School Fairness/ Popularity

Post Reply New Topic

Sorry, this is a bit of a rant about my daughter's school. She's only going to be there another year, then, hopefully the new small school will be built and she'll be transferring there.

Every month, each class selects a child as 'citizen of the month'. Now, logically you would think that this would be for some deed that was appreciated by another, or for being a generally helpful person. But, what my daughter tells me is that there's no discussion about who did what and why they should be nominated. There's just a blanket vote on who they want. As a result, the kids vote for their friends and the ones with the most friends have the best chance of winning. When I ask my daughter who voted for her (if there was anyone at all), it's whoever she has been playing with most that month. She doesn't have a lot of friends. She's a lovely caring little girl, but that doesn't get votes. Before one of the other ASD kids went to a specialist unit, my daughter used to spend a lot of time with him, helping him with his work, as he was struggling. I would have thought this sort of kindness would have been worthy of nomination, but only the boy in question voted for her then.

Also, her class has a toy monkey. Each evening, he goes home with one child, at the teacher's discretion. But, when he is brought back in the next day, the teacher tells the child to pass him on to someone else. Of course, they pick a friend, then they pass him on to another friend. Yet again, as my daughter only has a small number of friends, the chances of her getting to sit with the monkey are small. To make matters worse, my daughter forms attachments to objects, like this monkey. Of all the children in the class, she probably loves him the most. I've told the teachers about this unfairness and they don't see it as an issue.

That's out of order and also a very outdated attitude. I did teacher training when I first went to university 20 years ago and even back then we were taught to ensure all children got the same opportunity to participate. A good teacher would find a way to make this happen. EG a rota for Monkey, rigged if necessary so the child who needs it the most get him over the weekend.

When I was a cub/brownie leader we used to keep points at camp with a prize for the winner. Points were awarded for winning games, doing the activities etc.. Scores were kept on a board they could all see. But the children were also told that I kept a secret tally in my notebook, where I added points for kindness, helping, and took points off for meanness, laziness etc. At the end of camp I used the secret, non-existent tally, to even out the numbers so that no child came last or did dramatically worse than the others. We never changed the winner, we just fiddled the figures so it looked like everyone had done well and they'd won by the narrowest of margins.

That sounds like a teacher who has no idea what it is like to not be popular, and thus thinks about how fun it is to be able to pick your friend, while being totally clueless as to how such policies can literally defeat less popular children. Those are not inclusive policies.

And many people don't care. They'll say it is a dog eat dog world after all, may as well get used to it.

But it is highly short sighted to not see the issues these little things create in those around you. School should not be about supporting popularity, but about supporting potential, and giving equal opportunity to every child to experience and try.

It is not fair. The school should be trying to downplay the popularity and promote thinking about values.

At my daughter's school kids get awards for positive citizenship, such as making new friends and helping others. The awards are such that a child is rewarded for overcoming a personal challenge. Since my daughter is shy, she gets a reward when she makes a new friend. Highly social kids may be rewarded for other things, like taking turns, or showing patience etc.

She also has a soft toy to bring home. Apparently they pull his name out of a hat. Personally, I'm not a big fan of the soft.....germs.....

Thanks for your replies, everyone. It seems that common sense is in short supply in my daughter's school. I mentioned the citizen award to the headteacher and said that I didn't think my daughter would ever have a chance at it. Her response was, 'We had a child with an ASD who won once'. Woopy do! One child, in a school of almost 600, and over what length of time? The kids also vote for others to go on committees or various things, e.g. eco, health, pupil council. Yet again, getting nominated depends on numbers of friends. My daughter would be good for either the eco one or the health one, but didn't stand a chance.

The monkey really upsets my daughter. She came out crying on Friday, because a girl got him for the weekend and we're almost certain this is the 3rd time she has had him at the weekend (my daughter has never had him at the weekend). He has a diary, which the kids write in and I make a mental note of who has had him, especially the ones who get him for more than one night. I hate doing it, because it does seem petty, but when your child gets so upset about it, it does pay to have ammo to fire at the teacher. Also, they're supposed to get him home when it's their birthday. But, when it was my daughter's birthday, another child had him the night before and was then off sick. She got him home the next night, but I think she should have got compensation for that.

I'm going to see the plans for the new school today. August 2013 can't come quick enough.

That is an odd way of doing things. At our school, they have a school value each month and each class has one kid that is chosen by the teacher that best exemplifies that character every month. It is completely teacher driven and my son does not get chosen of course because he is always considered "rude", but it never seems to bother him. It is very random and I have no idea how the teachers go about picking because I have 5 kids at that school, all in different classes, and only one has been chosen by their teacher as a month's character kid. Since none of my kids except my Aspie are ever in "trouble", I am surprised the rest haven't been chosen at some point. My point is on one hand at least it is fairer than having the kids vote, but even with the teacher choosing, I see no real rhyme or reason.

In second grade, they had a stuffed animal and journal that went home with a kid each week and the kid could write what the stuffed animal did while at their house in the journal; however, each kid got a turn and the order was chosen by the teacher, usually when they were the star kid that week (which is when they do a poster all about them and present it to the class.). The children never picked the order or who got it.

The only thing that is voted on by the kids in our elementary school is student council, which is started in the 3rd grade. Each class chooses 2 representatives, but it has to be one boy and one girl, for student council. In 3rd grade, my AS son was actually chosen, but I think it was because it was their first year to vote and he was the only kid to actually ask kids to vote for him. He was pretty disappointed in 4th grade because it was a popularity contest. Plus, he was manipulated by a girl in his class who told him if he voted for her, she would vote for him, but then later he found out she didn't vote for him. It is hard when they have to learn lessons the hard way.

Personally, I am not a fan of the stuffed animal either. Who knows what that animal has been through at some homes. Plus, they have enough lice checks at that school, that I don't think stuffed animals are a good idea. Having said that, all my kids loved it and I cringed and went along.

Have you gone over the teacher's head? I hate to suggest to do that, but you do have documentation that this situation isn't equitable.

This stuff sucks. At least we're living in a world where it isn't a norm and parents are horrified by it: when I was a little girl, the opposite was true.

Can you give your daughter a special stuffed toy that she gets as soon as you pick her up from school?

I would also add that it's LAZY teaching. They are taking the easiest path rather than the best.

It was like that at my school and it really sucked. I dreaded those games we played, etc, because you only got picked if you were popular. I was so unpopular (not to mention unskilled at games, etc) that not only was I the last one picked, but team captains would argue and trade players about who had to get stuck with me. Even if it wasn't a game that required skills, etc, they did me like that. It sucked to be me back then.

I used to tell my mother and grandmother about that kind of thing, and they would go to the teacher who then made it a POINT to include me, and it was pretty obvious to me that she was doing so because she was asked to, so that just made things worse because it called attention to it.

I really didn't have friends until 9th grade, but after I made some friends, I started learning social skills and what to do and not to do. Up until then, I had really only socialized or been around adults, who pretty much had to act nice and had to act like I was accepted. I tried out for majorette at the end of the 8th grade, and made it because the judges were from another school, (in the interest of fairness) and I surprised myself at how quickly and how well I learned baton (Another girl and I were the only two who were allowed to handle fire batons that year, and she had been twirling since Kindergarden)

I would suggest two things, which I wish had been done for me back when I was in school. 1, find out who some of the mediumly popular kids are who don't pick on your kid. Call the parents of two or three of them and tell them that your kid doesn't have friends, and see if they would be interested in helping foster a friendship. Maybe meeting at a pizza place or a park or something. You could hang out with the other parent and the kids could play together. Make it look like you are the one wanting to hang out with the other parent though, and the kids are just there. If it looks like the kids are being pushed to be friends, they will pick up on it and one or the other will resent it.

The other thing I'd suggest is to ask the teacher to observe the kids and see if she can tell why your kid isn't making friends. If it's something she's doing or not doing. Then tell your child "Maybe it's because of this, lets try this instead" and work on that issue. Lots of parents don't want to point out their kids perceived shortcomings to them because they think it will make them self conscious. If your daughter is anything like me (I have AS), then she is already self conscious and would love to know what to do to not be that way. I always knew that I was doing something wrong, but I didn't know what it was and anytime I would ask at home, I was just told that it wasn't me, it was the other kids and they were mean and bullies. Well, they were mean and bullies, but I was doing a lot of stuff the wrong way or not doing other things at all, etc. I wanted to change the "wierd" things about me, but I didn't know what they were or how to change them. I would have given my right arm to have my differences pointed out to me kindly at an early age and have help to change them. I'm sure that my mom may have tried to point things out, but she was never explicit. If she had said "talking about I Dream of Jeannie all the time is annoying" I would have simply thought that it annoyed HER and never thought that it annoyed anyone else. She would have had to tell me "Talking about I Dream of Jeannie all the time is probably annoying the other kids and they don't like it. Lets find some other things to talk about with them" for me to understand.

One more thing I just thought of is that while the other kids in my class saw each other from time to time outside of school, I never did. Some lived in the same neighborhood, some had parents who were friends, many had parents involved in school activities and most went to the same church. The few times I did get my mother or grandmother to do something like that, it was different with the other kids and much more fun and relaxed. It seemed like a different environment caused them to act differently, and give me more of a chance than they did at school.

Either way, good luck. It sucks to be in your daughters predicament, and I do think that you can help her if you do some of those things. I have four kids of my own and I know that it's terribly offensive to be told or hinted at, that your child is doing something that causes other kids to not like them, and the knee jerk reaction is that the other kids are wrong. However, if you look at it from a kids point of view, whichever kid that is the outcast is doing things that break the social code that the kids follow. Your child, probably like me, doesn't know that social code. I had no clue there was one, and if I had known I wouldn't have understood the purpose for following it, unless it was spellled out to me exactly. "Frances, there are certain things that kids do and don't do. When a kid doesn't do what they are supposed to do, or does something they aren't supposed to do, then other kid's don't want to be their friend. These are the things you are doing wrong;...." would have done so much for me that I can't even put it into words. That was exactly the kind of thing that the friends I made in 9th grade did, which helped me learn and make friends. They quickly found out that they had to explain it very well, and even go into detail about things which would have hurt someone else's feelings.

Ah yes. When I was in kindergarten my school did a similar thing. Every week there would be "good citizen awards" and I so badly wanted one. I always made sure to be very good. I did exactly as the teacher told me, never talked out of turn, never cut in line. I sat quietly at my table with my hands together after assignments and I always shared my school supplies when asked. However, I came to eventually realize that this award was given randomly, much like the task of getting to pin the date on the calender, that I was only permitted to do after my mother informed the teacher that I had really been looking forward to doing it.

I would speak to the teacher about this because the nomination system does not serve it's purpose and overlooks children such as your daughter who are really very altruistic beings.

Additionally, I would investigate if your daughter does not have many friends because she does not know how to reach out to other children, or if she is rejected by them. It's very important that children on the spectrum know that while being caring and friendly is important, it doesn't automatically result in friends and that they have to initiate friendships themselves sometimes by asking the other children if they can play with them or if they'd like to come over and play.



It is an issue because it likely makes your daughter feel wrongfully excluded. She likely sees herself as a nice, good person and doesn't understand why she is being (unintentionally) persecuted by exclusion. But the underlying problem is her poor social skills and this needs to be addressed or it will continue to be an issue in her life. You can't always be there to make sure she is included and treated fairly and she needs to be taught how to deal with the social realities of life.

I would ask the teacher if she feels your daughter can do anything to advance socially, or if she observe differences between she interacts with other children and the way other children interact with each other that might pose as problematic in terms of making friends. A lot of times teachers make some valuable observations but don't know how to approach the parents about it without upsetting them. If you provide a channel of communication through which she can do this without being persecuted, you might learn something important about how you might help your daughter.

Sounds like a lazy teacher to me.