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.

@Joanissy I have a 5yo in school and none of his teachers this year or last year have ever behaved the way OPs teacher did. Nor would I condone it. We have 1 kid who is particularly disruptive in the class and potentially undiagnosed SEN (identified by school) and her behaviour is very challenging - running off, not listening, hitting, being "naughty". There is ongoing communication between parents and teacher, primary head teacher and school psychologist on how "best to support" the child and parents and how best to approach this - its a collaborative effort. The tone of the comms is always supportive, empathetic and solution focused NOT snapping at toddlers, or judging the parents for being poor parents. In this situation the teacher would have said oh I can see you want to play in the hedgehog class, but that's for bigger kids, sorry sweetheart, why don't you come and see this and then redirected her to something else. Because a "good" teacher would recognise that 2yo was being a normal curious 2yo - developmentally normal. But instead teacher was inappropriate and unprofessional and not able to control her emotions.

@headlightshiningbright I do think you need to take some control of the narrative here. I had a recent issue with my sons behaviour in school - nothing major and he has ASD. We had a reoccurring issue over a month. The school asked for a meeting with DS teacher, primary head teacher and school psychologist. We discussed what was happening, why it might be happening and what we thought we could do collectively to help improve the situation - we made a plan and set another meeting for 3wks later to reconvene. We also kept a record of his behaviour - what was happening and when to try and spot patterns which I'd recommend doing to identify triggers - tiredness, hunger etc. I was very proactive in what we did and we resolved the issue. The school appreciated that we were proactive and making an effort. If I were you and would be emailing to have a meeting and discuss all of these points when you can attend without your daughter. If it was an isolated one off issue then I would leave it. All kids have the odd bad day.

Thank you.

I did meet with her (in a proper, scheduled meeting!) before half term as I was concerned it felt like ds was getting into trouble a lot over little things - low level disruption if you like, which as all teachers know isn’t low level. I was reassured this wasn’t the case.

He’s got a couple of friends in the class and they aren’t positive friendships. It’s a shame as there actually are boys in there he likes and relates well to but gravitates to the other two time and again and then ends up in trouble … I’ve tried to encourage him to play with others, had others round for play dates - but he just can’t seem to stay away from these other two!

That isn’t the whole story of course, he’s capable of being silly without their influence, but it is a troubling factor.

OP I was caught on the hop a few times for “quick chats” with DSs teachers as he had additional needs and at that time I had DD who wasn’t yet at preschool with me. They’d always immediately offer DD some colouring sheets or show her over to the toy /sand /play area . Look none of us were there so sometimes in these situations it’s hard to judge who was in the right or wrong. It’s more or less the end of the year so before you know it you won’t have to deal with this teacher anyway

Yep, I’m not a teacher but considering no other professional is likely to snap at a toddler in their workplace in front of a parent, I would assume this would be doubly true for a teacher. Any one with a shred of insight into children’s behaviour would know a bit of distraction works wonders in this situation.

I think your follow up advice to the @headlightshiningbright is really good. OP has to deal with this teacher next year as well so it would be worthwhile getting a plan in place to protect and nurture your DS,
Please do not let her push you over though, once is a lapse of judgment, more than that and it needs to be highlighted. Bear in mind your ds my be acting out because he doesn’t like the teacher?

It’s a mixed reception and Y1 class! Then when he goes into the next class DD starts so I am keen to keep things cordial.

@headlightshiningbright so we had a similar thing with my DS. He struck up a close friendship with the girl who was considered to be "the baddest kid in class" - this is what all the other kids said. The school have said to the parents they think she has development issues but the parents won't entertain the idea - meanwhile she causes chaos every day. But we had a period of time where she was telling DS to hit other kids, and telling him what to say. In our meeting with the school we said we didn't think the dynamic was a positive one and didn't want them together next year which they agreed to. We also set up playdates with other kids to reinforce wider friendship groups. The school did a lot of workshops of role play and friendships. We don't exclude this girl either in playdates but at least if u can supervise I can keep an eye out for it. And we have since found DS is playing more with other kids and is less influenced by her. We told the school we know that he is responsible for his own actions but also recognise that as part of his ASD he can be highly suggestible - often copies other kids behaviour. So peer groups are important.

You cannot be possibly serious 😹
you are saying that a grown woman whose JOB is to deal with very young children is much more tired and exhausted at only 3 pm
than a 2 year old and so she is allowed to have less patience than a 2 year old? 😹😹😹

this has to be a wind up.
I’m a solicitor btw. Hope you are not a barrister.