What would/ should you do if someone else's child confides in you when you are helping in a school?

[claire70]

I was helping with the Y1 reading last week and little girl who is new to the school told me she is unhappy at school. Her comment was provoked by the story she'd just read to me. I didn't really probe, but from the little she said, I got the impression that she just hasn't settled in yet and maybe feels an outsider in the playground (she's relatively new to the school).

I know her mother a little and she seems to me to be the kind of parent who is really concerned to do right by their child and I am 100% sure she'd want to know this (but I guess she does already?).

The teacher is a nice person too and very professional. Maybe two criticisms I would make though is that there isn't a lot of time to listen to the children because there is only a part-time TA and I know my own children had trouble settling in too but the school didn't pick up on that either.

So what is the etiquette in these sort of situations? Should I tell the mother or the teacher what was said to me and leave them to deal with it, as they see appropriate. Or should I just butt out and say nothing as it is really none of my business? I don't want to

Whistleblowing to my mind would mean :

• telling the teacher
• if no joy, telling the head
• if no joy, telling the governors
• if no joy, telling Ofsted.

It would not include telling the parents.

what about all the parent partnership type initiatives? Why are the parents the last to find out?

When you started helping you should have been told who to speak to in the event of a disclosure or concern usually the class teacher unless it is a child protection issue when you would need to speak to the designated CP person. Nothing in your post suggests that there is a CP concern so I would raise the issue with teacher.
Speaking to the parents would be in breech of confidentiality and while it is a huge concern that the child is so unhappy she isn't in any danger in school.

This isn't the same as the newspaper report unless you know the child is unhappy because she is being bullied???
The lady in the report should have informed the designated child protection person who should be known by all the staff students and volunteers in the school.

I've parent volunteered at school loads over the years and never been told anything about confidentiality! tbh, I hate this whole "Can't say anything straight to the people directly concerned" culture we've fallen into; must follow a "policy" instead about what you're allowed to say to whom.

mrs - I, agree: the story is completely different from my circumstances (and no, I wasn't given any kind of intro).

One major difference between me and that lady is of course that I am not an employee and therefore I am not remunerated in any way. However, I am happy to conform to school procedures (once i know what they are).

Whistleblowing is when you see something happening in a/your organisation that is wrong. Who you tell depends very much on the circumstances, but it is easy to think of lots of times where you do not give the perpetrator time to fix things themselves e.g. if a bank manager was stealing, then it would not be a satisfactory solution to tip him off.
In this case the dinner lady wasn't even whistleblowing: she just wrongly assumed that the parents already knew what had happened, but the school had only given them a first aid report that said there had been a 2skipping rope incident". She didn't know that and if she had wanted to protect herself then she might have acted more cautiously. However, in the end all she did was tell the parents what they had a right to know. She did not name the other children, so the only child's confidentiality that she breached was the daughter of the people she was speaking to. Tell me I am wrong, or what I am missing?

As a parent volunteer you are expected to follow the same confidentiality procedures as an employee.

There are certain standard procedures that all/most schools follow (as I explained) which the class teacher or whoever asked you to help should have explained.

The dinner lady broke the school's code of confidentiality and it doesn't make a difference whether or not she named other pupils involved or not. If she felt the school wasn't dealing with things correctly she should have followed procedure

As I said in my last post, I will honour the school's procedures now that I know what they most likely are. I have not breached them and I will not.

The dinner lady was sacked for breaching the child's confidentiality, not the school's. And IF you believe her story then she did not knowingly even do that .. she just asked the mother how her daughter was. She assumed (wrongly) that when the head said she had some calls to make that she meant that she was going to call the child's parents. Instead the head only called the aggressors's parents (one of whom was a school governor).

I do have a problem though with any attitude that puts the reputation of a school before the safety of the children in it. And there does seem to be an emerging theme that schools are in some way above parents when determining what is best for a child, which would be a view that I do not agree with at all.

It is not putting the school's reputation before the safety of the child, it is about not giving a parent "half a story" because even as an employee the dinner lady is not in full possession of all the facts and alarming parents without knowing what action has been taken is wrong. None of us know the full story (unless we are the parents or the child or the head of the school) so making judgements from sensationalised news reports is pointless.

If a child is in danger there are procedures in place which the dinner lady should have followed but instead she "gossiped"

She told the head immediately. How is that gossiping?

But do you real feel "gossip" is the right verb to use when the adult who rescued a child from being tied up and whipped, speaks to the child's mother?

I am really surprised at this thread because what started as a small dilemma, seems to be evolving into much darker territory. Mrz. I know you are a HT (because you said you were when you helped me in a thread a few months ago) and I have always respected your views (and have been grateful for your help), but today for this first time, i find myself disagreeing with you. It makes me think that either you are representing a viewpoint which does not respect the parent's role in a child's life or (more likely and definitely hopefully), I have just misunderstood your meaning.

Yes I do think "gossip" is the right word to use. It was not her place to tell the parents or to discuss it with parents it was the job of the headteacher. Now did the headteacher do the right thing is another thing altogether.

claire if you know I'm a headteacher it is more than I do and I have certainly never claimed to be one as that would be a lie.

I am however the designated child protection teacher and I would be concerned if either a dinner lady or headteacher failed to act correctly which I feel as an outsider (not in full possession of all the facts) is the case in the school in question. The dinner lady should have said nothing to the parents and the head should have.

So the priority of Cover Your Arse prevails over the cause of Transparency, yet again. As has always been the case with all institutions. That's what "Policies" and "Procedures" are really about. (Sigh).

I told the teacher this morning. I felt like an interfering busy-body as I went over to talk to her but she was concerned and took it seriously. I hope she sorts something out for this little girl.

No the priority of keeping a child safe takes precedence over jumping in without knowing all the facts lljkk. As in another real case of a well meaning classroom helper asking a parent about a child's injuries not knowing the child was at risk so tipping off the parent to do a vanishing trick ...

claire I'm pleased you've been able to talk to the teacher and she has recognised your concerns. I imagine you feel much happier