General Chat

Dear All

Hello

Harassment and violence in any job is totally deplorable.

Most shops and public services have zero tolerance notices to try and protect their staff.

Sadly, people seem to be far more aggressive and so impatient now.

Everyone uses their phones as they walk along the streets.

Technology seems to be ruling people, instead of helping them.


Take gentle care
Best wishes
Elizabeth, EOS
xx

Im the type Maggie that would have walked down the alley and made a point of saying hello or just have you got the time please? By actually making communication with them, I think they would less likely attack you.

I also remember in the mid 70s when young people dressed punk style. In Brighton I would have to walk 1/2 mile to where dad lived at the time. As they were all going down town, I was so scared of even looking at them incase they mugged me.....but when I described one of them, dad knew him and said, the spiked hairdo was just a front, underneath it all he was a sound guy!


As Ive said to many a colleague.For 6 hours we have the children in our sights but once the bell rings at the end of the day, we have no control as to what goes on in their life then.. And in the morning, we start all over again.

Florence in the hebrides

But David, that doesn't mean they will attack - after all, they have mothers, fathers, siblings etc.
Any dog can bite, but most don't. Any cat can scratch too.
Very few people go through life avoiding them 'just in case'.

Well Maggie as you observed people are afraid of then and they can smell fear :-| :-0

I parked outside a small garden centre yesterday that had a gravel surface in the car park. Up cruises one of those large, posh pickups with 4 doors and lots of chrome and out jumps father and starts a shouting match with his 2 young boys who were squabbling inside. Out they get and so does his pregnant partner? whose eyes never leave her smartphone. The father starts sorting the back of the vehicle to presumably make room for intended purchases while the lady stays glued to her phone. What are the boys doing? Kicking the gravel at each other and up the side of my car. Then through the wing mirror I see them leaning against the side of my car scratching their backs up and down on my car and rubbing any grit into the paintwork. Neither parent noticed or if they did they couldn't give a toss, but as soon as I started up to shift my car elsewhere I was glared at as if I shouldn't be moving my car anywhere near the little dears. :-S

'Spare the cane & spoil the child'. {An old saying from my very distant youth}.

I remember walking from the car past another where a woman with a boy of about three was locking her car and getting her fags out.

He started shouting 'Fat lady' at me and I told him he was a rude boy while she carried on looking for her fags.

She soon sorted him out when I said 'What a badly brought up child!'.

On my usual bandwagon, I also think a lot of abusive parents are able to carry on because people turn a blind eye. Both adults and children need a bit of support sometimes!

Some children aren't given limits by their parents, and some children themselves seem incapable/unwilling to 'toe the line'.

I was at the bus station a couple of years ago.
There was a not so young woman with a boy aged about 10.
There was an older boy, about 12, who appeared to be bothering the younger boy.
He was being noisy, using foul language, and over-zealously 'play fighting' (or not) with the younger boy, who was running between waiting passengers in an effort to get away. The lady was asking him to stop - but he carried on.
The bus came. The elder boy tried to push in, to get on first.
I deftly manoeuvred myself so he couldn't, and others followed suit.
The lady and younger boy sat in front of me, the other boy at the front.
The bus was pretty full.
The elder boy shouts to the younger boy something (expletives deleted) about sitting with the 'old bag'.

I wasn't a happy bunny, so pointed out (shouted down the bus) words to the effect that he was a very rude boy, who had been bothersome at the bus stop. That, quite frankly at his age he should know how to behave, and everyone on the bus was utterly fed up with him. No-one wanted to hear another word from him.
There was a bit of a shocked silence - then a murmur of appreciation.

The lady with the younger boy turned around and thanked me.
Both boys were her grandsons! :-0

Now, I know none of my grandchildren would ever be so rude to me, or anyone else in my company. That isn't to say they're afraid to say anything, they take the mickey, and I give it back.
I mean, my 2 grandsons (8 and 10) both started doing the 'floss' dance at the bus stop once. I walked away (laughing) and pretended I wasn't with them. I could have threatened to do it as well, but they wouldn't have been bothered.
Fortunately, there were no other people waiting. :-\

But why did the 12 year old think ignoring his nan and calling her names was acceptable?
Why are adults frightened of showing their disapproval?
Why are adults so frightened, full stop?

Where I worked once, the quickest way to the bus stop home was down an alleyway with steps near the end.
A group of teenage lads regularly gathered there smoking (I didn't ask what!)
When I came across them, I just said 'excuse me please' - and they moved!!
It got to the point where I just said 'Hello, it's me', and they'd say 'hello' back, and ask how my day had gone.

Yet a couple of the people I worked with wouldn't go down the alley, because of the lads.

It seems that the children are trapped in between parents and teachers.

I could never believe that a parent would allow their child to be caned without causing the greatest grief possible but our parents were still afraid of teachers (fear is not respect I might add!) and assumed they knew best.

One of the reasons I did not have children was that I would not want to subject any young child to primary education as I remembered it but my contemporaries who did were not as afraid as were our parents.

Children, who have no voice of their own, have to make the best of whatever the state of play is at the time between the other factions.

No David...As staff we are not aloud to do very much. Ignore the negative but praise the positive. Children repeat everything back to their parents, so one really has to watch what you say and the tone you say it in.

Once, many years ago, I worked in a nursery. A child kept rudely sticking their tongue out at me. Without thinking(I was very new) I said " if you don't put that tongue back in your mouth, I will chop it off," I said it tho in a very childish way. The next day, the parent came in to complain that I had said I was going to cut his tongue out and didn't like my tone!

I was spoken to and very quickly realised just what is told back to parents.

Its worse in upper primary. Everything you say, do, wear..lol it all gets repeated back. Its really got to the point, where we are scared to engage in any general conversation these days.I never say what I did at the weekend.


One teacher was telling her news and sharing the weekend with her class and in turn they did the same. She happened to say she went to party and she liked a glass of wine.One pupil then said I expect you got drunk miss? Word got around and other parents were saying she was a drunkard!!!! Totally untrue but that's kids for you starting rumours.


I do my job because I enjoy helping those that need it more. Its true that the majority of schools are safe to work in but more recently we are seeing a whole new breed of children who are literally out of control. The parents have no skills to discipline their children.


In secondary school, life skills should be taught as a subject and parenting should be included in the hope that the next generation might stand a chance with their own children.

Florence in the hebrides

No, the role is reversed now.

Umm, no, David.

Is a teacher, male or female, allowed to hit a pupil back ;-)

My CPC was multiple-choice as I recall and I didn't like it, there was no room for explanation.

It was like going back to the Victorian rote learning.

I agree ref A S Neill, Sharron.
There was a relaxed atmosphere - as there also was in the Special Needs school I worked in.
I think one of the problems now, is children aren't being educated - they're being taught to make the 'correct' responses to exam questions - which can be very boring, and stressful.

When I was at school, if you put extra information into an exam answer, you got points added on. Papers were marked by those who knew the subject.
Nowadays, those marking have a 'tick box' system, and in some cases very little knowledge of the subject they are marking.
If a child puts in extra information - that isn't in the tick boxes - they actually lose marks.

The 2014 fatal stabbing of Leeds schoolteacher Ann Maguire in front of her class is another case to be added to the long list of out-of-control pupils.

In 1995, head teacher Philip Lawrence was stabbed to death outside his school in London's Maida Vale district. The incident was witnessed by a number of students & staff. The mental effects of the crime have been long-lasting.

Generally speaking though, we shouldn't lose sight of the fact that most schools are safe places to either work or be educated.

I think the smacking debate is a bit like the corporal punishment in schools debate. Because there will always be parents and teachers with no self-control,the option must be removed from all.

Considering our present educational system was instigated to make the labouring poor easier to control to accommodate the needs of the impending industrialization of the country and of capitalism, it certainly is time there was a radical re-think of education.

A.S Neill had some quite surprising results.

I think the smacking debate is a bit like the corporal punishment in schools debate. Because there will always be parents and teachers with no self-control,the option must be removed from all.

Considering our present educational system was instigated to make the labouring poor easier to control to accommodate the needs of the impending industrialization of the country and of capitalism, it certainly is time there was a radical re-think of education.

A.S Neill had some quite surprising results.

The trouble is since Maggie Thatcher took away Discipline in Schools and now Homes.
This is the consequence of it.

We had a teacher stabbed and killed in Leeds a few year ago.she was retiring in around 3/4 weeks but landed up in a box.

Until the government bring back Discipline in Schools and homes and parents taking responsibility for the actions of their children then nothing is going to change.

Up in Scotland there is a proposal to ban smacking any child for misbehaving but My personnel opinion is that smacking on the top of the leg is ok if you don't go too far by beating the child.

Before long there are going to be 2/3/4/5 yr olds running the household.

Governments want to get with it and realise that children are going to end up being murdered or murderers in future years.


So glad I won't be around to see it all happening.

I just cant believe that the poor lady who has lost her baby has just had to get over it and carry on!


We too had the cane when I was at school and I am glad that it was banned.Some children need to be taught right from wrong but not by beating them with a stick....


I personally think the whole system needs overhauling as it really is in a mess. Just wait til next year when on the curriculum we will be letting children choose their gender!(but that will do for another thread)

Florence in the hebrides