Reply to S. Arlington and Mean Kindergarteners

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Folks who have kids at Campbell or Drew especially, can you tell me whether your experience has been better than mine?  We are a month into K at Claremont, and we like the school/program, but the other children are breathtaking in their aggressiveness.

For context, I have an outgoing, well socialized kid who did great at a private Montessori school, and these encounters are completely alien.  I don't know if it's that Montessori really does deliver on the empathy/community front, or whether private schools simply can kick out the mean kids, or whether it's all about size (it certainly seems like kids are thrown to the wolves in a big public school classroom in a way they weren't in our old school, which went up through upper el btw and those kids were all great).  Or is it just Claremont?  Is something wrong here?  Do I just teach my kid to forget all her nice behavior and put up her dukes with the other kids?  Or should I have chosen one of the other schools (thus my question about Campbell/Drew)?

Here is the kind of sad statement I have had to hear barely a month into school, "I guess I just have to get used to being tripped and pinched and punched".  This has not been isolated to one child or one classroom context (it happens in line, at recess, in the cafeteria, during specials, on the bus, etc).  To be fair, when I complained about one child's inappropriate behavior, it was dealt with, and it does sound like the teachers will do something when a kid tells on another kid for hitting...but I am told that the other children actively watch for the teacher's attention to be diverted elsewhere before grabbing her arm and digging their nails into it (this is at least two different children on multiple occasions) or punching her in the chest or pulling her hair.  In other words, I feel like I could seek a solution if it were one context or one child.  But what is there to discuss with the teacher or even the principal if the problem is pervasive?  I don't even know what I should be asking for.

So I just want to know...is this normal?  I don't remember kindergarten being quite so mean when I was a kid, but maybe things have changed.  Is it worth switching to one of the other schools next year or is this just what I should expect at APS?  Thanks in advance.[/quote]

Are these "diverse" schools? You know the virtuous ones people are always going on about?[/quote]

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