Further Follow up from Child Hurt at School

I read this post, the original post, but did not have time to read all of the responses. I have a question for you.

B., what is you want? What is it YOU need to be able let this go?

Figure this out and just ask for it.

You want money? Tell them you want money. You want them to pay your copay for the insurance? Tell them, Here is my copay bill. You want them to print up playground rules? Tell them instead of money you want a sign, You want the staff to be retrained? Figure out where to find the money so they can all be trained.

But whatever it is figure it out, write it down and then ask for it.

Your child broke his arm. No one stood there and broke it. It was not done on purpose. This is a typical childhood accident.

Children break bones all of the time, it is just part of being an adventurous, inquisitive, active child.

Children learn the most with "free play". Exploring, testing and trying new physical tasks.. They are told what to do all day, surely they can be allowed to play on their off time too. Especially during the winter, when they could be cooped up..

My nephew broke his arm 3 Times! Each time while under his own parents care. Then he started playing football in the 5th grade.. Basketball and baseball,

Sprains, twists, bruised shoulders.. etc..

He played quarterback all through middle and high school. Did my sister want him to play? NO! how do you hold them back?

He could do tricks on his bike, he skate boarded, he high dived..

This was just his personality..

If this break is freaking you out this bad, get ready for some real breaks in the future.

You want him to be safe, speak with him about your expectations. Tell the staff they are not allowed to permit your son play on the slide, on the swings etc.. Keep him away from the skating rink, his bike, the swing sets, the tree houses, climbing ropes.

But please, do not push your fears on all of the other children that did not break their arms.

WTH, Robin!? People in academia don't want to work and toil and look out for your kids!? I can't even say to you what I want because I will be banned, but I haven't seen such an ignorant statement on here in a very long time. Go grind your axe elsewhere. You are not qualified to give legal advice and your motivations are now very clear.

I've not read every response or every post you have made regarding your child falling at school day care.

What I do get from the numerous post and continued attempt at explaining and trying to justify yourself is..... What do you really want? You can't let this go so you want something. Do you want to sue? The accident (which is what it was) has already cost other children from play, which is not fair. Also, you work at this school and you are causing issues with the care? Do you like your job? I ask because when they run the numbers for the people to transfer or lay off next year, you have tossed your hat in that race.

Your child can have an accident in your home, walking across the street, playing at school, and just about anywhere.

He's a child, he is doing what children do... PLAY and sometimes when children play they have an accident. It is no one's fault.

Bottom line, if you are looking for money just say it and go ask the school for money. In the meantime, don't allow your healthcare insurance to lapse... this is one of those times you need it and you don't have it because you allowed it to lapse.

It is your responsibility to provide adequate medical coverage for your children. If you can't afford it, then go to the proper sources to sign them up on state insurance for children.

I'll just say this-- if you don't think your aftercare program is keeping your son reasonably safe and keeping the kids reasonably in check, making them pay money will not solve the real problem. Instead, finding a new situation would be a better use of your resources.

I'm a former child care provider and honestly, if anyone had thought to sue me for negligence (no one had, I wasn't negligent, and kids do some pretty dumb things all on their own, even with supervision)-- I would have expected them to fire me first. If an agency is so negligent that they deserve to be sued (and you probably signed a waiver when you did your entry paperwork) then it stands to reason that you wouldn't trust the caregivers and would put your kid in a different-- maybe even less convenient-- care situation. Or you chalk it up to 'my kid did something dumb and now we have to deal with it'.

Ditto TF Plano and Laurie A.

Robin, your answer leaves me nonplussed. How sad that you have such little regard for the wonderful teachers and people who work in our schools and who care very deeply about the health, growth and welfare of our children. With such a bleak view of educators, I'm assuming you homeschooled your kids?

Kids hurt themselves with or without supervision, rules and/or structure.
You just want someone to pay the bill.
You can ask the after school care to pay for his medical bill - they'll say either yes or no - I'm guessing most likely 'no'.
But this really falls under the cost of having kids.
I broke an arm 3 times - jumping off a swing, falling off a log, falling while ice skating.
I've also broken several fingers and toes.
Breaking something didn't keep me from climbing, jumping, running, playing and taking risks ever again.
My Mom never sued anyone and my 'consequences' was wearing a cast for 8 weeks every time I broke a bone.
In fact one time I went swimming with the cast on (tried to keep it dry with a plastic bag) but it got wet and disintegrated anyway.
Ohh boy, the doctor sure was mad when he had to put a new cast on!
There was just no slowing me down for anything!

The place to respond is the SWH of your question, not to start a whole new thread (again).

Just a little thing.....
A child that has climbed on something, fallen, and broken his arm will probably not climb that thing again.
Natural Consequences.

I think most people don't think you should sue.

It feels awful when your child is hurt under someone elses care, even if its just an accident. It sounds like you don't really want to sue the school, and it would be a long ugly process if you did. It might hurt your relationship with the school also. Yes there should have been more supervision, but even if there was an adult there to tell the kids not to pile up on the slide, he might have still fell as they scrambled off. And it sounds like school does want to fix the situation and is taking steps toward that.

I think in a few months you'll look back and won't be as worried. My daughter came home from summer camp last year with a large scrape on her back. She said they were playing a game and a girl tagged her but grabbed her shirt and she fell on the pavement. I was concerned about leaving her there after that (she was only 4) but looking back, it could easily have happened at home playing with her brother. Kids will get hurt no matter who's watching sometimes.

I didn't answer your other question, though I did read it. I'm not going to bother to go back and look at the answers you got, but I just want to say that anyone who says that your child didn't follow the rules when there were 6 kids on the slide, is just being argumentative, unreasonable, and just plain RUDE. They weren't there. They don't know if he was first or 6th or in the middle.

Just let THEIR kids get their arms broken in free play and see just how fast they DEMAND of the principal to get his or her house in order.

If your child is being blamed by this forum for getting hurt, that's ridiculous.

I'd ask the after care provider to pay for the medical costs. If you can't afford insurance for your child you need to go apply for a state medical card for them. They should not be doing without medical care just in case stuff like this happens. The program that was supervising your child should be financially responsible for this bill.

I completely get where you are coming from.

While children can and should be taught to take responsibility for their actions, it is up to the adults around them to set and enforce the rules.

If a parent leaves a child unsupervised at home, and something happens, who gets the blame? The PARENT because they were supposed to be providing supervision, and failed the child in that aspect.

I feel this is a similar incident... Your child was left in their care, and they did not enforce their rules. Every school I ever attended when I was young (and I went through 5 elementary schools...) as well as the schools my nieces and nephews go to have adults who are supposed to supervise the children as they are playing. That adult should never have allowed the circumstance of six kids being on one slide when they had rules in place that disallowed it in the first place, and the program itself should have had enough monitors to handle the amount of kids OR not had so many kids outside at once to create such a hazard.

Is your son to blame? Sure, at least partly. He should have known better. But kids don't have the same level of awareness and common sense as adults. It is to be expected that under such lax supervision somebody will get hurt eventually.

I definitely wouldn't actually try to sue the school; though I would try to see if they have some kind of insurance policy that would at least help with the bills. If the school was just brushing his incident off, and acting like it was no big deal, I would have a different opinion... but they seem to be addressing the issue and resolving it in a way to make things safer for the kids, so I would be satisfied with that.

Either way, good luck getting this resolved, and I hope your son's arm heals quick and clean.