My sons teacher was awful to my toddler and I’m still a bit confused and upset about it

[headlightshiningbright]

My ds (5, in reception) has not had a good week at school and got into quite a bit of trouble. His teacher wanted to speak to me about it which is fair enough. I am supportive of the school and I have hopefully made it clear to ds that there cannot be a repeat of this behaviour.

However, in the meeting, my nearly three year old kicked off a bit. There was a club going on next door which she wanted to join in and she ran to the door and started crying and saying she wanted to make what they were making. My DS’s teacher spoke really sharply to her, saying her name and very firmly ‘no’ - I can’t honestly say it was shouting but wasn’t far off. She then carried on telling her off.

To be honest the whole meeting felt very confrontational and while I sort of understand she wasn’t pleased with ds it felt like my parenting had been tried and felt lacking and that she needed to step in.

I don’t even know what the point to this post is! I guess I’m just wondering if others would feel a bit peculiar about it? Intentionally or otherwise it was incredibly undermining and felt horrible to be honest.

I think it’s that a lot of the time people like bashing the OP, so if the OP is about a teacher there’s a lot of defensiveness and argey-bargey from teachers and those purporting to support them but if the OP is a teacher we then see ‘teacher bashing.’ So if I’d posted as the teacher - ‘WIBU to raise my voice at a two year old sibling of one of the children in my class’ if probably have been annihilated. But there are many sensible and measured comments too.

Sorry OP, there are alot of nut jobs on here. I would just end the thread because alot of the posters have lost the plot. Very normal 2 yo behaviour to want to join in a class. She didn't do anything wrong, I very much doubt she would have been able to open the door herself and had she tried to you would have obviously gone to stop her - i don't think anyone including the teacher gave you a chance and I think the teachers reaction was disproportionate to what happened. Also think it's pretty human for a 5 yo to want to splash in a puddle and his hearing loss should be taken into account. Seems to be a lack of empathy and rationale on this forum.
Having a 5yo myself and regularly witnessing playground antics, they all slip up, make mistakes, do things they shouldn't at this stage because THEY ARE 5. And still learning. Kids learn from mistakes. It's how they grow. Your child is not bad, he might be a bit immature for his age and you probably have your hands full with 2 kids. Do not beat yourself up. People on here are bat sh** crazy. At the age of 5 we have most success reinforcing good behaviour- definitely see what you can do to improve the hearing situation and make an appt with the school to discuss. Best to get a handle on it and control the narrative.

Thank God your are not a teacher @TaoJing I feel sorry for your kids.

You were in their classroom. That teacher is used to managing other people's children's behaviour in her classroom and it would have been an automatic reaction on her behalf to step in and speak to your child regardless of her young age.

@headlightshiningbright I'm sorry that some people on this thread are haranguing you and inventing details about an incident they didn't witness, rather than offering supportive or helpful comments.

I agree with you that your DD did nothing wrong. She's not yet 3, of course she doesn't have a great deal of impulse control or a mature understanding of delayed gratification. Sometimes people genuinely seem to view children as miniature adults. It's bizarre. Your DD saw other children doing a craft project that was very appealing to her and wanted to join them. There is absolutely nothing wrong with that, it's a perfectly natural thing for a child of that age to want. Of course, that doesn't mean that you would sit blithely by and allow her to disrupt the other children. As you've said, you had no intention of allowing her to run into the other room, but the teacher's sharp comments and telling her off didn't help the situation and instead made it worse. I would hope her reaction was due to a bad day, frustration, etc. We're all human, we all get it wrong sometimes.

I would imagine that one reason you are still thinking about this incident is that you're concerned that it wasn't a one-off, especially since it happened during a meeting that had an antagonistic and hostile tone. That would worry me too TBH.

The first sounds like the school mine are at now (also EA). We moved from somewhere where the school was run by someone who would have given Miss Trunchbull a run for her money

That whole interaction felt really upsetting to me too OP as I read it. The teacher sounded impatient and just unkind. Presumably because she's having a hard time with your son's behaviour at the moment, but I can totally understand why you would feel upset. It also feels like she has judged your parenting by not leaving it to you to manage your DD. I'm not sure I would really want another 3 years of her either if this is the case.

I also just wanted to say that moderate hearing loss is really significant in a school setting both in terms of what he can and can't hear and also potentially with behaviour. My DS has had glue ear twice and although he's well behaved in school the difference in his home behaviour after grommets was very noticeable. If you are offered grommets I would highly recommend them.

LadyWhistledownsSocietyPapers · Yesterday 22:11
So yes, if I had to see a lawyer and had no childcare, my toddler would be coming with me.

At 5-10 quid a minute or whatever it costs in the UK now, I'm sure you would. Of course.While the kid screams, the clock marches on...ker-ching.
I have known lawyers to curtail meetings with screeching kids in the room.With fairly decisive language.

Hey OP, there are lots of “perfect parents” on here who don’t seem to have spent any time with any toddlers recently (or ever?). I don’t have any specific advice, other than to say my DD is the same age as yours and is very much still a toddler 😅 I think you are entitled to your feelings, whatever you decide to do (or not); and you can feel free to ignore some of the frankly batshit responses on here. I hope things improve for you soon xx

I’m going to hazard a guess that she had no other option? Did that possibility really not cross your mind before posting or did you just fancy putting the boot in?

Neither possibility, as ‘the professional’ you self-identified as, is flattering to you.

Why are you so determined to make it all the OP's fault? And if you are going to contradict other posters, at least do us all the courtesy of reading the OP's posts properly first.

If that’s what she was thinking then she’s in the wrong job, with such poor understanding of child development (it is absolutely developmentally normal for a 2 year old with an ear infection to throw a wobbler when faced with disappointment, and does not in any way indicate they will become a badly behaved 5 year old).

Op I’m not a teacher but have three grown up kids. I gradually realised that not all teachers would gel with my child and I wouldn’t like all of them with 3 children there were moments of horribleness but I learned to ride the wave eventually and not expect it all to work well all the time.

This. It doesn’t sound like the teacher has done anything wrong here. It sounds like you have issues with both of your children and need to reflect on your strategies). Look into some parenting classes/courses.

I don’t personally think a five year child being silly in reception and a two year old wailing by a door are cause for immediate alarm. That’s not to say I can’t do better; I’m sure I can, but parenting classes for this reason alone seems somewhat overkill.

This isn’t a reflection of your parenting op. Kids can sometimes just be arseholes. My eldest was a dream. My youngest is now 5 and I think back to when she was 2/3 and some of the things I had to deal with in public and honestly I was out of my depth and frankly bewildered by her crazy behaviour so many times.
I think it’s natural to feel defensive over your children and maybe a quick ‘I’ll deal with it….x come here please and stop that’ would have shown the teacher that you didn’t need their input. At least not in that kind of tone.
Please don’t take some of the vile comments here personally. Honestly there are some deeply unpleasant posters on here who will jump on any thread if it gives them an opportunity to kick someone down. They do it to feel superior but in reality they are just lacking somewhere in life.

I was braced for it but yes, some comments are awful and say more about the poster than me or my children.

The thing is OP you re upset people have suggested it might be your parenting and you think they’re being mean to you. However, you said the teacher was “awful”. You didn’t say unreasonable or sharp or express your self in multiple ways that show you understand the teacher may have been at the end of a long hard day.

You get to call someone else awful but expect to be treated with respect and consideration yourself. I would imagine many teachers reading that would, quite rightly, have been pissed off at you and reacted to that.
If you don’t like being called an awful parent perhaps you should hold off calling someone an awful teacher. You could have asked for opinions on how it was dealt with without insults - that’s what you wanted for you but not what you did.

I’m not upset, I just think it’s nonsense. It’s very limited information. My son was silly in school, my toddler cried and wanted to do something and I need parenting classes? Absolute nonsense and a desire just to make me feel bad. Luckily, I did wait until I was in the sort of headspace I could take it but even so it isn’t very pleasant to read and stops you getting advice because you’re saying ‘no actually, she wasn’t running around the classroom …’

At no point have I said she is an awful teacher. I have said the way she spoke to us all, especially the toddler, was somewhat hostile and belligerent: perhaps that wasn’t the intention but it certainly wasn’t a supportive ‘this hasn’t gone well; let’s see how we can all work together to change it’ conversation which tbh I think is reasonable for this age and stage.

So perhaps you’d like to read through again because I certainly didn’t say she was an awful teacher or even suggest this. My comments have all related to this specific event.

The key difference there is that the op has come here to vent and almost immediately people are falling over themselves to tell her she’s a shit mum.

She didn’t tell the teacher she was awful. She is saying it anonymously on a forum.

Who said the teacher couldn't cope? She has a class of likely 30 odd kids and can't have one child constantly misbehaving.

I'm sure all children, especially five year olds, have their moments, but if the behaviour has been going on all week or more, it's more than a moment.

I don't think it's too much to ask to bring the behaviour to the parents' attention and hope they'll support the school in tackling the poor behaviour.

I appreciate the support, but I’m not! I did think this particular meeting / conversation was needlessly hostile and somewhat cold and uncomfortable in tone, but that’s no reflection on her abilities as a teacher.

They had an INSET day on Monday and the meeting was Tuesday, so it was hardly going on all week.

I agree it was unacceptable but equally it wasn’t days and days of terrible behaviour.

OP cut out the semantics! You said my “son’s teacher was awful” and now you’re saying I didn’t say she was awful. Technically, you’re wrong I said she spoke in an awful way. This is the kind of nit picking that drives teachers mad. My naughty child didn’t do this precise thing they did that thing so this proves you are wrong. While claiming you didn’t call the teacher awful, you re saying she was ‘hostile’ and implying she is cold - that sounds like an awful teacher to me.
If you were nit picking like this with the teacher, my child only did this because of that, if you had done this then my child wouldn’t do that, it was only 2 days not 3 days, she was probably really bloody irritated with you and then your younger child starts up!

Does she know you're a teacher OP? I'd drop that into conversation if not.