Am I Going Mad?

[red]

you have to pursue it.

i would demand nothing less than the teacher telling your daughter the dress is lovely. and in front of you too. Teacher definitely needs to understand she cannot tell people that home made is not good enough. So long as the dress fits the criteria of the school uniform, its fine. end of.

[boboff]

Abso flaming lutely.

[MKG]

Boboff, I'm sure that your explanation of normal school policy will be helpful. However, if I was in KB's situation, then I wouldn't give a hoot about school policy - it would be MY policy which I would put into effect. Rather than crawl through a mostly ignorant hierarchy, I would always go directly to the highest point I thought necessary (and that, in my experience, would also mean bypassing the governors). There would have been no point in KB approaching the SAME teacher who had already expressed a mistaken idea, no matter what school "rules" say. She would merely have repeated the drivel she gave to KB junior. And it's beginning to look like the same kind of argument will be applicable to the head.

Go in high, and go in with guns blazing. That's the only way to treat these kinds of people.

Mike

[oldjerry]

I agree with Boboff in that the first point of call should have been the teacher, but I feel that this works both ways. If the teacher had a problem then the first point of call should have been me and NOT my 6 year old daughter.

Completely right

I now feel that this has become something other than just an issue about wheather 'homemade' is acceptable or not, but rather an issue of professionalism. The teacher had no right to express this point of view to my daughter and although could have cut the matter short with a simple explaination and apology she has chosen instead to ignore me (so far).

Completely right.

Apart from being completely unproffessional,this teacher displays ignorance and inability do understand the feelings of a young child.My children were bullied as their clothing wasn't as new as their classmates,and we aren't as talented as you.(we were really skint at the time and they had to wear handme downs ,the school refused to do anything about it ,and only several visits and letters brought about a partial result,and I pulled the kids from the school in the end).It seems to me that the bullying here is coming from the teacher.
Some parents are without doubt a pain in the arse,Many teachers are middle class kids with second rate degrees,and zero experience of real life.
My advise ,for what it's worth?..Give them hell,you may make enemies of a few people,but your daughter will learn where real peoples loyalties lay,with their family. BW

[boboff]

I find it hard to believe that any Teacher would ever tell a child that Home made is not acceptable, it's just an idiotic statement to make in this day and age, surely the fact that it is hand made and unique would make it really special and something to be extremely proud of.........

The trouble Mike that going in guns blazing, as I said before, something that I have done, is that when you get to the actual facts of what has happened, it can be very different to what the child has said.

It looks like that is not the case here, but it's just simple things my kids have kept from me, like when they say Teacher, they might mean a "TA", when they say they got told off, well they got asked to stop doing something, normally by the TA who is giving one to one tuition to someone with SEN's.

I hope it all gets sorted out to your satisfaction though.

[Susie]

Sarah - I think you're being very reasonable. I definitely think you're right pursuing it though (I really do). It seems to me this is fairly cut and dried. If the policy on uniform specifies a certain colour/ type of dress but doesn't specify a particular supplier then you're absolutely in the right, the teacher shouldn't have made your daughter feel bad. If there's some unspoken policy that they've not told you, then they need to clarify, (and perhaps change it).

Teachers used to say the most amazing things to me when I was at school, my poor mother was always down there telling people off. I had some excellent teachers too (and my dad was one before he retired!) but, yes, some teachers told me some really terrible things. My mother is very robust and we used to laugh about it, so I think your daughter seeing you defending her and giving her a different message to what the teacher said will definitely have a good effect in the long term.

++ you only have to register a folksy shop and then you can call yourself a dressmaker/ designer to your heart's content, I'd definitely pay money for your things if I had any! (money!).

++ I think all your daughter's class should do a project on how High Street clothes are made, starting with all the labels the teacher's wearing. Suggest that in the letter!

[Keaniebean]

Haha Susie, I can make you a lovely blue gingham dress if you want - free of charge, but my payment would be a photo on this board of you wearing it

Well, still no joy, no phone call, no email and I could even include no visit as i'm within spitting distance of the school. So It's quill and inkwell time unless perchance I recieve such between now and well.. a bit later this evening.

[chickenchargrill]

It is very unprofessional of them not to have got back to you about it. I'd be fuming :/

[julie_lanteri]

100% with boboff about following the school procedures and also misunderstandings. Have you written a note to the teacher to explain what's going on? like "my daughter said bla bla bla, as you know the school policy on uniform only states a blue gingham dress which is what I made. My daughter was very upset as a result and so was I. Can you let me know when we could arrange a meeting to discuss the matter as soon as possible". Sometimes the best way to get what you want is to play nice & dumb to start with. In that case, you want to know exactly what happened (only the teacher will tell you the other side of the story), put things straight and move on so you children can enjoy their school life. I personally don't think going to see the headteacher threatening of A, B, C will achieve that...
good luck!

[Mrs Moustoir]

Exactly! I feel for you KB but do make sure you have the right story from your LO before you go off the deep end - good advice from Julie-L! Children do get their wires crossed sometimes. Of course, that doesn't excuse their rudeness at avoiding you and failing to respond to a complaint.

To give you and example of crossed wires and quotes out of context - my DD came home from school aged 5 and kept on telling me that "Miss Smith says I have to put this in my book bag this way round" and this and that blah blah blah. Anyway, after about the 10th "Miss Smith said I must...", my patience was getting a bit frayed and I snapped "well, if Miss Smith said 'put your head up the chimney' - would you do it?"

Next day, Miss S stops me at school and says, "your daughter has told me that 'my mum said you should stick your head up the chimney' Is that correct?"...

[Silver Ether]

I think the dress is lovely and she looks a right little imp ... :) I agree they should mind their own business your daughters out fit is fine ... what I want to know .. I may have missed it in the thread and sorry if I have as there is such a lot to read ... how did the teacher know it was home made ... it looks a very professional job to me.

[MKG]

KB said ...

"I of course have been VERY careful to find out from my daughter exactly how she was told and in what circumstances. It appears that luckily she was not made a show of infront of any of the other children, but that the teacher repeatedly told her that her dress should be a 'proper' school dress and not home made."

So just how sure does one have to be? Sorry, ladies, but I'm damn sure that a softly-softly approach gets zero result in a situation like this. Well - it does get a result, really. It gets you completely overridden and ignored. If we were talking about a supermarket checkout operative here, I doubt there'd be any of this argument. But no - it's a teacher. All I can say is that it's a bad teacher and, faced with such a thing, there should be a swift and severe reaction. If she's allowed to get away with this one, who knows what's next?

The decline of standards in any profession is a sad thing ... when it's teaching standards which are declining, I think it time to draw a line in the sand.

Mike

[julie_lanteri]

(DISCLAIMER: KG, I'm not directing this to you at all, just hypothesising on some of the advice given. Using "you" as I'm not used to using "one")
Mike, the main difference with a supermarket checkout operative is that the teacher/school is looking after your kids 5 days a week... And that's the important thing to keep in mind if you want your kids to stay in the same school, which seems to be what KG wants. I don't think going to the LEA to complain because your-daughter-said-that-the-teacher-said is going to get you anywhere, appart from being known as the over-reacting/crazy mum and that's NOT the effect we're looking for. You would loose all credibility in 2 seconds: "did you speak to the teacher?" "well, no, I tried a couple of time but she was busy", "did you talk to someone else?" "well, no, the headteacher was in a meeting"...
My point is, by following the procedure, in an extreme case senario, you would end up with "I've tried to talk to the teacher, she didn't have time in the morning so I wrote a note to explain and arrange a meeting; didn't get a reply so asked to speak to the head; didn't hear back either, so sent a letter to the head; then governors etc" stepping up a notch each time. This way, you have done all you could do and have proof of the other side's unprofessionalism.

As far as the decline of teaching standards... They closely followed the decline of parenting standards/society in general... The only hope: people like you and me who actually care! (but we've got to play it smart :p)

[oldjerry]

I 'm not sure that any decline in 'society in general' can excuse a decline in teaching standards,but that to one side,the wholesale introduction of outside regulation of teaching,offstead,sats,health and safety,national curriculae etc.etc. has led to situation where much primary teaching is almost by rote,this means that many inspired and innovative teachers aren't allowed to use their talent fully for the benefit of their classes,and MOST importantly,quite a few uninspired and frankly unsuitable individuals are enabled to hold down a job.
While your children are at school the teachers are 'in loco parentis' ,they aren't just there to look after the kids so you can go out to work,or to indoctrinate them into their own personal consumerist nightmare,moreover to 'play the game' and not kick up because your child has to attend the school suggests that the staff would somehow 'take it out' on you or the child in the future,how proffessional is that?

[boboff]

You see I fundamentally disagree with most of that Jerry.

Whilst the over regulation of schools put together now with the LEA ducking all responsibilty and providing little or no support for the Heads, means schools have to be run almost independantly, which is why in actual fact this government is actively promoting "acadamies" ( They recently removed the criteria for schools to be outstanding to apply to be an Academy, and now they offer £25,000 just for a school to look into becoming an academy)

The facts as I see it are that Primary education is in excellent hands. There is no learning by route, their is no daft Scalastic stuff, just basic simple engaging ciriculum related items based around themes and the 5 key elements ( not sure what they are but staying safe, eating healthy, that sort of thing) As for innovation, yes of cource it goes on, recently our school got a grant to build a relationship with the Plymouth Basket Ball Team, it involved getting the whole school and parents to go to a couple of games, plus the MD came and couched after school, and they used the material to feed into all aspects of the ciriculum ( stats for maths, club history, designing uniforms, doing press releases etc etc etc)

The amount of outdoor foundation play areas is growing and fantastic.

I do appreciate that if you have had a bad experience of bullying at school and poor support in dealing with it, that it will of cource mean you feel the way you do, but there are possitive experiences out there to be had