Should I Press Charges Against a Teacher Aide That Pulled My Sons Hair?

I don't think you should.

Last year I was teaching an Art Goes To School class. A little boy that has emotional issues got up and picked up the chair he was sitting on and was about to throw it. It took his aide, the teacher and 2 other school personnel to get him under control. I never knew that a second grader could be so scary until I witnessed it.

ETA: based on the re-written SWH. You need to get a grip on yourself. No one here came down on you. You received a lot of objective opinions. You mention that you think day to day vs future and I believe it is critical that you think about the future because your son needs help to control his outbursts before an outburst backfires on your family.

Please redirect your anger and frustration into doing something positive to help your son. Focus on the priority... Your SON!!!

Based on your SWH, if you love this school then you let the school handle it.

Once you press charges you will make a name for yourself in the community and you may have a hard time finding any school that will accept your son if he is known to be aggressive and violent to adults.

Based on your question... NO, I would not press charges because your son attacked first and the teacher was doing her job. Maybe she overreacted but then again, he attacked her. Pressing charges is setting yourself and your son up for future issues. Suing will not do anything except get you publicity within your area which will likely be viewed negatively toward you and your family.

I have been on the teacher side of being with special needs. I was attacked once by a student and injured enough to miss work 2 days. Even if I had the grounds to pursue action against this child or the school, I did not because I knew that risk when I accepted the job. You should be thankful that this teacher and the school are not pressing charges against your child.

Spin your anger and frustration in a positive way to try to help your son with the aggression issues because it needs to be addressed sooner than later. As he gets older and bigger, he can really hurt someone and you may be held liable.

I, too, have a child who attacks people (due to special needs), so I know exactly how you feel. I think I would let the school handle it however they are going to (although I am surprised they are keeping her - most places are zero tolerance for this kind of stuff). I also think I would ask if they do decide to keep her, that there is a 30 day "break" between the incident and when she works with him again. Our son "burned out" aides frequently due to his high behaviors so we had to rotate because otherwise they would quit or refuse to work with him if they had to do it all the time. If this really was a one off for this aide, it sounds like she needs a break more than anything - everyone (including parents) can "snap."

If you press charges, no school will want anything to do with you or your son in the future. This teacher admitted she feels terrible for what happened. Your son attacked her first. I would be having my son write an apology letter and baking her cookies, not thinking about pressing charges against her!

No school HAS to accept your son. Not even public schools. If a child has violent behaviors, they are not forced to keep him. You need to get his behavior under control or you may find yourself with no school that will accept him. No, I wouldn't press charges. He attacked first. Your lucky she isn't pressing charges against you!

my opinion? let it go. everybody makes mistakes, she acknowledged the mistake and the best thing for all involved is to move on. let the school handle it

Not saying it was right but you could probably understand her frustration and his ability to calm down. Once my son was out of control at a Friendlys restaurant. I literally threw a coke at him. Ice and all (not a bottle) It really caught his attention and then settled down. I felt bad but did get over it. Sounds like everyone knows it was not the thing to do by acknowledging it. Let it go.

WOW! Your son physically assaulted a teacher and you actually considered suing the school? Yes, that is way over the top. I think that you need to accept that the teacher is human. She didn't actually hurt him and you admit that she has made real progress with him. I would think that this was a one-time moment of frustration. Would you react well to getting beat up by a 6 year old? I get the mama-bear reaction, but you even admit that your son's behavior was absolutely horrid. Your son is not innocent in this situation at all. You would do best to work with the school to determine a go-forward plan on how they are going to manage his awful behavior.

How will "pressing charges" help your son? Personally, I would not want to spend any of my time focusing my energy pursuing the teacher. I think you should invest your energy in your son instead and focus with him on what behaviors HE needs to learn to be successful at school going forward. Focus on developing positive, collaborative relationships with his current teachers.

Wow. This is just an opinion but no you don't press charges. She is on the school's radar and they will take care of it. You don't need to protect other people's children from her, in this case. She does not sound like an awful predator. She sounds like an overworked teacher that reacted without thinking when in an awful situation. I would think sitting down and having a conversation with her might be a better first step than litigation.

If this is really how your son acts on a regular basis I would be sending cookies and brownies and thank you cards once a week. These teachers are humans, not machines, and they are doing a job many of us could not handle. I can't even imagine the chaos they must face in that classroom. They sound like wonderful people.

Added: Never did I say reward her. I would be thanking EVERYONE in his classroom as much as I could. You are angry at people for not reading your post thoroughly but you also did not read my answer thoroughly. Don't send the darn cookies. It was just an idea to show your gratitude for the ones you seemed to like there. Geeesh......

I think you should move on. Your son physically attacked her. Yes, she messed up, but she apologized and has been taken out of your son's classroom. That is enough. The school will handle it if another problem arises. Most likely this is a one time thing, but if not they will handle it. I think pressing charges is too much.

As inappropriate as it was what could you possibly hope to gain by pressing charges? Likely she's a minimally educated, barely trained and poorly paid school employee. Sadly this is the state of education in our country. Who wants to work with special ed kids for 8 hours a day for minimum wage? Almost no one, even I would rather work in fast food than do that job :-(

My nanny works in a similar classroom as a paraprofessional, only with older kids (5th grade age) who are often as big as or bigger than the teachers. It's an incredibly tough job, as you know. That said, she would NEVER do what that teacher did, nor would any of her colleagues. A boy in her class recently pulled a teacher's hair so hard that he dragged her to the floor and two other teachers had to use release and restraint techniques to get him to let her go and get him restrained. Scary day for everyone, most especially the boy, who doesn't understand and can't control his actions.

There should be a protocol for your school district to record and report the incident, which would be according to state laws. Look up the laws in your state and make sure that the school follows them. For me, as long as this incident was recorded and reported properly so that there is a record of it, I would let it go and let the school handle the discipline part of dealing with the teacher/para. That way if there ever is another incident involving this person, there will be a record of the past infraction recorded that will indicate a pattern of behavior.

ETA: Mountain Mama, your information is not correct. If a child has behavioral, educational or emotional issues that can't be addressed in a local school setting, then a child will be outplaced into a setting that is the right fit for him or her. But no, a school district can't refuse to educate a child. They can say "we can't handle him here" and then they're on the hook to find an appropriate setting, pay for it, and cover the transportation costs. There are students my nanny works with who should absolutely be in a therapeutic setting but the school district doesn't want to absorb those costs and their parents don't have the knowledge or resource to advocate for outplacement so they stay in her special classroom in public school where they are learning nothing, not improving, and every day is an exercise in mitigating outbursts or preventing or stopping violence. I had no idea that this happens in public school, but it does.

I'm with 2kidmama on this. Curious about the school. Is this a public school? Special needs school? I have a special needs son and the public schools couldn't educate him because of his behavior. This doesn't apply yet (I don't think) but please consider your options as he grows. If this happens and he's older, the law could become involved. What if he attacks another student? Once puberty hits, the "attacks" have to be managed (physically) at a much higher level. I know how hard this is. Please start lining up a long term educational plan. Wishing you the best...

It is a hard call and obviously it's easier for me to say one thing since it's not my child, though I may feel differently if it was. Anyway, if it was me, I would let the school handle it. It sounds like they understand that it was serious because they removed her from the classroom and are considering what further action to take. It also sounds like the aide understands how wrong her behavior does.

I have acted out of frustration in the heat of the moment and always regret it after (nothing harmful) and I think that's probably what happened here. It's true you should expect more patience from a teacher working in this classroom, but sometimes we act before we even give ourselves a second to think.

Obviously, if anything else were to ever happen I would strongly recommend doing something more, but I think this is a one time offense and being handled well by the school and the aide.

Considering that it was only your son's hair, this was a one-time event, and everyone says she is normally a good, loving aide, I think you should let this go. Teachers and aides are human, and kids can really test one's patience.

If she does it again, then you can take action. But it's nice that you have empathy for how challenging your son can be.

A classroom full of kids can test the patience of a saint. It sure tested mine this week. She doesn't need to lose her job over one hair pull.

I think pressing charges is way over the top. Disciplinary action with the school, maybe. I think we need more information to even determine if that is warranted. What happens when your son starts punching and pulling someone's hair? What does it take to get him to stop? Is he so focused that he zones out? Maybe pulling his hair was a tactic to shock him out of it and get him to stop. How hard did she even pull his hair? What are the teachers allowed to do to make him stop? Restrain him? Talk to him? At some point, the teachers have to protect themselves. Granted, I do not have an autistic child, but I just couldn't see myself demanding that a teacher get in trouble, much less press charges, when my son attacked her first.

I think you are focusing on the wrong thing here. It happened, it's over, she no longer works with your son. Let the school deal with the aide however they want to, you don't have control over that. The protection of their students is on them. Obviously you are choosing to still attend the school so you must trust them.

I think your focus should be on helping your son, and looking forward. To dwell on the incident and try to keep it alive by pressing charges will keep you in a negative mind frame unnecessarily. And it sounds like your son needs a lot of attention. Why add hassle and stress to your plate? Especially hassle that only serves to punish someone, and doesn't bring anything positive to you or the progress of your son. Let it go.

Man, I don't know. That's a tough one.
You yourself know how very difficult your son is, but you are trusting the school and anyone that it employs to take care of your son, not hurt him.
But the teacher's aid...she had a human moment. And unfortunately when you are in a position of power (which you are as a teacher, especially for a 6 year old), you don't get to have a lot of human moments. She can't react like that to him.
I see the conflict. Understanding how she feels but not understanding how she couldn't remove herself from a 6 year old and regroup.
I would definitely have a talk with the principle. There should be some kind of disciplinary action taken back. As a teacher's assistant she may need to have more training to work with kids with special needs.

I had not gotten a chance to answer your question yet. I did understand your original post (unlike some of the posters), though it was also helpful to read your SWH.

And yeah, why people write without really reading what you said makes no sense. It's not like you wrote a book either. So for those posts, B., just discount them.

I know that this is probably going to sound depressing, but I am going to detail it here for you anyway. I had a neighbor who was a speech therapist and knew all of the in's and out's of the medical field. She had an autistic son who was a bit worse off than your son sounds. He was not able to stay in school even with all the help your son has. The bigger he got, the harder he got to deal with. She loved him with every fiber in her being, B., but staying with her at home was just not to be. They had to institutionalize him.

I want you to know that as hard as it is, you must keep it in the back of your mind. My neighbor really didn't have a choice. For her safety's sake, and his safety's sake, she did it. It was an act of love, no matter what some may think.

And no, you don't bake cookies for the aide. Good grief. (You were right to pounce on that one - if the poster didn't mean it, she shouldn't have said it.) If the aide doesn't want to work with special needs children, she should switch to mainstreamed kids.

I am shocked at the responses. Sorry, if you choose to work with behaviorally challenged kids, you don't get to make a "mistake" like yanking a kid's hair. No matter how wild and violent the kid gets. I worked with kids at a domestic violence shelter for 4 years. I had my knee dislocated twice, my glasses ripped off my face, a chair thrown at me and was punched in the stomach. I got REALLY good at therapeutic holds and had compassion for these kiddos. I never once put my hands on a kid in a hurtful way. NEVER. The shelter had a no exclusion policy so I had to accept that I was gonna be working with some tough kids. It was MY CHOICE. When it got to be too much, I quit. I didn't shove a kid, slap them, pinch them etc. I don't have compassion for staff who hurt kids out of fatigue, stress, frustration, etc. I feel compassion for the kiddo that can't control himself for whatever reason. If you can't take the heat, get out of the kitchen.

Added:
Don't press charges. Talk with the principal and ask how they are going to handle it. I would also inform the district of the incident and document everything.

I just wanted to offer this resource for any parents who need it. It was put together by adults on the autism spectrum and shares what they went through and what might be helpful. Aggressive kids don't want to be aggressive, but communication problems really screw things up for them. I hope this helps in some small way. Please feel free to PM me and I'll see what else I can find.

"A checklist for identifying sources of aggression" from the blog We Are Like Your Child
http://wearelikeyourchild.blogspot.com/2014/05/a-checklis...

It sounds like she must have been seated for him to reach her head and hair. Did she pull his hair in order to free herself? Professionals are trained to give restraints. It seems she used a restraint less severe than a body hold/hug that schools teach teachers to use.

I am glad that she told the truth that she did it out of frustration. Most folk would have lied.

Why do you wish to sue? No one at that school will deal with you or your son if you sue. They will give him and you a berth so wide that he will feel much worse in comparison.