parents ignoring child's behavior

[Pre-k teacher]

I work at a church preschool and the children that go here come from very affluent families. I've worked at this preschool for several years and really like it. Overall the parents are great. Some parents are so appreciative of what the preschool teachers do and they let us know, and I love hearing that. But then we have some parents that no matter what you do you will never please them. I have one boy in my class that acts up every single day. In the beginning of the year I would speak to his mom about it. But she got tired of hearing what her son did and complained to the director. I would send notes home, and always tried to find something positive to say as well. But she complained to the director that all I did was say negative things to her about her son even after I photocopied the notes to proove that I said positive things as well. She said I focused too much on the negative behavior. She actually told the director and me that unless something was serious she did not want to hear about her son's behavior. So I no longer send notes home to her or talk to her about her son's behavior because she does not want to hear it. Her son can get physical and will try to hit me. He has hit me on one occasion. When that happened I sent him to another classroom and she gets upset that he is being punished. Hello, he hit a teacher so of course I am going to remove him from my class. I will not tolerate that kind of behavior. Maybe she should teach her son not to hit teachers or any adult or person for that matter. I can not believe that some parents don't want to hear about their children's behavior and choose to ignore it. Her son is in time-out almost every day, and she does not care. She'll ask why to him, but doesn't ask me. Well yesterday when she came to pick her son up he was of course in time-out. She asks him why he is in time out and her son punches her in the chest. Her parenting needs a lot of work. She told him that it was unacceptable to hit her, but when he has hit me she acts like its no big deal. I do like the school I work at, but they cater to the parents too much cause they are rich, and many of them are very well known in our community. Most the moms(who don't work) belong to the Junior League and have very successful husbands. I think the school fears making the parents mad cause they know they are powerful and influencial people. The school will cater to the parents more than I would, but I know if something got too severe the school would not allow a child to continue going here. For example we don't tolerate biting. We had a child that bit, and we told the parents if he did it again he could not attend this school. Well he did it again so we had to tell the mom that she needed for find a new school for her child because biting is not acceptable.
I just don't get some parents igoring their kids behavior. I'm a parent too, and if my child was acting up every single day at school I sure would want to know about it. I may not like it, but I want to know about it so I can correct my child.

 

[SC]

Denial

I don't get why biting is unacceptable at your school, but hitting isn't. If a student hit me, they would be kicked out.

There will always be parents who don't believe that their "angel" did anything wrong. It definitely helps to have an administrator back you up, though, and it stinks that yours doesn't.

I can understand that the mom may not want to know EVERY tiny detail of her son's behavior, but she should be interested in why he is getting time out so often. At my school, we quit telling the Pre-K parents of every detail because it was getting overwhelming. Now they just tell them the number of times they were in trouble and about "big" incidents.

 

[Suzydiana]

daycare rules

In some states, if a child continues to bite, the child has to be removed from the daycare. It becomes a health issue. Not sure it this is in all states.
I used to teach in a daycare and had a very similar situation. It was so hard to teach in such a situation where the parent is of no help. I would continue the time-outs. But document every single thing. You may need it for backing one day. I pity that family when they start elementary school.

 

[RedSoxGirl]

Some parents ...

unfortunately don't want to be held accountable for their child's behavior because they don't want to deal w/ the behavior. And because they won't be accountable, their child isn't accountable, either. It sounds like this particular set of parents are like that. Good luck and just remember that next year this cherub will be someone else's.

 

[bamateach]

parents

I am the one that posted on the vent about the stolen cell phone. This child has yet to be punished at home for that incident. She is being raised by her grandmother. The lack of punishment helps to explain why her mom is living in a shed strung out on drugs.

Onto your situation - I agree that too much negative can be overwhelming. My policy is that if the child is a continual behavior problem I try to only tell them when it is really bad. No parent wants to hear daily how bad their child is. Even if you start with a positive if you are telling them daily alll they hear is the negative. However his behavior doesn't need to be ingnored either. I use behavior contracts. You might be able to use something similar just so that you are not the one telling her the bad stuff all the time. Print out a weekly calendar and put a sticker on the page if the child was good and if not write a SHORT explaination. Ex: hit teacher One of the main reasons that I do this is so that parents don't have to hear bad news directly from me daily. That way the issue is between them and their child not the teacher and them. If she wants to know more she will appraoch you - other wise just let her deal with it.

 

[Mrs.B]

document

I don't have much advice but I also have a parent in denial. I document everything! If you're not, please start.