This can't be good news...

gcvmom

Here we go again!
The assistant principal (typically the one who handles discipline issues) of difficult child 1's school left a message on our machine while I was out this morning at a meeting with the psychiatric at difficult child 2's school...

I just called back and he's out supervising the morning break. My gut's in knots now. :sick: difficult child 1 NEVER gets in trouble at school, so I'm really dumbfounded over what this could be about.
 

gcvmom

Here we go again!
Still no word yet, but thanks for the well wishes anyway!

I guess one consolation is that he didn't sound urgent and it was a "when you get a chance, call me back" message. So I guess it can't be too, too bad. Right? RIGHT?!
 

gcvmom

Here we go again!
Well, he STILL hasn't called back (it's 5pm now) but I did find out what happened from difficult child 1.

Yesterday in Tech Lab difficult child 1 was working on a circuit board and this other difficult child (the same kid who's been bugging him all year... first quarter in Computer Lab he was reaching over to difficult child 1's keyboard and typing garbage on it while difficult child 1 was typing, or if difficult child 1 left his seat, the kid would delete whatever he was working on. Lately he's been kicking difficult child 1's backpack in class every time he walks by) grabbed a pair of pliers out of his hands and wouldn't give them back. difficult child 1 said he went ballistic on the kid, grabbed him by the shirt and spun him around and demanded that he give the pliers back to him. Then he went and told the teacher, who then intervened and made the kid give back the pliers. Then the two were sent to see Mr. R the assistant principal, who told them they were both out of line, made them apologize and sent them on their merry way.

difficult child 1 said that the difficult child to him again today in class. difficult child 1 says he thinks they've worked things out. I'm not holding my breath, and I intend to have a "talk" :warrior: with Mr. R about all the other times this difficult child has bullied my kid this year. I still have emails I sent in the first quarter about cr@p this kid was pulling.


difficult child 1 was worried he was in trouble with us. I told him no, he's not in trouble. I said I was disappointed how he handled it, but it was understandable how he reacted, and that I was glad he didn't sit back and continue to allow the difficult child to victimize him. I said we can't help him if we don't know about these incidents. And the teachers, etc. can't stop the difficult child if HE doesn't speak up about it. I said from now on, it's zero tolerance for anything inappropriate the difficult child does to him, and he HAS to report it to the teacher AND to either Mr. R or the counselor AND to us so that WE can make noise about it, too.

Poor Mr. R is gonna get an earful from me tomorrow! :D
 

Star*

call 911........call 911
You know - when Dude was little this similar thing happened to him.

We reported it to the teacher. She did nothing.
We reported it to the principal. He did nothing.
We reported it to guidance. They did nothing.
We sent a registered letter to the asst. principal. She did nothing.

This went on and on - and finally after being pushed to his limits and getting pushed in the back with a plastic lunch tray - Dude turned around and used our 1,2,3 rule. He asked the kid to stop. HE did not and kept pushing him in the back with the tray and hitting him. Then Dude TOLD the kid to stop. THe kid mocked him, hit him with the tray and punched him in the back ,then said "What are you going to do about it?" and with that Dude went into rule #3 - and co-cocked this kid in the side of the head with his lunch tray, knocking him out.

Of course he got sent to the principal. Of COURSE I got a call. And of COURSE they said he would be suspended until I pulled out my copy of all the notes to the teacher, the principal himself, the registered letter - the letter to guidance - and said "GO AHEAD and SUSPEND him and I'll have an ATTORNEY in 30 minutes."

He was sent home for the day - and the other kid was removed from the class a week later when he kicked the principal in the privates and bit him on the arm.

There is a little justice sometimes - but when Dude asked me if he was in trouble - I asked if if it was little Jamal - and he said yes. I said did you do our 1,2,3 rule? Yes. And 3 this time wasn't walking away? No Momma. Well then - okay - you're not in trouble - because you had to solve your own problem that 4 school officials could not.

Nuf sed -
I wish you luck and hope Mr. R can't sit tonight.
 

Hound dog

Nana's are Beautiful
Good for difficult child for finally sticking up for himself. It couldn't be handled differently in my opinion because those he could turn to weren't listening.

My kids were told from the get go they were allowed to stand up to bullies. They'd better never throw the first punch, but once the bully did...to hit em fast and hit em hard.

And like Star said......I never heard from anyone until one of my kids fought back, then suddenly everyone was paying attention. sheesh And they wonder why bullying has gotten so out of hand.

Hugs
 
I had a lot of those calls too when my difficult child was in mmiddle school and high school. The Jocks would pick on him and no one would do anything. So I went to the princiipal and told him what was going on. My difficult child was small and I guess a little different than the jocks and I guess my codependency got the best of me and I had to try and do something about it - I guess they quit bugging him but he did take a swing at them once and we didnt punish him because they deserved it. No one knows what it is like to have a difficult child except you guys!
 

susiestar

Roll With It
I hate it when the attitude from school is that it is no big deal if it is happening TO our kids, but if our kids are doing ANYTHING then it is a major deal. There were days Wiz came home bruised from other kids in 2nd grade, but if he so much as called a kid a "jerk" I got a note AND phone calls from both the principal and the teacher. But if we complained about the bruises, missing jackets, stolen lunches, etc... we were told that it wasn't happening.

I hope you make NOTES of what you say to Mr. R, send a letter by registered mail, and also insist that next year the OTHER child be moved to be in classes your difficult child is not in. Make sure that they KNOW that YOU KNOW that they have allowed the bullying to go on for so long that THEY have become complicit to it.

This just chaps my hide.

I think that your child should get ICE CREAM AND CAKE for his actions. He stopped when the teacher told him to, didn't he???
 

gcvmom

Here we go again!
Thank you one and all :D

difficult child 1 said no problems with the other difficult child the last two days. But our dear Mr. R has still not returned my call. I just fired off an e-mail (a really, really NICE e-mail) asking for a little meeting with him next week to discuss my concerns about a pattern that has evolved with this other kid.

I'll let you know how it goes!
 

gcvmom

Here we go again!
Got a reply to my e-mail today. Mr. R can meet with me tomorrow morning at 10am, but I'll have to wait until tomorrow morning to let him know for sure since easy child has been sick with a fever all weekend.

The copy of the referral slip came in yesterday's mail. difficult child 1 neglected to tell me he pulled the other difficult child's HAIR (not shirt as he had told me)! Whatever. Doesn't really change things for me. difficult child 1's still been a victim of this bully for far too long, and the school really needs to do something about it instead of ignoring the boy's problem.

I'll let you know how it goes...
 

Marguerite

Active Member
Hair; shirt; frankly, I don't think it makes any difference. Besides, who says it was hahir? WHat does difficult child 1 say, when asked about this? A teacher who isn't really paying attention can't really be used as an expert witness in something like this. A kid who is defending himself can't be criticised if it's hair he pulls and not a shirt.

On the subject of kids hitting back even with extreme provocation - I always taught my boys to not hit back regardless, and only to defend themselves at most by pushing others away if it b ecame absolutely necessary. The reason - it's always the weird kid who is accused of being the aggressor, and I didn't want ANY chance that my kid would be accused of being the aggressor in any way. Even so, the other kids would try to say, "difficult child 3 started it," and without independent witnesses we couldn't prove anything, quite often. Until I began to replay what we had worked out - thanks to my indoctrination of non-violence, difficult child 3 never started ANYTHING physical and I had confidence in saying so.

However, in a recent incident with difficult child 3, when he was pointing a cap gun at some kids and firing it, I tore strips off him for it because although the gun was an obvious toy (fluoresecent pink and green, and clear plastic) andalthough he made no physical contact, it was an overtly aggressive act and if those boys had wanted to make trouble, it would have been sufficient for him to get charged with threatening behaviour. difficult child 3's only defence was that the boys were saying mean things to him. I know those boys; difficult child 3 was probably right. But he went to the carnival (where this happened) with that gun in his pocket, he went ready in case of perceived trouble, he wasn't going to let anyone walk over him.
It could be argued that our non-violence policy finally made him crack; or it could be argued that it's all that has kept him safe from prosecution so far.

The bullying problems, we have also. But thankfully not jocks vs nerds. Nerds in general do cop it a bit more, but some of them are able to hold their own verbally, and often that's what counts especially in high school. While we do have students who are very athletically capable, we don't have sporting scholarships or anything like it here. Not in the same way as you guys. Maybe that is why our jocks tend to not throw their weight around as much, they're not so much on a pedestal. The kids who tend to bully others here, are the ones who themselves have been bullied, or who for whatever reason feel a ned to drag others down to feel worse about themselves than the bullies do. Or the bullies want to eliminate anything and anyone whose very existence makes them feel uncomfortable. Hence the attack on anyone too different. Or the source of amusement caper, when they go for the kid whose reactions are most spectacular.

Any bully who is untouchable here, sometimes it's the high achievers who the school don't ant to admit are also a behaviour problem with younger students, but generally it's the students whose parents are either very scary, or very useful to the school. Which is just one more reason why I strongly recommend that if you have a problem difficult child and your main communication with the school is when you're cfalled up to meet the principal, then where you can, make yourself so useful to the school that they will bend over bakcwards to meet your requirements. If you're the person organising canteen duty, or always covering books in the library, then a teacher wanting to have a quiet informal word with you can quickly pop into the canteen (or library) and chat, often heading off larger problems at the pass.

Whatever is likely to work in your area... and there are many ways to be invaluable to your school, even if you work full-time. One parent I know is the one who rings around other companies and gets loads of stuff donated to the school for school carnival days.

HUman nature, it's the same the whole word over.

Marg
 

gcvmom

Here we go again!
I learned from difficult child 1 last night that this other difficult child has trouble staying where he should and is up visiting lots of people in this class, not just difficult child 1. Perhaps it's undiagnosed ADHD -- but whatever the cause, it doesn't justify the continued harrassment. I'll bet this difficult child did not in a million years expect to get his hair yanked by difficult child 1, who is typically a very quiet amd well behaved boy at school (thanks to medications) and never provokes anyone. In fact, his teachers report that he keeps to himself as a rule. I have no doubt the teacher has not been paying close enough attention to the situation (nor did the last semester's teacher). So far it seems the hair pulling got the difficult child's attention because he hasn't bothered difficult child 1 for three days. Today starts a new week, so we'll see how it goes. I probably won't be meeting with Mr. R now until Thursday, as easy child still has a decent fever going :( difficult child 1 has instructions to report ANY future disturbance from the other difficult child to me so that I can take action.

I'll keep you posted :)
 
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