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.

SecretSquid · Today 10:17
OP, apparently you have "failed to be proactive in your parenting to facilitate a meeting"!
I'm not sure if the writer of this bilge (47 years of phenomenal results, dontcha-know) was expecting you to use your gift of clairvoyance to book in a meeting about an incident that you hadn't yet been told about... But then my attention wanders when someone uses lots of bigly words for no good reason.

I was responding to OP's snide comment about my professionalism : if you speak to parents in the way you are to me, I’m not surprised you get their backs up (where did I say that?)

OP - this is a forum for debate, for the expression of opinion.Everyone's ...

and SecretSquid...sorry if "bigly words" confuse you.

Once again for those who don't understand bigly words:

OP, you should have told the teacher ("being proactive" ) all the background
about why it was not convenient to speak with her at that time and arranged another time. ("facilitating a meeting"). Geddit? No frustrated teacher evidently concerned about elder DC's misbehaviour and being"awful" when she had the myriad of (oops) many tasks of a teacher at the end of the day.

And since this thread is full of excuses for everything, I was taking a few moments from hours of writing a book using bigly words and had fallen into a certain style. That, and a couple of glasses of literary lubricant.

Right, back to my chapter book...

Many teachers do 1 year pgce or Scitt type courses where they learn on the job. You can’t assume everyone does a 4 year bed

It wasn’t snide, or that wasn’t the intent. According to you, you have a career of nearly forty years in which parents and pupils alike have only spoken about you in glowing terms - Phenomenal results. Phenomenal relationships with parents and children.You should see the boxes of cards, letters, the grateful thanks for what they registered and appreciated as what I had done for them. "The one teacher who changed my life..." all that sort of thing

Simultaneously, you tell me that Oh, I have had so many dealings with people like this who defend their indefensible stance. They and their little kiddie-winkies are never, ever wrong. They do their kids no good at all. And they can't see it. Teacher bad. Mummy good. Kiddy good. Bad, bad teacher.

I do think that the insistence that I said something I didn’t (awful to my DD = awful teacher) is trying in the extreme but more generally it would be really unusual in a career that length of time to never have approached something badly or been wrong and I have been. I’ve definitely been too strict / soft / blamed Oliver when it was actually Reuben, overreacted to some silly whispering and ignored some big event without intending to.

I think as teachers we are used to not losing face in the classroom and that can be frustrating for parents when this continues in adult conversations. On this instance, you were incorrect to suggest that I called the teacher an awful teacher or person (actually on the contrary I think she’s a very good teacher but that isn’t actually relevant here)

The irony was that in insisting I was the one nitpicking and defending my stance you were doing the very thing you accused me of. And the fact that you don’t see that doesn’t indicate to me someone blessed with insight and understanding about themselves or other people.

To be honest though it was convenient to meet at that time, or as convenient as any other. I’ll always make time for my children’s teachers even if they aren’t telling me what I’d ideally like to hear!

The PGCE includes psychology and child development.
I wasn't assuming they all did education degrees. I know many, many teachers and have done for over 40 years.

I think the teacher was being unreasonable. She isn't your toddler's teacher and it's not her place to tell her off. Sometimes toddlers have tantrums, it's not the end of the world. There are a lot of unpleasant comments here, I wouldn't take much notice. There are a lot of people on Mumsnet who enjoy sticking the boot in, and there's also a lot who think teachers can do no wrong, and apparently some teachers who think the same thing! There are lots of great teachers, lots of terrible teachers, and everything in between! Being a teacher is no guarantee of anything.

They and their little kiddie-winkies are never, ever wrong. They do their kids no good at all. And they can't see it. Teacher bad. Mummy good. Kiddy good. Bad, bad teacher.

I became friends with some of my kids’ teachers. As I said before, my children were lucky enough to have largely amazing teachers with only one or two duds (who seemed to hate kids) in their entire school career. That’s pretty impressive. I made sure I appreciated the great teachers with words, cards and most importantly, emails to the Head.

They talked in general terms about difficult days and challenging kids and parents. None of them used a nasty tone or spoke disparagingly like this about children and parents. Good teachers rarely do.

I am a teacher and in charge of behaviour. I meet with lots of parents to discuss behaviour. It doesn't sound like a meeting, as you were both standing - just sounds like a conversation. I would not tell your toddler off , if you had to bring a toddler with you I would understand you might be feeling under pressure and frazzled. I might even try to get some stickers to busy your toddler. It's not my job to make you feel bad about your parenting; we are meant to be a team.

At my daughter's school, staff will take toddlers into the nursery to play so that you can talk properly with staff. Why would parents seek support if they feel small and stupid ?

You remind me of the majority of my kids’ former teachers. Decent and reasonable professionals with an understanding attitude!

lol, I don’t want to argue, but i come from a family of teachers, know loads of them and I also did a highly regarded early years pgce. Sure there were a couple of psychology lectures but mostly it was about how to teach. I didn’t learn much about how toddlers work until I had my own children - and I am a much more empathetic teacher now that I’ve had children too.

Finally some common sense on the thread. I think try to survive until the end of term OP. I think your DS got unlucky with a teacher who doesn't like teaching or kids, is unprofessional and lacks empathy and knowledge of child development. There are some of those out there. Hopefully next year you get a better one!

I honestly don’t know how posters can take from this interaction that the teacher doesn’t like teaching or children and is unprofessional. I take from it that she wanted to talk to you about your son’s behaviour to try and nip it in the bud, your other child was kicking off and she’d had a long day and was frustrated that she couldn’t have the conversation she needed to have. I can’t believe how this relatively small incident has been blown up in both the OP’s mind and how others are piling in to vent their grievances about teachers.

Any other profession that snapped at your toddler because they had a long day and were a bit frustrated - would that be ok? It's not ok. It happened but it's not ok - teachers can't behave to different standards. We all have bad days - we need to deal with that and not take it out on others especially in a professional capacity.

Exactly. As a doctor, if one of my patients had a toddler who was causing a bit of a disruption, I would not dream of snapping at the child or the parent. In fact it has happened, and I engage the child and smile at them and then take my focus back to the patient. If the child were doing something potentially dangerous, I would let the parent deal with it first anyway, and I would just not behave unpleasantly to anybody. Toddlers are toddlers. And my day being stressful would be no excuse to snap at anyone.

I’ve noticed lots of people jumping to the defence of the teacher also refer to it being the end of a long day, the teacher giving up their free time for a meeting, etc etc. It was 3.15, what do they think other full time workers are doing at that time?! It’s not the end of the day that’s for sure.

I think teaching is a hard profession with a lot of extra work involved, but the teachers here aren’t really supporting that idea.

It was a small incident but it’s true it had played on my mind rather a lot.

I don’t think there was any frustration there. She’d said what needed to be said and we were saying our goodbyes when the door opened and the hedgehogs inadvertently caused a problem

I think it’s played on my mind because she was parenting my child for me and while I know some posters are very insistent that that is because I didn’t, that’s not the case. So I suspect it is either that she overstepped believing herself to be helping, took frustration of a bad day out on my toddler or decided to show me ‘how it’s done’, or possibly a mix of the above.

I am making no snap judgements or decisions but I am conscious I don’t feel I can approach her to ask about ds now and I would like to as although my thread has focused on DD, I am very concerned about my DS.

And that's the cost - the partnership between teacher and parent has been damaged. I felt the same way about a physiotherapist who got grumpy with me for not telling him about an old injury, I had but he didn't listen - he snapped at me. I wrote a note to the practice saying I could not continue with the treatment because I wasn't happy with his attitude - he probably had a bad day too - but that's not my problem and I had the choice to pay for a different therapist.

There is actually no evidence the teacher had had a long day. There is evidence that the toddler did, as she was up since 4:30 in the morning with an ear infection.

There is also ample evidence that the teacher does not like children/her job, she snapped at a two year old who was not in her care, she snapped at the op and she also told the ops ds to remove his Spider-Man keychain. My own ds is 6 and in an infant class and all of the kids have keychains/ attachments on their school bags. It’s obviously not against policy in ops school either as she said all the kids have them. So why would the teacher single this 5 year old out and tell him he can’t wear his anymore?? Seems pretty cruel to me.

It is unbelievable that some posters are willing to allow the teacher (a grown adult and a professional teacher) the grace to have had a long day(doing the job she is paid to do)but not a sick two year old?!?

As pp said it was 3:15 not 5:15, it was her choice to call the meeting. If she was feeling frazzled and exhausted and stressed from her looooong day then she could simply have scheduled a meeting for another time.

There is actually no evidence the teacher had had a long day. There is evidence that the toddler did, as she was up since 4:30 in the morning with an ear infection.

Any day in a classroom from 8am to 4ish is a long day when dealing with 30 Yr Rs!

You cannot seriously be comparing a 2 year old (who may have napped during the day) with a woman doing a full-on professional job?

There is also ample evidence that the teacher does not like children/her job,

All I can say is thank goodness some posters are not barristers as they would be doing a very bad job with their 'logic' 😀

OT but as an empty-nester, this:
DD loves hedgehogs for some reason so started pointing to the closed door and saying ‘my make a hedgehog
makes my heart melt with cuteness. I have forgot the downsides ;-)

A huge percentage of posters on MN are teachers who post all day every day. They arrive in a pack to every post about teachers and tear the poster apart.

It’s pathetic bullying behaviour. Use the search button and you will see for yourself.

Any day in a classroom from 8am to 4ish is a long day when dealing with 30 Yr Rs!
That is the job she is paid to do! She does it every single day Mon-Fri and I’m not saying 5 y/o’s are easy but that is literally her job, if she can’t handle it she should make a change.

You cannot seriously be comparing a 2 year old (who may have napped during the day) with a woman doing a full-on professional job?
If you read the thread the op explained the toddler didn’t nap and I am 100% comparing the two… and am finding the teacher lacking in every way she dealt with the situation. There is no excuse for her lack of professionalism, if she was so tired from her ‘full-on’ day she should have rescheduled.

She hadn’t napped @TaoJing ; I do say this. Appreciate it’s a long thread but you’ve been very vocal about people not reading, so …

@TellingIt it is cute … problem is when she focuses on something she quickly goes to tears / tantrum when it doesn’t happen. I’m really hoping this improves soon 😩 it is a developmental stage though and to be honest there’s just not a whole lot you can do … I know you weren’t suggesting otherwise!

I guess the point is if we’re awarding grace and kindness to the teacher for a long day, frustration etc we do have to award the same to DD, I don’t see that there’s any way around that really.

Thank you, this made me lol! Maybe the teacher was simply ‘frazzled’ and ‘worn out from a long day’ of bullying people on mumsnet! Sounds about right actually!

Well, I can’t argue with that logic. Two year olds get naps and in fact don’t do any work at all the lazy sods, and should therefore be able to regulate their emotions. Indeed, they cannot be compared with professional women, who have earned their right to snap at people by 4ish (or 3.15 in the afternoon to everyone else) dammit!

To be fair I should clarify here I don’t think DS’s teacher is cruel or nasty or mean. I certainly haven’t seen any evidence of that and I think she is a skilled and talented teacher.

However I do think on this occasion she was wrong in how she spoke to me and my two year old and perhaps I need to reflect on how I can be a bit more assertive in such situations. I’ve been very keen to be a supportive and respectful parent and as such it’s possible I’ve gone a bit far the other way. I don’t want to be That Parent but equally I do have growing concerns (not about the teacher as such but more about ds in reception generally) and they do need to be addressed.

I won’t do anything for a week or so though unless she approaches me first (and hope no one is making hedgehogs!(