Y6 DD class disrupted by unruly pupils. Frightened to go to school

[fuziluv]

Background-My DD is in Year 6, she finally has a great teacher after months of supply teachers. Sch is struggling after poor ofsted and we would have considered moving her but she loves the school, current, now permanent teacher is fab and SATs are looming so want to minimise disruption.
For a few months, 2 pupils have been causing disruption to lessons, physically violent with angry outbursts and have to be physically restrained. When my daughter was last on the receiving end of one of the children’s outbursts, head butted in the chest, the teacher said se was in the wrong place at the wrong time but it is being dealt with.
Today child has major outburst, throws glue stick across room and it hits DD arm, leaving a scratch/bruise. He then throws hard back books and one hits DD and another child in face. After teachers are taken from other classes to deal with child my DD and other who was hurt are given ice packs. No phone calls home....she has come home very distressed and frightened to return to school.
That child was sent home lunchtime, not sure if they will return tomorrow.
Then this afternoon another child kicks off, throws a chair, kicks and screams also has to be forcibly restrained but is not sent home but allowed to spend 2 hours playing with Lego to calm him down.
I do not dispute these children have issues and for that I am sorry but it is affecting my child’s education.
I have written another strong email to the Head, awaiting reply.
Anyone else had similar??

You can't send a child home unless an adult comes to collect them, which often parents just won't do. Calming them down is sometimes to best option.

Keep complaining and asking the Head how they will safeguard your child, how they can win her trust, how they will support her and others in the class who may feel the same, how they will ensure her educations does not suffer.

I suggest your daughter writes down how she felt at the time and how she feels when the child might be going to kick off. This is something schools do to gauge the impact of an unruly child and if support as a class or group is needed.

The lego therapy is a good idea so that aspect the school are doing well - the children were presumably not disrupting the class at that point. Obviously it would be much better if the child had been removed before they completely lost control. It sounds like the children can't really cope in the classroom and the school doesn't have the resources to properly manage them.

SATS are irrelevant so don’t keep her in a bad school because of that. Her SATS results have no bearing on anyone except the school.

Do what is best for her long term education. You only get one chance.

I hope you heard back from the Head. It's not something your dc should have to put up with. A boy was like this in dd's Year 1 class. It wasn't his fault, he just couldn't cope. Luckily they were able to find a special school that suited him better. This was around 2013 but it's possible it's harder to find special school places now

Your DD has a right to feel safe in school. It’s not a safeguarding issue but schools must keep pupils safe and they are failing to do this.

I would make an appointment to see the Head. Immediately. It’s not acceptable that these DC are behaving like this towards other children. They certainly could be excluded. Also the Head or SLT should be intervening and ensuring all pupils are safe.

Many DC have issues but their behaviour cannot be allowed to impinge so greatly on others and you must complain. The DC should be removed from the classroom immediately they kick off. Getting the Head to intervene is a start.

The lego therapy is a good idea so that aspect the school are doing well

Lego therapy is a group activity so doubt it was that.

OP my DD has to move schools because of a boy like this, she moved for year 6. However I understand your concern for SATS.

Schools hands are tied and to be honest your complaints serve to help them get extra support and funding. Ask all the parents to do the same. The more complaints the louder the school are heard.

Thanks all for the replies.
I got an email back from the Head advising that they are dealing with the situation with both children with the support of external bodies.
The one child was suspended yesterday, not sure if he’s back today.
I also had a phone call from the class teacher apologising for not informing me that DDhad been hurt.
Am documenting it all and other parents have also complained. We’ll see!

I think that’s a reasonable start. They have responded and they have apologised. They appear to be taking advice. It might not be a quick fix but they are dealing with it. Have they suggested how they can help your DD settle back into school? This should be discussed in my opinion. Usually DC are open to a caring adult looking out for them and taking their point of view seriously. If the school can find a TA to be a bit of a “mother hen” for DD until half term, I think this might help.

Also I hope your DD isn’t going to the same secondary school as the children with poor behaviour?

It’s always tough for schools to deal with these things.

If they can’t safely get the pupil in meltdown out of the class then they need to have a plan to safely get the other pupils out to protect them and to also protect the pupil in meltdown.

School need to have a plan in place to keep all pupils safe

Complain every single time. If the children are violent they have no place in a mainstream school.

It’s obviously completely unacceptable that your DD has been hurt and is afraid of going into school. I’m sure you can’t be the only parent deeply worried about how this behaviour is affecting their child, even if their DC haven’t been in the direct receiving line.

It sounds like action is being taken & yes document everything and go in after any further incidences. I would be extremely hesitant about removing your child at this stage in Year 6. Depending on where she is heading, her SATS scores very well may matter. Some secondary schools run mixed ability classes but a lot will stream & some like DDs school will do so on their SATS results (as well as predict their GCSE grades and track them against this).Yes there will be a test or two into the year to ensure they are in the right stream and they may go down or up one but you do not want your child starting out in bottom streams. In DDs school they have 4 streams and a draconian behaviour policy - DD is in the top streams for everything bar Science where she is in stream 3. The general behaviour, number of detentions given and attitude to learning in this stream according to DD is a very different ball game to her other classes. On top of that, if your DD has good friends, plunging her into a new school now on top of the huge change coming ahead in September will be very very disorientating for her.
I would as a PP has suggested try and find out where these children might be headed next before Secondary offers are out and then take a view on things after offer. In a bigger school she might not come across them very often, in a small she might. If it turns out that they all are going to go to the same Secondary, I would speak to the school in advance asking them not to placed in the same class based on a prior history of violence.

DH is Vice Chair of Governors of our local Primary and they have just temporarily excluded one child after similar behaviour. They also have a dedicated support teacher who will have essentially counselling & coping sessions with children dealing with a whole range of issues. It may be helpful for your DD to have a few sessions with the equivalent in her school just to help her cope through this? As parents we can be too angry, protective and emotive to always give the right answers to our DC!

Good luck OP! It may not seem like it now but really in terms of this Primary, the end is in sight.

A friend of mine's child was excluded for a week for kicking another child so I would expect the same here. However he was not indiscriminate, he was kicking the person who was taunting him. In your child's case it is unprovoked, which is worse.

I would make it very clear to the teacher / heat teacher that your child is now afraid to go to school and anxious. It is not correct that one or two children are allowed to disrupt the education of a whole class. If this happened to my child I would make a big fuss and keep a record of all incidents.

My friend's child had to attend a referal unit for a year part-time. They have really small classes and it really helped him. He attended his normal school in the afternoons. The waiting list is long though...

Good luck.

^^pp - its alright saying 'if they are violent they have no place in a mainstream school' where do you think they should go then ? it took months and months of threats etc to pupils and staff to remove one of our yr3 to the PRU six weeks later and hes back and still the same only sleeps on the floor when hes done being a pain or trying to escape

There isn’t anywhere for DC to go. That’s why mainstream schools have to manège these DC. It is slow progress and hard work. Many disruptive DC are permanently excluded but this doesn’t resolve the problem. They need help and they need to have effective strategies in place to deal with their aggression.

Your poor DD and the poor teachers who have to deal with these children and are no doubt getting injured themselves.
It's no wonder nobody wants to be a teacher nowadays.

This really isn’t an everyday occurrence in every school. Most DC are perfectly calm.