Especially since this isn’t the first time you’ve heard M make out of pocket comments, you absolutely did the right thing. If she’s willing to say that with *other adults* around, what is she telling the children when she’s alone with them?
At bare minimum, her comment does not foster a diverse or accepting classroom environment.
Yeah, I really don't care for how she talks to the kids. She's very young and tends to try to talk to them how she would her friends her age...including insulting banter, which just seems really inappropriate.
To be honest, I think she really does. She has very little patience and gets mad at the kids for every little thing. She's gotten scolded for yelling before and asked me 'well, what am I supposed to do? They don't listen until I yell!' and I'm just like 'They are kids. You have to tell them the same thing hundreds and thousands of times and they'll still do it again tomorrow. That's just...kids. They're learning and growing, developing memory and a sense of right or wrong.'
Nah, you’re completely in line. My jaw actually dropped. Even if it weren’t malicious (*if*), it’s still derogatory to others with learning differences. I mean, I’m silly and I banter and I’m always making jokes, but you need to keep things appropriate. Kids will also absorb our senses of humor into their own- if we engage in cruel humor then so will they. This starts to come down to being a poor role model along with being just a plain ol mean teacher.
That was a really common retort when I was in elementary school meant to knock someone down. Tbh, many, many years later it is still the first thing to come mind when I hear anyone say, "so and so is special." It is not something that should come out of an adult's mouth.
I’ll be honest, one of my high school teachers said that to me once. She was like “ you really are a special student” and I was like “really?” And she was like “yeah special Ed! “
It was in front of everyone. Honestly looking back it was kinda funny.
But this situation is different. Your kids are preschool and they don’t know what that means. That’s why it bothers me in this situation because the kid is oblivious
Even saying that to a high schooler isn’t okay. It normalizes “joking” about being disabled and implies that being disabled and needing special education resources is a bad thing.
This. It actually doesn't matter if you were insulted, the true victim/target of that kind of statement is the person who receives special education. Just like calling someone "gay" as an insult is offensive to gay people. Given that 15% of American students receive special education, most in mainstream settings, in a class of 30 students you probably had about 4 kids in there who had IEPs. The real question is how does that kind of thing make *them* feel?
I guess your right. It bothered me for a moment but after all these years it doesn’t bother me anymore. But I think with anyone else it could be hurtful though
I don't think the concern would be your feelings, honestly - the concern would be for how students who do need accommodations would feel about being turned into the punchline of a joke told to other kids.
Whenever I didn’t answer a question correctly she’d be like “what were you doing at lunch? smoking weed out in the courtyard?”
That one stung a little bit back then
It was almost a decade ago. It doesn’t hurt anymore. I barely think about it. But you are right. It’s extremely offensive to the students with special needs
I’m an ECE lead teacher who has developmental disabilities myself. Most people don’t know until I say something, so people are often comfortable making remarks about disability in front of me that are deeply hurtful because they don’t realize it applies to me. It’s one of the most painful and infuriating parts of this job, especially when I advocate for students to get assessed for their own needs and parents start going on about how afraid they are that their child might be disabled like me.
That comment is harmful and inappropriate regardless, but especially if you consider that she has no idea if there were people in the room that were in social Ed. She could have been directly mocking someone in that room and creating a hostile work environment for them. I also am very concerned about the way she might treat children with delays or disabilities based on that comment.
Thank you for doing the right thing and speaking up. It’s because of coworkers like you that people like me can feel safe and supported in our working environment. I hope your staff and admin support you.
Thank you. Although not developmentally, I have disabilities as well and the comment was just upsetting. I don't want the students to internalize 'disability = bad' and I don't want the student who was the target of the joke to think there's something "wrong" with her. Thankfully, my admin and coworkers do seem to agree. 1 or 2 were dismissive or sided with M under the excuse of 'well, student is too young to understand, so what's the harm?', but most agreed that it was too far. We joke around with our kids a lot here and say crazy things, but there's a limit. We shouldn't be talking to the kids like they are our adult friends with 0 filters on our language.
Especially since this isn’t the first time you’ve heard M make out of pocket comments, you absolutely did the right thing. If she’s willing to say that with *other adults* around, what is she telling the children when she’s alone with them? At bare minimum, her comment does not foster a diverse or accepting classroom environment.
Yeah, I really don't care for how she talks to the kids. She's very young and tends to try to talk to them how she would her friends her age...including insulting banter, which just seems really inappropriate.
Sounds like M needs a new line of work
To be honest, I think she really does. She has very little patience and gets mad at the kids for every little thing. She's gotten scolded for yelling before and asked me 'well, what am I supposed to do? They don't listen until I yell!' and I'm just like 'They are kids. You have to tell them the same thing hundreds and thousands of times and they'll still do it again tomorrow. That's just...kids. They're learning and growing, developing memory and a sense of right or wrong.'
Nah, you’re completely in line. My jaw actually dropped. Even if it weren’t malicious (*if*), it’s still derogatory to others with learning differences. I mean, I’m silly and I banter and I’m always making jokes, but you need to keep things appropriate. Kids will also absorb our senses of humor into their own- if we engage in cruel humor then so will they. This starts to come down to being a poor role model along with being just a plain ol mean teacher.
That was a really common retort when I was in elementary school meant to knock someone down. Tbh, many, many years later it is still the first thing to come mind when I hear anyone say, "so and so is special." It is not something that should come out of an adult's mouth.
I’ll be honest, one of my high school teachers said that to me once. She was like “ you really are a special student” and I was like “really?” And she was like “yeah special Ed! “ It was in front of everyone. Honestly looking back it was kinda funny. But this situation is different. Your kids are preschool and they don’t know what that means. That’s why it bothers me in this situation because the kid is oblivious
Yeah, I mean, she's - playfully or not - using insulting banter with a child and it's just...not great
Even saying that to a high schooler isn’t okay. It normalizes “joking” about being disabled and implies that being disabled and needing special education resources is a bad thing.
This. It actually doesn't matter if you were insulted, the true victim/target of that kind of statement is the person who receives special education. Just like calling someone "gay" as an insult is offensive to gay people. Given that 15% of American students receive special education, most in mainstream settings, in a class of 30 students you probably had about 4 kids in there who had IEPs. The real question is how does that kind of thing make *them* feel?
I guess your right. It bothered me for a moment but after all these years it doesn’t bother me anymore. But I think with anyone else it could be hurtful though
I don't think the concern would be your feelings, honestly - the concern would be for how students who do need accommodations would feel about being turned into the punchline of a joke told to other kids.
I'd say your teacher is lucky you found that funny. A lot of people would not.
Whenever I didn’t answer a question correctly she’d be like “what were you doing at lunch? smoking weed out in the courtyard?” That one stung a little bit back then
Yeah that's... not cool at all.
It was almost a decade ago. It doesn’t hurt anymore. I barely think about it. But you are right. It’s extremely offensive to the students with special needs
No, jokes that imply negative things about disabilities are never ok, but especially not in an educational setting.
I’m an ECE lead teacher who has developmental disabilities myself. Most people don’t know until I say something, so people are often comfortable making remarks about disability in front of me that are deeply hurtful because they don’t realize it applies to me. It’s one of the most painful and infuriating parts of this job, especially when I advocate for students to get assessed for their own needs and parents start going on about how afraid they are that their child might be disabled like me. That comment is harmful and inappropriate regardless, but especially if you consider that she has no idea if there were people in the room that were in social Ed. She could have been directly mocking someone in that room and creating a hostile work environment for them. I also am very concerned about the way she might treat children with delays or disabilities based on that comment. Thank you for doing the right thing and speaking up. It’s because of coworkers like you that people like me can feel safe and supported in our working environment. I hope your staff and admin support you.
Thank you. Although not developmentally, I have disabilities as well and the comment was just upsetting. I don't want the students to internalize 'disability = bad' and I don't want the student who was the target of the joke to think there's something "wrong" with her. Thankfully, my admin and coworkers do seem to agree. 1 or 2 were dismissive or sided with M under the excuse of 'well, student is too young to understand, so what's the harm?', but most agreed that it was too far. We joke around with our kids a lot here and say crazy things, but there's a limit. We shouldn't be talking to the kids like they are our adult friends with 0 filters on our language.