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Post by mollycoddle on Mar 24, 2022 20:44:56 GMT
Ive read through this a couple of times and if I had received your email, I would have made sure my child apologized and replaced the candy. However, I think this is something that should have had in-school consequences and the email to the parents was probably overkill. It seems like something a teacher should be able to handle on their own. I think parents need to know that he lied. And escalated the lie. I didn't care about the candy. I cared that a child took something from my desk without permission and lied about it. The lie is the issue. Had he owned up to taking it, I would have let the issue go with a chat. He never took responsibility. We do teach responsibility and citizenship at school. I think taking responsibility for actions is a very important lesson. The resolution was this: the student brought me 3 bags of candy. No apology or anything. I said I don't want the candy. He said his dad told him to give it to me. I talked to him about the incident and asked him what he should have done. He said not take the candy. And then I asked him what he should have done after he took the candy. He said he should have owned up to it. Later in the day I got a one line email from mom saying that they sent the student with candy to give to me and wanted to make sure I got it. My thought is that they didn't think stealing and lying is an issue. I am deeply bothered by that. I agree. I don’t believe for a second that he thought it was ok to take the candy. And he doubled down on his lie and tried to get another student to cover his lie. |
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Post by Bridget in MD on Mar 24, 2022 20:47:33 GMT
I'm so grateful for teachers! I do not know how you do it!! Are you allowed to search a kid's backpack? I have no idea. If I were the parent, I would likely wait to respond to the email until I had a chance to talk to my kid about it. That talk would have happened asap after school. I would respond with an apology even if my kid denied it. The response came today. Mom wanted to make sure her son brought the candy. Mom wanted to make sure you got the candy... and made sure you knew it was taken care of at home. Or did she said 3 big ass bags to be obnoxious about how snowflake took one single piece and she feels you blew it out of proportion? As a parent I would thank you for letting me know and probably send in a replacement bag (not bags). I could never be a middle school teacher and put up with this bullshit! |
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oh yvonne
Prolific Pea
Posts: 8,064
Jun 26, 2014 0:45:23 GMT
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Post by oh yvonne on Mar 24, 2022 21:00:28 GMT
The parents are being petty AF. No wonder the kid’s a jerk look who’s is raising him.
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Post by leannec on Mar 24, 2022 22:11:43 GMT
The apple doesn't fall far from the tree ... it's not about the candy  I don't give out candy as rewards in my class anymore because it makes too much garbage and it's all they want ... I'm a mean teacher!  Teaching is stressful enough without this added into the pot ... I think a jar of candy on your desk is really just temptation for thieves  |
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Post by sideways on Mar 24, 2022 22:36:41 GMT
My feeling is that the overkill of sending three bags of candy, and mom’s email making sure you got the candy, is a passive/aggressive FU.
eta - sorry…you asked how we’d respond. At this point, I’d let it go with the parents. They’re not going to do anything. It sounds like you’ve made it clear with the kid, but I’d make sure he knew the issue was about respecting boundaries (staying off of your desk), and, most of all, his lying.
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amom23
Drama Llama
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Post by amom23 on Mar 24, 2022 23:41:32 GMT
Speaking as a parent what exactly would you be expecting me to do? If I talk to my kid privately at home you wouldn't know now would you? So I think you are out of line for suggesting the parents didn't talk to their kid. If the parents came off snippy well maybe they were having a bad day already and you just unfortunately got some of it directed your way. Point is you really don't know and are just assuming. Jr. High kids do some dumbass things and hopefully this kid learned a lesson. As his teacher I hope you can move on from this incident as well.
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Post by sideways on Mar 24, 2022 23:50:58 GMT
Speaking as a parent what exactly would you be expecting me to do? If I talk to my kid privately at home you wouldn't know now would you? So I think you are out of line for suggesting the parents didn't talk to their kid. If the parents came off snippy well maybe they were having a bad day already and you just unfortunately got some of it directed your way. Point is you really don't know and are just assuming. Jr. High kids do some dumbass things and hopefully this kid learned a lesson. As his teacher I hope you can move on from this incident as well. Apologize for your dumbass kid and have him apologize for lying. |
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peabay
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Jun 25, 2014 19:50:41 GMT
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Post by peabay on Mar 24, 2022 23:52:21 GMT
As a parent, what would your response be? I would say "Thank you for letting us know, we will discuss with him" Ditto. |
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amom23
Drama Llama
Posts: 5,447
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Post by amom23 on Mar 24, 2022 23:53:21 GMT
Speaking as a parent what exactly would you be expecting me to do? If I talk to my kid privately at home you wouldn't know now would you? So I think you are out of line for suggesting the parents didn't talk to their kid. If the parents came off snippy well maybe they were having a bad day already and you just unfortunately got some of it directed your way. Point is you really don't know and are just assuming. Jr. High kids do some dumbass things and hopefully this kid learned a lesson. As his teacher I hope you can move on from this incident as well. Apologize for your dumbass kid and have him apologize for lying. Do you have kids? |
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Post by sideways on Mar 24, 2022 23:57:53 GMT
Apologize for your dumbass kid and have him apologize for lying. Do you have kids? Yes. Two who are now grown. One of them pulled a lot of stupid shit in MS and had to face his share of consequences for them, including apologizing when he needed to. |
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huskergal
Pearl Clutcher
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Post by huskergal on Mar 25, 2022 0:05:07 GMT
Speaking as a parent what exactly would you be expecting me to do? If I talk to my kid privately at home you wouldn't know now would you? So I think you are out of line for suggesting the parents didn't talk to their kid. If the parents came off snippy well maybe they were having a bad day already and you just unfortunately got some of it directed your way. Point is you really don't know and are just assuming. Jr. High kids do some dumbass things and hopefully this kid learned a lesson. As his teacher I hope you can move on from this incident as well. Maybe have the kid come back to the school the next day and apologize instead of handing me 3 bags of candy and say that my dad wanted me to give you these and then send me an email to make sure the kid gave me the candy. |
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huskergal
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Post by huskergal on Mar 25, 2022 0:07:38 GMT
My thought is that they didn't think stealing and lying is an issue. I am deeply bothered by that. But you don't have any idea what the conversation was at home. I agree with you, lying is the issue. As a parent, I would be mortified if my child had not apologized. I *also* think you don't know what the conversation was so there's really nowhere to go from here. I would drop it. I never said I was going to take this any further. I simply wanted to know how parents would respond. Since the kid didn't apologize or the mom didn't say anything in the email, the underlying message is that they didn't think it was a big deal. |
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Post by busy on Mar 25, 2022 0:08:39 GMT
Speaking as a parent what exactly would you be expecting me to do? If I talk to my kid privately at home you wouldn't know now would you? So I think you are out of line for suggesting the parents didn't talk to their kid. If the parents came off snippy well maybe they were having a bad day already and you just unfortunately got some of it directed your way. Point is you really don't know and are just assuming. Jr. High kids do some dumbass things and hopefully this kid learned a lesson. As his teacher I hope you can move on from this incident as well. Apologize for your dumbass kid and have him apologize for lying. The KID is who should apologize. And we don’t know that’s not what the parents told him to do. The three bags of candy is overkill and could come across as passive aggressive but maybe there was an explanation behind it that the kid was supposed to provide and didn’t. I’d err on the side of grace to the parents. Middle school boys aren’t always the best decision makers or the best at follow through but that doesn’t necessarily mean their parents suck. And he’s at an age when lots and lots and lots of peas talk about letting kids deal with their own consequences at school. Perhaps the parents here are trying to push him to be accountable and independent and he’s not doing a good job of it. |
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Post by sideways on Mar 25, 2022 0:16:49 GMT
But you don't have any idea what the conversation was at home. I agree with you, lying is the issue. As a parent, I would be mortified if my child had not apologized. I *also* think you don't know what the conversation was so there's really nowhere to go from here. I would drop it. I never said I was going to take this any further. I simply wanted to know how parents would respond. Since the kid didn't apologize or the mom didn't say anything in the email, the underlying message is that they didn't think it was a big deal. I misread your OP twice. 😝 You wanted to know how we’d respond as parents. In case you didn’t surmise it from my other posts, I’d make it clear that he’d be talked to, that it would never happen again. He’d be apologizing to you when he saw you again. I’d probably also apologize for it happening. |
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Post by myshelly on Mar 25, 2022 0:20:45 GMT
I don’t think you can or should assume what happened at home/whether the parents thought it was no big deal from that communication.
I think what the parents did was way better than arguing with you that their kid had a different story or not believing you or asking you to prove it.
I would have responded “thank you for letting me know.”
I would not have felt the need to let you know how we talked about it or dealt with it at home.
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Post by deekaye on Mar 25, 2022 0:50:57 GMT
But you don't have any idea what the conversation was at home. I agree with you, lying is the issue. As a parent, I would be mortified if my child had not apologized. I *also* think you don't know what the conversation was so there's really nowhere to go from here. I would drop it. I never said I was going to take this any further. I simply wanted to know how parents would respond. Since the kid didn't apologize or the mom didn't say anything in the email, the underlying message is that they didn't think it was a big deal. I've never been a teacher but I have several years experience working (volunteering) with kids of all ages. I'm also a mom of two, (now adults) and a grandmother of one. I think we all know what the conversation was like at home. The parents obviously don't think this is a big deal and just to prove that they think you are making a big deal out of it, they sent not one but THREE bags of candy, and then followed up by "did you get the candy?" (you can just hear the smirk in her email). This boy is being raised by immature jackals and is just following their actions. None of them will ever realize that it had nothing to do with the candy, and everything to do with stealing/lying. |
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Post by freecharlie on Mar 25, 2022 0:53:17 GMT
Maybe they made him pay for it himself?
I would have dealt with it originally in the classroom. I don't see this as a reason to involve parents, but that is my nature.
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garcia5050
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Posts: 2,773
Location: So. Calif.
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Post by garcia5050 on Mar 25, 2022 1:03:51 GMT
I’m the mean mom. I would have bought a replacement bag if candy and made the kid do chores to replace the cost of that candy. And I would have insisted he/she apologize.
You don’t know that any of that happened. It’s possible the kid was supposed to apologize but just didn’t.
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Post by originalvanillabean on Mar 25, 2022 1:20:38 GMT
I am 100% with you, it isn't the candy, it's the lie.
We don't have kids so I'm not sure what I would have said but I think something along the lines of "we'll discuss it", or "we'll address it" and we then we would.
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Post by bc2ca on Mar 25, 2022 1:22:01 GMT
He told me he had a big bag of the candy and home and brought it to school. I said let's check your backpack to see if you have any in there. FWIW, this bugs me. Did you suggest you were going to search his backpack in front of other kids? Did you include this bit of information in your email to the parents? I also have a problem with taking a candy being called stealing.  Take someone's book, phone, etc., sitting on a desk is stealing. A candy? |
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Post by sideways on Mar 25, 2022 1:32:40 GMT
He told me he had a big bag of the candy and home and brought it to school. I said let's check your backpack to see if you have any in there. FWIW, this bugs me. Did you suggest you were going to search his backpack in front of other kids? Did you include this bit of information in your email to the parents? I also have a problem with taking a candy being called stealing.  Take someone's book, phone, etc., sitting on a desk is stealing. A candy? She said it wasn’t about the candy. It was the lying. For me, it also would’ve been about taking something off my desk. I wouldn’t have cared what it was. The kid doesn’t respect personal space or boundaries. |
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Post by freecharlie on Mar 25, 2022 2:00:50 GMT
I forgot to say how I would respond.
I'd say "thank you for letting me know."
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Post by chaosisapony on Mar 25, 2022 2:11:42 GMT
I think you made this into a bigger situation than it needed to be. From acting like you were going to search his backpack to an email to the parents... just not really how I would have handled it. A simple statement to the class about taking things from your desk and saying the candy would no longer be part of class is as far as this should have gone IMO.
The parents were petty and passive aggressive and their response would annoy me.
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Post by mom on Mar 25, 2022 2:37:31 GMT
I think you are making a bunch of assumptions about the parents that you don't know to be true, but have already decided in your mind how they much they don't care about stealing and lying. Even though you have absolutely no clue what they discussed with their child.
If I had been the parent in this situation, I would not have said much more than the childs parent. I don't think its anyone else's business what punishment I give at home. If a teacher wants to designate what the punishment is, then they should have dealt with it at school.
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Post by 950nancy on Mar 25, 2022 4:14:28 GMT
Maybe the mom was embarrassed. Maybe the kid did get chewed out at home. Maybe mom and dad didn't agree with how to deal with the kid and his consequences. Maybe mom covers for the kid doing crappy stuff. Maybe the dad over punishes. Ugh. You just never know. I think the important part is that you communicated with the parent and let them know what happened. That is you doing your job. You just can't worry about how the parents respond to your email. It would have been nice to have an apology, but it looks like you aren't going to get one. I'd let this go and maybe keep the candy locked up for a few weeks. Sometimes kids are just really crappy (you know this already). Just move on with your awesome teaching self. My guess is something will happen between now and the end of school that will give you the tiniest bit of vindication. I always felt like those things happened when I was willing to let things go.
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Post by FuzzyMutt on Mar 25, 2022 5:23:45 GMT
Honestly, I have a personal policy that food is always meant to be shared. I would have picked the wrapper up, placed it in the trash, and simply reminded the class that trash goes in the trash can.
In an age where we know that poverty and food insecurity is a real thing, I would have never put someone on the spot. Part of me still wonders if the kid took the candy... (yes, I read the update.)
I also agree, homelife is such a wild card. I saw my uncle put a gun to my Aunt's head, because when he came home from work, to dinner on the table, his children had sauce on their face and that was unacceptable.
Seriously, nothing will make this better. Let it go. Please.
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cycworker
Pearl Clutcher
Posts: 4,409
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Post by cycworker on Mar 25, 2022 6:05:54 GMT
I am also going to be one of the few to gently suggest that I would never have handled it the way you did at all, from the start. Hear me out, please.
Kids at that age still don't have great impulse control. Their brains are still developing. And one of the worst things you you can do to a kid at that early teen age is embarrass them, particularly in front of peers.
Words like stealing & lying are far too loaded for this situation, and make it harder to achieve what I would think is the goal - to reinforce good citizenship, as opposed to just exerting power & control over another person.
And one of the worst things you you can do to a kid at that early teen age is embarrass them, particularly in front of peers.
You don't want to be a jellyfish, and you also don't want to be a brick wall. The goal should be boundaries that are BOTH firm AND kind/rooted in relationship/empathy.
So I would have skipped the sarcasm/putting the kid on the spot, and just issued a broad reminder to the whole class what the candy boundaries are, and dropped it. I definitely would not have emailed the parent.
If I had said something that resulted in this exchange, I'd have asked the kid to come to my desk as the class ended, note that it wasn't my intent to embarrass him, and say something like, 'So, I know you were saying you didn't take the candy, if you DID ever take the candy from my desk, you could tell me. Telling the truth is than having to make up a story. It's easier on everyone.' Give the kid a face saving way to admit it with some grace.
And if I were the parent, while I would certain talk to my kid about lying and have him apologize for that, and for touching your stuff, there would be no letter of apology, and I wouldn't make him replace it. I think that's overkill - especially the apologizing in writing.
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peaname
Pearl Clutcher
Posts: 3,390
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Post by peaname on Mar 25, 2022 10:48:49 GMT
He told me he had a big bag of the candy and home and brought it to school. I said let's check your backpack to see if you have any in there. FWIW, this bugs me. Did you suggest you were going to search his backpack in front of other kids? Did you include this bit of information in your email to the parents? I also have a problem with taking a candy being called stealing. Take someone's book, phone, etc., sitting on a desk is stealing. A candy? To me this is a slippery slope especially for a kid. I have an eighth grade son and he is quite immature and I do not believe the pandemic helped. If he believes it’s acceptable to take a paper clip off someone’s desk without permission I have not done my job as a parent. I would have thanked you for your email and he would have had a consequence at home such as no dessert while the family enjoys his favorite. There have been quite a few teacher emails this year God bless teachers! I don’t like kids but if I was a teacher this incident would burn me on candy and I’d never hand out another piece in class again. Lol I work with the elderly and one of my residents sends her bingo prize treats home with me to share with my bratty eighth grader I guess she’s just a better person than I am. |
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johnnysmom
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Jun 25, 2014 21:16:33 GMT
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Post by johnnysmom on Mar 25, 2022 11:08:24 GMT
As a parent I would have been confused why I was even being told about this (assuming it was a one time thing). This is the kind of stuff I assume is being handled at school and I would support any reasonable consequences the teacher/school handed out. In fact I rarely punish(ed) my kids for something that happened at school. We would discuss it but I figured the loss of privileges/recess or chat with the principal or whatever else the school did was punishment enough. I’m general my kids behaved at school but they’d occasionally do something dumb, if they had ongoing behavior issues it would be a different story. If I received your email I may have responded saying thanks or we’d discuss it at home but that’s it.
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Post by melanell on Mar 25, 2022 11:13:44 GMT
Oh man....what really bugs me is that the kid could have easily just kept his mouth shut. But he decided to dive in and start spinning tales immediately. Lying is one of the things I least tolerate in my own kids, so that would bother me in this situation, as either the teacher or the parents.
I wouldn't love their response, either. I hope, for this kid's sake, that his parents do care that their kid is stealing and lying, and that their over-the-top candy response to you was more out of embarrassment, but I honestly don't feel like that's the case.
(As an aside, when I was in school kids often sat unattended in classrooms between classes, and when I asked my kids, they reported that the same thing still happens now.)
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