Teacher Fired My 9 Year Old Daughter from Class Job Because She Walks Too Slow

This is the age when school gets serious and they aren't babied anymore.

I am pretty upset that you would let her start the school year without PERSONALLY informing him that she in essence has a disability. In my opinion, some of the blame for this situation lies with you.

Is there more to this story that you haven't shared?? For what it is worth, I do think he could have handled the situation better. There is no way I could imagine standing in front of a class of even 15 kids and keepign every one of them ( and their parents) happy every single minutes of the entire school day. Tough Tough job.

What was the job? It was wrong for him to say this in front of the class and he owes her an apology. Now that all the kids have had a chance to work their "jobs" they should evaluate if the job is the right one for them, and then give them the chance to switch. He should allow them to switch jobs monthly anyway. I don't understand why he can't just give her a different job to do that she can do well. Is there another class she could move too?

If the teacher is being unreasonable, talk to him about finding another job or letting her continue this job. It's better to speak with him in person to get both sides of the story. Sometimes kids take things the wrong way. If he is being unreasonably rude, then switch classes or schools, especially if you're seeing other red flags. Good luck!

::sigh::

Ask the teacher to have your daughter and another student with a job that she CAN do to switch their jobs. Problem solved.

Did this teacher handle things 100% perfectly? No, but I think he had limited options and no matter what he did he was going to come off looking like a dickhole.

For what it's worth, he didn't complain about her personality or her grades or how obedient she is. Only that she's not performing her classroom job appropriately and the other students were not only noticing, but complaining. As a result, he used only one of a couple of solutions that would have been appropriate. He should have switched jobs with another student that wouldn't have required your daughter to walk around.

School has only just started for the year, so I wouldn't take her out of the class just yet. I would wait and see what the resolution is and how the teacher handles the situation. This doesn't have to ruin the entire school year and your daughter and the other kids in the class can use this as a learning experience.

I think that since the teacher is ok with discussing things of a private nature in front of the whole class that his apology to your daughter should be public too. Seriously, if she has an issue with her leg of which he was not aware, he should address that and as long as it doesn't embarass her further, let the class know so that she's not judged,

I am imagining something like this, "Class, I would like to apologize to ____ for saying she didn't walk fast enough in her job as ___. I was unaware that she is healing from a minor injury (Note: whether it's true or not is irrelevant; this just saves her embarassment and keeps explanations to a minimum) and if I had known I never would have said this. I think _____ is fabulous at doing _____ so for the next couple of months she is going to be our class (INSERT NEW JOB HERE). Please accept our apologies and our wishes for a quick recovery! We are so glad you are a part of this class!"

Simple, adult, and professional. And no I do not think you are overreacting. Every person, adult or child, deserves to be treated with dignity and respect. This is a great teachable moment for the entire class.

I hate stories like this because we are only seeing one side.

So the kids in the class were complaining how slow she was so in front of the class he said she was fired. I would hate to be a teacher because of working with different personalities and how to get them to work together. It sounds like he was taking in the needs of the rest of the class and didn't consider your daughter's side, that she hurt her leg.

I am not saying what he did was right but I am thinking it isn't as wrong as you think.

Just for laughs consider one alternate plan. He removes her from the job and tells her, and the kids that complained, what has happened in private. So she wonders why she was removed, he could tell her the other kids complained that she was slow, hurtful. What else could he have told her though, his rules were clear, this is your job. Add to that the kids would know she was removed. All it would take was one of them telling her well you were so slow we complained and now you don't have the job, again hurtful.

In a perfect world he would have known about her injury and told the kids she is healing or better yet not given her that specific job. It just seems to me that in the end your daughter got her feelings hurt. Wouldn't it be better to make this a learning experience for everyone instead of a lynching?

I guess just knowing kids if other kids were complaining the whole class knew anyway so what was actually made public?

I agree with Dawn that since this was dealt with publicly the resolution should be public as well. Like I said a learning experience.

What is her job?
It's hard to know how to answer your post.
If her walking slowly is affecting the other kids, maybe she can be assigned a different "job".
In my experience, it's pretty typical for kids to rotate being this or that "monitor". Handing out the assigments, being responsible for placing craft items at work stations, putting recess equipment away, etc.
They usually trade off.
If your daughter has physical limitations, the "job" may not have been appropriate for her.
I'm sure she could be given a job that is better suited for her which wouldn't be a bad thing.

Like I said, without more information, it's hard to know what to say.

Also....no offense intended, but why didn't her teacher know about her leg issue? That's not something I would have expected a teacher to find in a file in the office, I would have had a discussion up front and explained the situation so there would be no problems.
My son gets migraines. It's in his file. But....I always talk to his teachers up front every year because if he feels one coming on, he knows what to do and it's straightened out with the teacher and the office to allow him, according to the physician information on file, to handle it.
I never took the chance that each new teacher would just know, and he went to the same school for K-8.
I know you're upset and I'm sorry. I'm just saying that "he may not have known" might be part of the problem.
If you had made him aware, perhaps her job assignment could have been one more easily handled for her.

Well what did the teacher and principal say? I find it all a bit odd and just from what you've written it sounds like a huge miscommunication. Maybe she is just temporarily being removed from her job? Maybe she's switching jobs until she can do her job faster (when her leg heals). I have a hard time believing that you confronted the teacher and the principal and they did nothing to alleviate your frustration over this incident, that's just terrible. Fill us in on what happened and it might be easier to give some advice.

The teacher should have known from her file if she has a disability. She does not need to apologize for her disability and the teacher needs to apologize and make accommodations. Shame on him. He is encouraging bullying. He needs to find an appropriate job for your daughter to do and to apologize for his behavior. I'd like to rap his knuckles with the ruler.

I agree with the other responses that say that there really is not enough information to really give an opinion.

I also agree that you should have personally spoken with the teacher BEFORE classes even started to let him/her know that you daughter had a medical limitation. My daughter doesn't have any limitations and I still make a point out of making sure that I at least meet her teacher face-to-face before (or the morning of) the 1st day of school and just introduce myself and that way I can bring up anything that may need to be brought up.

I don't believe that majority of teachers actually read each and every child's file, frankly I wouldn't want them too. I want them to form their own decisions and opinions about my child and not just go off of someone else's.

I would talk to the teacher and find out exactly what his/her side of the story is. Was there any "warnings" or anything said to your daughter before the "reassignement"?

Without knowing what the other inappropriate incidents are it is really hard to see your whole side of the situation.

.

I have to agree with V.M on this one. When my son started kindergarten I personally told his teacher he was diagnosed with ADHD/bipolar a d what meds he was taking. Its sad what happened to your child but like many said sometimes the teachers may not read the entire profile so it's up to us as parents to inform them about our kids especially if it's something serious.

First, I think that you need to meet with the teacher and explain about her leg issue. I'm SURE that he did not read her file. Many teachers prefer not to read the files so that they don't pre-judge a student.
That said, this is a Christian school - tolerance should be part of the curriculum, but since he didn't know about her leg issue he probably didn't know to be tolerant. I'm absolutely sure that he thought she was just fooling around or dawdling.
It sounds to me that there are other issues you have with the school and that this is the icing on the cake.
Personally, I think that the student - teacher relationship can be repaired at this point, but it's up to you. You are the person paying the bill.
LBC

Sometimes I just don't get certain school "rules". I was in a private boarding school overseas for 4 years. My mobility is seriously limited due to a childhood illness and corrective surgery. I still HAD to take 2 credits(2 years out of the 4 I was there) of PE to gradate, every few weeks of my Freshman year it seemed like the PE teacher got Alzheimer or something and just forgot that I couldn't participate. She kept trying to make me hike and run the mile. Finally my senior year we got a new PE teacher who got the idea. I walked the track once then did library research for him and wrote PE themed papers.

PS: Your daughter's teacher is a flake. Give the principal time to correct the issue, if your daughter doesn't get her 'job" back, then bring it up again and make sure to tell the principal that that's what you want done.

Doesn't sound very Christian to me!

How did the talks with the teacher and principal go? What was their response? Is it possible for her to be transferred to another teacher's classroom? Or do you want to pull her out completely?

Sounds like you could have a case of discrimination on your hands. If they won't give her the job back, or find an acceptable alternative, I would let them know you are going to discuss the matter with your attorney, and maybe even think about contacting the media, which will just make them look even worse. You will also be considering withdrawing your daughter (and therefore your tuition money) from the school. Not sure how much of a stink you want to make of this, and normally I don't like confrontations, but that was my daughter, I'd be PISSED!

What is the leg problem and what other issues have you had with the school and teacher? I have a very slow mover and I would fire mine. It would have been better if he would have given her a more appropriate job to begin with. I would want to know if he had spoken with your child before he fired her. Was she given any warnings?

You have to be your child's advocate. If you have talked to the teacher and you still believe that this teacher publically humiliated your child that has a MEDICAL CONDITION, that is just beyond appalling. If you cannot get satisfaction through the teacher/pricipal, then your only recourse is to remove her.

This breaks my heart. I have a 9 yr old daughter as well, and I would be so upset if that happened to her. He should certainly have known about her leg condition that's on file if he's her teacher. I would insist he return the job to her. The principal should ream him out for that! Good luck!

That is really offensive. If no one at the school is willing to do anything to defend and protect your daughter take her out. That makes me really sad for her. I would do something to make her feel extra special at home. If you can take her out do it!

And we wonder why there is so much bullying......Need to look to the adults to be POSITIVE Role models!

You didn't say, but it sounds like you didn't get much satisfaction from the principal or teacher. I'd bring up the term "Bullying" as it is a topic that everyone is sensitive too and the fact is the teacher was acting as a bully! IF he were a decent honorable person he will apologize (even publicly) to your daughter. I doubt it though, afterall she's "just a kid" GRRRR hate the mentality!

I would call the school and talk to the teacher. Or maybe have a meeting. If your child has a legit reason to walk slow, 1) he should not call her out in front of the class and 2) he should have made a trade and given her a job she could do more easily. If it's become that she now no longer has a job and everyone else does, how does that help the kids? Sure the job might be done faster, but your daughter is left feeling bad and the other kids don't learn how to be sensitive to people's differences.

Your daughter is having a temporary disability and was ridiculed and "fired" from her assigned task for this issue. I think that if you wanted to you could easily file a complaint with the American Disabilities Association. If you call them and visit with them about it them mention that you did this the school is going to bend over backwards to appease you and make this right.

I would be in his face and making his life miserable.

it is your duty as the parent to notify your childs teacher of any impairments, whether it be physical, academic, emotional etc.........for example if your child has vision problems & he assigns her to the back of the class, by making the information available before school started, the seating arrangements could have been handled appropriately.

If you are not happy or your daughter, with the school for other reasons too, then it's time to consider changing schools

This would be a reason for me to end my contract and switch schools.
What you are saying is that at this time she has a disability and he not only brought that to everyone's attention but then exploited it.
Not appropriate.
I would not only have words with tthe principal, but the superintendent of the school systen he is part of. THere should be someone above the principal in the Christian schools. If this is a Catholic school I would go to my priest too, and up the ladder.

Go directly to the school board. That is unacceptable treatment towards your daughter. And then transfer to another classroom, and when you do this, talk with the new teacher and explain her situation, what you went through with her last teacher and how unfairly he treated and humiliated her in front of the whole class.
I would definitely demand that the teacher she has now apologize to her in front of the class along with expressing how wrong he was with how he treated her. Ugh....this ruffles my feathers. Hope you get this resolved. Try to stay calm and cool about it but with a stern projected voice about your concern. :-) GET'EM GIRL! lol

I'm a little curious in wondering if the teachers go through each child's profile to get to know them a little before school starts? Or does the profile just stay in the office? Don't know how that works, but if he knew about her situation and did this, then I would be upset. But if he didn't know she was healing from a hurt leg causing her to walk slowly, then I would definitely bring that to his attention and still ask him to apologize to her because it was unnecessary for him to humiliate her in front of the class. No matter what.

Reading about your daughter's situation makes me so mad! Her teacher totally ruined the year for her, in my opinion. I had a jerk teacher fro fifth grade and turned from a gregarious, eager, fun-loving student to a kid who suffered severe social anxiety and low self esteem for the rest of my school years. I would make the teacher aware of her problem, confront him about his attitude and "teaching" skills and then remind him that God chose Moses to do a very important SPEAKING job, knowing he had a stutter. If God can hire people with special limitations, who is Mr Jerkypants to do differently? Seriously, confront the teacher with the principal present, and if you do not get satisfaction, find a better school. My suspicion is that the school will be unwilling to lose that tuition and the threat of bad publicity when it becomes known that they allow teachers to bully.

Well the first thing I thought when I read your comment was your child was possilby poky. As I read further down..that was not the case. I think something has to be said to the teacher. She (the teacher is insenitive) I remember being put on the spot when I was a child. Its humialting (sp wr) I had problems catching a ball. So she made a huge production in front of the whole class. I already had learing problems and felt picked on.
I think you need to tell the teacher one on one. Hopefully she will step up and apolize to you but especially to your child.

I am sorry this happened to your daughter. This is not ok. I like Susan L. post. This is what the teacher needs to do. Wow I can't believe a teacher would say this. I would go to the top person of this school if this doesn't get taken care of to your and your daughter liking.

That's terrible. Talk to them, and pull your kid out if you have to. How unnecessarily demoralizing that was to your daughter.

It is unfortunate that the teacher did not know about your child's leg issue before assigning the jobs. At this point I would talk to him about letting her trade jobs with another child so she can still have a job to be proud of that will not require her to be able to walk at a normal speed. I don't think that anything was done maliciously against your child though, or that the teacher does not think she is a good student, it is simply that her leg condition makes her a poor choice for a line leader type job. In the future I would be sure to mention the leg issue to her new teachers at the "meet and greets" that they have before the year starts.

Get out NOW!!! Seriously! My kids were in the Christian school in London, Ohio and all they cared about was how much money they could bring in from various fund raisers, etc. The only male teacher they had there would constantly belittle the kids and call them names. I went to the teachers AND principal about problems and they did NOTHING!!!! One of the boys knocked my son down and then later kicked him. Each time I got absolutely NO help! One of the teachers even had the nerve to tell me "boys will be boys"! I was furious!!! There were other incidents I heard about and the principal never did anything. We only stayed there because my husband thot the Catholic education would be good for them. Well, what goes on behind the scenes was horrible - I had to put up with all the gossip and backstabbing that went on with the mothers. I finally put my foot down and pulled them out. They are in a public school now (NOT in London) and couldn't be happier!!! I had enough of dealing with those "good little Christians"!!! That teacher sounds like a total jerk!!! Believe me, it won't get any better if this is how he acts on the first day! GET OUT NOW!!!!

Eileen,
Is it possible that maybe the teacher doesn't know this is a Christian school?

Or maybe he's confused about, or doesn't quite understand, what Christ taught us?

Idiot.

If he does not make a public apology to your daughter, you should find another school.

I don't care if it's just the beginning of the school year - you don't do something like that to a child - especially in front of the class. Whatever the hell the jobs are, they can NOT be such a big deal that he did what he did. We're talking about third grade, for crying out loud! (Oh, wait - unless her job was to lead the class out when there's a fire. Then maybe he could kindly suggest someone else do that job.)

Ugh! Makes me so mad!

Let us know what you do.

Ugh... That's awful. Was she the line leader or something? I don't know what you should do (sorry, lame advice!), but I just wanted to weigh because I'm a teacher. It's terrible. If it were truly an issue - her walking slowly - then I would talk with her privately about another job that she might like better. I'm not sure I would yank her out of class yet, but I'm curious to know how the conversation with him and the principal went. He may have reacted poorly (very poorly), but maybe he was trying to do it for her sake? So kids wouldn't bug her about it and he just didn't handle it right? Maybe that's a stretch... I don't know. Did you tell him about her medical condition before school started? I'll tell you right now that I have NOT read my kids' files yet... I've been too busy writing names on things and planning for my first few days of school. Anything that I really need to know - allergies, injuries, disorders, etc. - are relayed to me by previous year teachers and kids' parents. So sorry this happened. I'm sure you're even more upset about it than she is. My heart would hurt for my daughter in this situation.

Good decision. That is mean even if no injury.

Wow! I'm amazed at some of the responses you've gotten - especially from teachers. While I agree that teaching is a difficult job and it's hard to keep all the kids and all the parents of a classroom happy all the time. I think some things are just plain common sense. Quite frankly, I think that your daughter's physical condition is irrelevant. The fact that he publicly "fired" her and, it seems, ridiculed her in the process is unacceptable. Can you imagine how well it would go over if the teacher were publicly fired?! In an adult situation, a person would be notified - privately - that there are concerns about their job performance and given a chance to rectify it. If there were still concerns a person might be fired, but it would be done in private. In this case, if there was no improvement after concerns were brought to your daughter's attention; all that really needed to happen was for the teacher to say that your daughter and so-and-so were trading jobs (which also happens quite often in the adult business world.) No reason was required. I definitely think a public apology is in order. I don't think her physical issues even need to be addressed.

http://www.cnn.com/2011/09/06/living/teachers-want-to-tel...

I am a preschool teacher, we have jobs in our class ( my class is age 3)
I have taken a 3 year olds job away.

The only thing I see as an unfortunate ( and it was probably an HONEST over sight) is that your daughter has an issue with her leg, and he probably should not have said anything in front of the class, maybe taken her aside privately...

Teachers do not teach because of the Fabulous pay.....teachers teach because it is something they love.

You are a mom, you are upset...I think honestly, you are blowing this out of proportion.

I find the teacher to be insensitive. I think you need to talk to the teacher yourself and see if you can resolve this peacefully by telling him about her. If he does not respond sensitivally and give her job back and also teach kids to be sensitive to others then talk to the principal. Keep moving up through the ladder to get it taken care of right. Male teachers are not the most sensitive. SO remember this for the future and any new teachers.

What was the job?
If he cant make reasonable accommodations for her diability (temp) then he should assign her a new job.
He also needs to apologize to her in front of the class .......he may not have remembered her issue but that gave him no right to treat her that way!
I find that very harsh for what should be a nurturing environment.

From what you've told us it sounds like a terrible school. What is the problem with your daughters leg and why wasnt the school informed. What in the world is the teacher's side of the story? Why would you pay to send your child to a horrible place? Take her out and tell every parent at the school why

That's very insensitive, and I would bring it to his attention what her condition is and really lay on the guilt trip. He deserves it. If she likes her class and school, besides this incident, I'd let her stay...but you speak of other "inappropriate" things...use your best judgment. He was absolutely wrong for doing this.

I would bring it up to the principal that he should have spoken to her in private about her slowness.... I was always told "Praise in public, correct in private" .... he shouldn't have humiliated her in front of the class.

What was the principal's response when you talked to him/her?

Especially where it was in her file about her leg problem, she could have been assigned a job that didn't require so much walking.

Most teachers, rather than give a student a job for the entire year, rotate jobs frequently throughout the year. That way, if there is a problem with one student and a particular job, it doesn't have to be humiliating to have a job assignment changed.