The "plan" to keep wee difficult child and the other bd girl apart at school

[Shari]

The little girl that has issues and ends up provoking wee at school? Here's the plan to deal with that situation, in all its infinite wisdom.

We'll call her Malory.

I'm a little disappointed. While its great, in theory, if this was the answer, it would have solved itself as wee runs away from her.

I guess my first question is how. The second is what about all the times that the class is milling about, or perhaps isn't supposed to be, yet she is, and she approaches him, or he approaches her (I've never seen him do it, but its possible), or they just cross paths - what's going to prevent that. There are 24 kids and 2 adults in a 20x20-ish room...Who's enforcing it? The kids? The teacher? The aid? What happens when one or the other violates it?

Yeah...need to work on this.

Plan of Action for Wee and Malory​

The following steps should be followed to ensure that Malory and Wee can co-exist peacefully at school:

1.Malory and Wee should never be partners.
2.Malory and Wee should not be in the same group.
3.Malory and Wee should not have seats at the same table " if possible, they should be on opposite sides of the room and facing away from each other. This includes in the classroom, at lunch and at specials.
4.Malory and Wee should not stand by each other in line. If at all possible, one should be in the front of the line and the other at the back of the line.

 

[KTMom91]

Are there any consequences for Malory when she approaches wee and bothers him?

 

[gcvmom]

I agree with Mary, there should be consequences spelled out if this child continues to harrass and provoke wee difficult child. Why on earth can't they just put her in a different classroom?

 

[Marguerite]

Shari, from experience - we had this problem with difficult child 3 and the boy who kept sticking pins etc into him at every opportunity. A plan like this was already in place but the problems would show up in unstructured/unsupervised play during breaks; at times when the kids were milling around (getting ready to go back to class; getting ready to go to school hall; in school hall during unstructured activity). I think the crowning event was the day difficult child 3's class was given a 'reward' of unstructured play in the school hall with kids simply milling around allegedly supervised. difficult child 3 went to the teachers to complain that bully was sticking pins in him. Teacher A called bully over. "Do you have a pin? No? Well, difficult child 3, stay away from bully."
Yeah, right. In a crowded hall where bully was actively, sneakily, seeking him out.
difficult child 3 ended up screaming at Teacher A. Teacher B wrote me a nasty note home: "difficult child 3 has to apologist to Teacher A, who is pregnant and should not have been screamed at."
The genius Teacher B then sent difficult child 3 back to the classroom, unsupervised, to fetch his schoolbag to get ready to go home. In her infinite wisdom, she sent bully along with him! Somewhere on that unsupervised walk, difficult child 3 hit bully, who complained to Teacher B. difficult child 3 ended up on detention. Bully - nothing.

So pardon my scepticism - but how are they going to enforce this? Are they going to support/supervise to ensure compliance? And what are the consequences for this darling girl if/when she breaks the rules?

The one bright ray of sunshine out of my story - bully is now a more mature 16 yo who knows that difficult child 3 is no threat. He's actually rescued him a few times and we are now all on speaking terms and friendly when we meet. I actually greeted him in the street a couple of days ago, he's really grown and was very polite and friendly. It could have continued as nasty, especially since, after the incident I describe, Teacher B actually went round to that boy's parents and recommended they call the police to lay charges against difficult child 3. I would b=never have known if I hadn't one day decided to go talk to the family and at that talk I cleared the air and said, "Everything in the past on both sides - clean slate. Bully - I know you are also a victim at times and it's not fair. You should therefore know how difficult child 3 has felt at times. From here on - I will insist he is polite to you. I require the same of you. Nothing more. If he hurts you or attacks you, you may come to me and I will deal with him. If difficult child 3 comes to me - I will be back here talking to you and your mother. But I am sure that from now on we will not have any problems."
And we didn't.

But I'm not saying you can do this - I think I remember, Shari, you have considered this and sadly it is not an option.

But if I had left it to the teachers - it could have been even worse. They had other people (not just me) reporting the pin sticking (which went on for several years with different teachers) and still the school did nothing, apart from telling me it was not happening.

So stick to your guns, ask them to make sure their plan is actually enforced and enforceable.

Marg

 

[susiestar]

This is a plan???

Seems more like nonsense to me.

 

[Shari]

I wish I could talk to the girl's parents. She lives right next door to easy child 1's girlfriend and girlfriend says the parents absolutely do not watch her at all. Malory has been in their fenced in yard, in their pool, and is at their house all the time...the parents will come knocking an hour or two later wondering if she's even there, and not the least concerned if she isn't...

Now, chicken or the egg? I don't know...maybe they are just exhausted dealing with her and have given up? I don't know and I"m not gonna judge...but chances are a chat isn't gonna help.

I'm gonna talk to sped teacher tomorrow and get her take. Probably gonna require a meeting, cause this isn't a plan. As it is, wee runs from Malory if he feasibly can...the idea of keeping them apart is great...but we need some concrete ways to make that happen.

 

[timer lady]

Shari, a very simplistic approach but at least school is offering something. Better than nothing.

Now you get to hold the school to the plan. In the meantime, you can teach difficult child the skills he needs to deal with difficult peers.

But the big thing is you have to hold the school to the plan. Everytime difficult child comes home with another tale of Malory doing this or that you call school ~ they may get that this "plan" isn't enough.

 

[Shari]

It certainly does give me a little leverage, but everyone knows they have to be kept apart and has for some time...yet it hasn't been happening, and the issues with the morning "milling about" time isn't even on the "plan". I think I'll be proactive now in asking how they intend to suddenly make this happen.

Not for nothing, the mainstream teacher is human and has 22 other kids in her class...how is she supposed to keep track of every move of 2 out of 24...maybe she is superhuman and can, but thus far, it hasn't happened that way.

And I want to know how each child is going to be accountable. And what happens to wee if Malory continues to do as she's done and he gets fed up and clocks her.

 

[Marguerite]

Shari, how much input has the teacher had into this plan? Because so often the person who actually has to enforce it, doesn't get much of a say. Either that, or she has no real idea of how she's going to enforce it and is hoping that by having something in writing, it will reassure you sufficiently.

How much input do YOU have? You should have considerable input. I used to find that if I ensured some practical suggestions in the event that the plan that was presented seemed doomed to fail, my ideas were listened to. For a while I could suggest but would often be over-ridden. But my suggestions were on file and eventually when everything else failed, I would raise them again and say, "We've now tried everything your way. I believe that if you do X you may find better success. With all the problems, I do not feel X will increase your already considerable workload. Hopefully it should reduce it."

The two points they will respond to are workload, and cost. If what they propose is likely to increase their workload, they will resist implementing it. However, if you can demonstrate that NOT implementing it will make for a much bigger workload further down the track, you might get heard.

Good luck with this one!

Marg

 

[KTMom91]

Why don't schools listen? Miss KT was in second grade and had a boy hassling her, poking at her, etc. and the teacher never managed to stop it. My complaints weren't able to stop it. I finally told her that she was going to have to take care of it herself, and she was to let the boy know that HER MOTHER had given her permission to clock him good if he didn't stop, and if he kept on, to clock him. She told the boy, he kept on, she clocked him. School called me, I explained the situation very clearly, and added in that since they had not been able to correct the situation, we did. Problem solved. While I'm not condoning our solution, it did work. I know the school is already all over Wee, and I know he doesn't want to do anything to get into trouble. Hopefully the new plan will be implemented the way it's supposed to. Make sure you specify that all substitutes will be made aware of it as well.