A load of earache!

I heard a story recently about a parent who had gone screaming and shouting into the head teacher’s office because a teacher in the school, she claimed, had maimed her child’s ear by twisting it and pulling it when the child was talking in the class.

The parent apparently went on to exclaim that not only had the teacher damaged the outer part of the ear, she could also have potentially damaged his hearing as well.

Now, like any good head teacher would do, the one in question, allowed the parent to have her rant, and once she had let off enough steam, began the real discussion.  Notes were taken, heads were nodded and the parent left the school in the knowledge that the school was going to investigate the matter and then get back to her.

Obviously, this was a very serious allegation that could potentially ruin a teaching career, so it was very important that the head teacher investigated the matter thoroughly. Firstly, the social worker for that particular year asked the children individually and collectively what had happened and if indeed the ear had been twisted at all.

The year coordinator had a chat with the class teaching assistant and the head had a chat with the teacher being accused. 

After around an hour of digging and prodding, the three investigators came back together again to compare notes and indeed find out if the three stories matched. 

They did … and it was very clear that the teacher was, in fact, entirely innocent and the perpetrator of the actual crime had cooked up the story and spread it using the power of social media.

The real story was this: The boy with the sore ear got it because another boy had hit him. The boy hit his ear because the other boy had been calling him and his family names. The boy with the sore ear was then moved to a different table by the teacher who, seeing his ear was all right decided to split them up rather than make more of a fuss. This incensed the boy with the sore ear who hatched up a plan to get his own back.

When he got home, he told his mum that the teacher had twisted and bent his ear because he said that he wanted to go to the nurse because he wasn’t feeling well. 

The mother, as seems to be the way these days, jumped straight on her phone to take revenge for her offspring and, of course, his ear. 

Her first stop was the class WhatsApp Group, set up to help the teacher communicate efficiently with parents and families. After uploading a photo of her son’s ear, she followed it with the statement: ‘look what happened to my son’s ear in class’.

Well, from here the messages of support and incredulity came back thick-and-fast and by the end of the evening, the parent was boiling and the child was slightly concerned about the monster he had created. This takes us back to where we started. 

After the investigation had been completed and the paperwork filled in and filed, the parent was invited back to school. Once it became apparent that her son was to blame for the whole sorry affair, she was understandably furious at him and the day ended as it had begun … with this parent shouting at the top of her voice. Only this time her son was on the receiving end and they were going out of the school and not coming into it.

The whole sorry mess highlights two very dangerous truths facing those who work in education today. 

Social media and all of its applications can be a blessing and a curse and, secondly, if we do not teach our children about the impact social media can have from an early age, we are setting them up to be owned by it, just as half the population seem to be today.