Parent Complaint

[iteachbx]

I think it's better that they had this conversation with you than in on the playground or in the cafeteria. If there are that many children that knew so much about it then it was bound to come up after the moment of silence. Better to talk about it with an adult present than to have little bits and pieces of news stories and possible misconceptions and exaggerations being shared on the playground.

[MissScrimmage]

None of my first graders brought it up, so I didn't discuss it with them. If they bring it up then it needs to be dealt with appropriately. It sounds like your school invited discussion by having a moment of silence and you handled it as best you could.

[Roobunny]

Thanks for all of the responses. I apologized to the child and wrote an apology note to the parent who seemed satisfied.

Time to let it go and move on!

[jessiiteach]

We also had a moment of silence, a cop on campus, and lockdown drills. All of these events led to my third graders asking questions, wondering why we were doing so many different things. One student said "I know why." and I asked the students who knew to please not talk about it. It eventually got out and I had no choice but to address it because some of the students got scared. I tried my best to make them feel safe but I am now worrying about one parent getting upset because her son got very scared. It really couldn't be avoided to address the topic once the kids started talking about it.

[TamiJ]

Our director general sent us an email encouraging to discuss it with our students. We are a K-12 school, and she didn't specify the grades. None of my students mentioned it so I didn't bring it up. I think if your school had a moment of silence, which I find appropriate, then they should have known that discussion would evolve from that. Therefore, I don't think you did anything wrong. It sounds like the parents is over it now.

[juli233]

I work in a k-3 school and kids talk... even at this age.If you didn't talk to them about it they would have talked to each other anyway. Of course we do our best to be sensitive and reassuring but we are humans and we interpret things differently. I don't think you did anything wrong.

[queenie]

Originally Posted by GemStone

Your school opened this kind of conversation up when they had a moment of silence for the event.

I agree. What did they think would naturally happen AFTER the moment of silence? 2nd graders wouldn't ask about it or want to talk about it?? In my class we didn't mention it at all, but a week later after we had a lock down drill a couple of my students mentioned it and I simply said that nothing has ever happened at our school to cause us to have a "real" lock down and that everyone is doing everything possible to keep us all as safe as possible. I reminded them that all our outside doors are always locked, etc. I did not allow further discussion after a student asked me what I would do in an actual lock down. I simply said, "The first thing I would do is pray. The next thing I would do is protect you all in any way I could." Then it was back to work. I think it wasn't the best idea to allow them to discuss it since you never know what will come out of a second grader's mouth! And just because some of them surprised you by how much they knew doesn't mean ALL of them knew that much (or needed to know that much). If I was the parent I would be upset, but I would talk to YOU about it if it bothered me enough. Maybe you should go up to her and say, "Mrs. Soandso said that she got an email from you about suchandsuch. I wanted to explain what happened in class that day."