is what Ofsted had seen. It's not been deemed a good school in a long time, however, we chose that school as it's where she wanted to go, we wanted her to be happy, she's the one who has to go there for the next 5 years. We spoke to a lot of the other parents who already had kids there, they all said they're kids were happy enough there & had no problems.

However, DD is responsible for her own actions, she's well aware of this. I did think maybe she's done/acting like this to 'fit in' - but she's in y8 - it's not she's just started at y7. I don't think she's mentioned anyone new that she's hanging around with, but I am 'questioning' her, in a way, you know like 'how's' your day been' etc when she gets home so it's not like I'm barking at her, iukwim?

She's definitely been disciplined over her behaviour - no phone outside of school hours - ouch, she's hurting, but she needs to understand she cannot behave that way. I've warned her if I so much as get one more call, she'll never hold another smartphone again. It'll be a plain £4.99 black phone just for school.

*their kids not they're!

Sounds like she is being affected by the school. We all do this to a certain extent, what is around us becomes normal, though we may have been horrified by it in the beginning. To use a facetious example, my 75 year old DM now happily wears skinny jeans, and she thought they were the stuff of the devil 10 years ago.

I'd be having serious talks about what constitutes mature behaviour. Not disciplinary talks, but social talks. Doing what's best though others are not. Going against the popular political view. Standing up against racism. Succeeding despite difficulties. Being independent. All of those kind of things.

I really don’t think you should worry. Her tutor has rung you and you have sanctioned her and expressed your unhappiness. They are two isolated incidents 4 weeks apart.