Concerned about son's year 2 teacher and grouping

[TheBFactor]

Hello everyone
I am new here.
I have a wonderful, witty, energetic, extremely bright boy who is a summer baby, hence one of the youngest in a class of 30. We have been told since Reception that he is "immature" and behind the rest since the day he started Reception. The class teacher was very positive at the beginning of this year and seemed to really "get" my son finally, but more recently they seem to have turned negative again. He does not have Special Needs, but has been persistently grouped (I think for both Literacy and Maths) with a SEN boy and 2 overseas children whose English ability is weak. I am told my son is doing very well in Literacy (although they say he does not appear to focus on his writing - according to the teacher it is becacuse he can't be bothered !).

The class teacher says his attitude makes him extremely "disadvantged" and predicted taht he will be "disadvantage" next year also. She then proceeded to name various children in the class and make direct comparisons with other children, telling me very personal and private issues about other children and their abilities.

I am an educator (higher education level) myself - it is against the confidentiality rules for a teacher to talk about other students in such detail and make direct comparisons. My son ought to be compared to an ideal "age group" not to others in the class. I have been keeping an eye on him this year as I do not wish to destroy his confidence. He is naturally an extrovert, confident little boy, but he has said on numerous occassions that he feels he is bottom of the class and that the other children think so too - a few have called him babyish and I wonder how much of that come's from the teacher's attitude towards him.

Luckily, because of his graet personality, he has close friendships with several other boys and seems to be happy at school, but I am really concerned as the school are very good at having one way dialogues with me, i.e. they talk, but never listen to anything I have to say about him. They seem to think they know more about him than I do and that their reasons for placing him in whatever group is absolutely right. The negative labelling of boys is quiet common at schools I'm afraid. The quiet, shy girls seem to get away with things and the boys don't. I'm trying to get my son out of the labelling scenario.

A boy and a girl have so far been pulled out of the same class. When I spoke to their parents they had similar concerns, the other boy was also one of the youngest. The girl's mother (the girl had a learning disability) said to me in private that her daughter's emotional well-being wasn't being addressed in this class. This rings alarm bells for me.

It's meant to be an Ofsted Grade 1 school, yet I hear things from others that are similar to my views, that they are more concerned about ticking Ofsted boxes than they are about the needs of individual children.

So what now? Do I pull him out and take him to another school which is less Ofsted glorified, or do I write to the Head (usually it's chats that are not written down so I want it written down) and ask for a written reply? Should I ask them to switch my son around as I see no justification why such a bright little boy (even they have admitted he is intelligent) is in the weakest group where he is not being stretched ?

The taecher says my son is NOT naughty - he has also never been accused of being aggressive, hitting or swearing (thank goodness as it woudl be untrue any way). For some strange reason (perhaps because the teachers have decided they doesn't like me for asking questions?) I think my son is very much on the teacher's radar so gets noticed more often for whatever he does (he has been sent outside the classroom on quite a few occassions on the most absurd reasons like switching off the light by mistake or carrying on with something when the teacher had asked him to stop and she had not waited for him to explain that he had not heard her!)
I noticed on a recent class trip that my son was told off more often than other boys, even though others were behaving quite badly by most parents/teachers standards my son was extremely well behaved. I see a lot of unfair treatment going on. He is on the teacher's radar while others seem to be below it and get away with things he can't. Please help.

TheBFactor-

For some reason, possibly because your concerns threaten people's sense of wellbeing and desire to trust an education system they can do very little to change, you have recieved some shit sniping on this thread.

I have experience of many schools, and a lot of teachers are shit, bullying, uneducated and just plain nasty, in both private and state sector. Why people pretend that if you give a human being the label "teacher" it oobviates them from those particular traits, is beyond me.

I think you sound entirely reasonable, your concerns are justified, and you need to find another school.

Oddly enough RMCW teachers are of the opinion the GTC is there to persecute them

ohmydear of complaints against teachers only 2% were proved true.

and having worked in industry I would say it is just as difficult to prove that my boss is favouring colleagues and being unfair to me. I may feel they don't like me but how do I prove it? Subjective!

Well said hullygully.

Most of people I was at 6th form with went into teaching because they didnt get the a levels to do anything else....sorry but its true.

I am fairly well educated and well read individual and I was treated with utter contempt by my sons old school (unless they needed help on a trip!)...I didnt do myself any favours I suppose by pointing out when the TA sent home the wrong level books/wrote in my sons homework diary and spelt every other word wrong/didnt understand basic grammar etc etc.

The current system - which I understand that some teachers probably dont agree with tbh - is labelling children at age 4/5 as "struggling" with reading.....I would expect them to be "struggling" at age 4!!

bfactor Only you can do something about this.....go and visit some local schools pay no attention to the OFSTED reports and once you have weeded out the ones you dont like, take your son to see them too.

You apply online for an "in year admission" and as long as the school have a place it should take 2 weeks max.

Good luck x

BFactor, I am sorry if I misconstrued your point about SN. But if an NT child of mine had been upset about nasty comments due to him being seated with SN children, I would have thought it was the comments that needed dealing with, not the proximity to the SN child. Comments like you mention are a form of bullying, they are not something children are taught by their teachers but something most schools want to clamp down on. I was brought up in an extremely uncompetitive school system and I can assure you that small children were not any less nasty and competitive there. It's lack of social ability- but a good school should deal with it.

As for the rest of your posts, I fully believe teachers can be at fault: I had massive problems with my dd's primary school and was, in fact, on the point of sueing them; I think we would have had an extremely good case.

However, years as a parent have taught me never to say things like "The taecher says my son is NOT naughty - he has also never been accused of being aggressive, hitting or swearing (thank goodness as it woudl be untrue any way)." Experience has shown me that children can behave very differently in different settings, and the son I know at home may not be the boy his teacher knows or his mate's mum sees at her party. My lively boisterous ds was pretty well mute at school, while his charming and sweet friend was the playground terror. As parents we had no idea...

It may well be that this is simply not a good school and you need to move your ds.

However, you do come across as very negative towards the school system in general: wherever you go, your ds is bound to pick up on those vibes and so are the teachers- it will make it very difficult to establish the right attitude in your ds if you are convinced from the start that the whole system is wrong and bound to fail him.

I haven't read the whole thread, but I think it sounds as though the trust between you and the school is not there and you need a fresh start.

We moved ds1 at the start of year 3 and he hasn't looked back. Sometimes an outstanding school just isn't right for your child's personality. Ds1 is sensitive and caring and found a single sex overwhelming. He was described by the head of pre-prep at his last school as socially retarded (!) - whilst I was happy to respect her opinion I didn't agree with it (I'm also shy and personally wouldn't have appreciated being pushed and shoved on a daily basis so I guess that makes me socially retarded too!). FWIW she is a hugely experienced teacher and a genuinely nice person, but very used to dealing with loud, confident boys and ds1 flummoxed her.

So - my "social retard" is now happy, confident, outgoing and popular at his new school. I massively regret not moving him earlier.

Good luck OP, trust your instincts on this one.

Thanks eatmyfood.

I have some brilliant colleagues where I teach - some are incredibly good teachers and very kind to their students. For me teaching is in fact my 3rd career and I love it. I spent years in the private sector (where I gained my subject knowledge) and there are others like me with very good subject knowledge (which we actually bother to keep up to date). You need to have good subject specific knowledge AND a passion for learning to be any good at it teaching anything.

As a teacher, it helps to have a personality, a sense of humour and to be generally sociable with good communication skills. In fact it really helps if you actually LIKE other people ! Anti-child and anti-social people in general don't do very well in teaching careers. I often just get the impression that the lady teachers at my ds school don't actually like children very much which sort of defeats the purpose of teaching in a primary school to be honest.

Cory - yes you are absolutely right. It is the teacher's responsibility to deal with bullying/unkind comments in the classroom as well as in the playground.

I have a problem with the entire ethos of the school, not just the grouping system. The grouping system simply perpetuates the ethos of competition and general nastiness which is the point I was making.

I am sure that bullying is not actively promoted at this school, but the teachers are hugely insensitive with ds having been compared to a "toddler" in front of peers. There is a particular cartoon character ds loves which the other children tell him is too "childish".

Who tells these children such things? At what stage does something become too childish for them? Do they natually think that something has toddler status, or is it their parents/teachers who are "socialising" them into such thought processes? I think it must be the latter.

The posters that have suggested a hearing test do not think that your child is profoundly deaf. However, glue ear is so common in young children, and even a small reduction in hearing can effect a child's education. It is also treatable, so why would you not get it checked out?

Don't forget that when you speak to your son it is one-to-one, but when a teacher speaks to him it is across a classroom which almost certainly has some background noise.

No-one is saying that he has a problem with hearing, just that he may do. A sight test at the same time would be useful too. I had no idea that my dd needed to wear glasses before she was checked at the optician.

Bfactor - you're right, teachers should never belittle children like that. Your poor son.

I disagree with you a bit about table groupings / competition though, as if done well it doesn't need to knock a child's confidence. A good school makes every child feel positive about themselves. If yours isn't doing that, then definitely go and look at other schools.

mrz I am afraid I have to still disagree! in business, industrial tribunals, although abused sometimes, do have to prove that favouritism/discrimination is proven to have happened or no one would ever lose or win at them... are teachers different?

teachers are no different ohmydear and teachers have been proved to be at fault in 2% of all complaints. But you are being very naive if you believe that everyone (or even a small proportion of those) who feels they are the victim of discrimination /favouritism get to the point of going to tribunal.

I think you are missing the point, mrz - the point being that parents should feel free to question a teacher if they think it is warranted, and that it will be received in an unbiased and "objective" manner. The fact that many dont because of the environment that you describe i.e "the head should always back the teacher" is not a point to necessarily be proud of. Of course I do not believe that everyone who is a victim of discrim/favouritism gets to the point of a tribunal. The point was made in answer to your suggestion that it could never be proved and your indication that to complain of it was therefore futile!. The fact that only 2% were proved at GTC level does not really say anything bearing in mind the context of the background in schools that you describe.

Sorry ohmydear the 2% figure is for all cases not just those that came before the GTC (many don't get that far ... a bit like tribunals)

mrz, sorry I mostly agree with you (yes it is sometimes possible to 'prove' victimisation at school or in employment, but these tend to be the nastier cases - proof very difficult where it is low level) but am a bit confused by your 2% figure. Are you saying 2% of all complaints against teachers end up with a 'guilty' type finding by the GTC? because if so it seems a particularly useless statistic (sorry, again)

Surely there will be plenty of legitimate complaints, accepted as such by all relevant parties, which never make it as far as the GTC? just as there will be complaints which fall away for lack of evidence, lack of foundation, etc - not every valid complaint against a professional should end up before the relevant professional body, surely, in many cases that would be taking an inappropriate sledgehammer to what could be a very crackable nut.

Are you saying 2% of all complaints against teachers end up with a 'guilty' type finding by the GTC? no I'm saying that 2% of complaints against teachers are proven (GTC may or may not be involved - they are usually involved if the complaint results in a dismissal for example) The report also says that many of the complaints against teachers were malicious or frivolous.

OK, thanks, but the trouble is that just doesn't sound plausible. Where is the figure from - can't see it on the link though am not familiar with the site, it might be on another page somewhere?

Even if there were a high proportion of frivolous/vexatious allegations, on top of the usual misunderstandings/unprovables/mistakes, I can't get my head round the 2%!

Headteachers have demanded fines for the thousands of parents who make false accusations against educators each year.

'Vast majority' of allegations against teachers are false

At what point is the Head Teacher required by law to record a complaint by the parent?

I don't think any parent on here even made the slightest suggestion that they'd like to sue the school, that like suggested that parents and malicious children got together to dis-credit a teacher and make money - are you seriously thinking that is what this thread is about? Can we at least keep things slightly relevant.

when it is made

Complaints against teachers aren't about suing the school

OK but these reports say 1 in 20 which isn't 2% - and are talking about 4000 in the entire country in a year, most of which involve assault - ie serious allegations (possibly the numbers relate to criminal complaints?), not the usual parental complaint, surely?

and the suggestion in the articles is that parents do seem to envisage financial compensation of some sort

I think you have made your argument not credible mrz - you sound unfortunately very anti parental protests! - teachers are not infallible, like any other profession, and I would be very surprised if other professions had only a 2% rate of proven complaints, something is wrong if it does......

this thread is about complaining about relevant problems with teachers and getting an appropriate response from the school - lets not forget that....

i am frankly appalled that a post in which someone wants advice about their son seems to have turned into a bit of a witch hunt against teachers.
Sure there may be some bad teachers out there and trust me they are dealt with. But lets face it, as a parent i know that i am very biased about my daughters education. My personal view about a teacher and how well they do their job may be different to other parents.
For example - in my school, one teacher had 2 complaints about the way he taught a class. The two pupils in question apparently were not learning anything and hadn't progressed at all in a year. From the SAME class, they had 3 letters from parents saying how much he had enthused their child about his subject and how much more they had learnt from the year before. How can this be if as others suggested he was a bad teacher?
I suggest that the op should speak to the head teacher. If there are concerns from others too, then they will be investigated. If other parents are happy with the teaching and other pupils are progressing well, then maybe the headteacher and the class teacher need to suggest how they are going to support the op's son to help him progress too. Otherwise, look for a better school. (i agree that outstanding ofted is not the be all and end all).
Sorry - rant over!

sorry tigg it is not a witch hunt against teachers, completely wrong to say so, the post clearly says that there are great teachers and great schools, just not always!. The thread is supporting the OP in her postition to be allowed to be uncomfortable about what is happening in the class with her son, which involves the teachers... it is only the response of teachers, to her question about advice, which has prompted a response regarding parents rights to complain about dcs teachers attitude - this is what is causing the op to look at leaving the school, no need to whitewash it as an inappropriate response, as for the comment re "how can it be a bad teacher as some children have positive remarks", well that is the point the op is making - favouritism!