Apr. 13

According to students, fourth-grade teacher Jennifer Blockman punished the boys by tying pink bows in their hair and cutting their hair in front of the class.

He doesn’t really want to go back to school because he's afraid he's going to be made fun of (and) maybe picked on.

Other parents expressed outrage as they waited to see how the school district would handle the incident.

If it was a concern of the teacher, the teacher should have talked it over with the children's parents. It's also humiliating for the kids involved because it happened in front of other kids.

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What a stupid woman, and those poor little kids :\

Hope she enjoys never being allowed to teach again.

That is really mean!

Yes, she is a horrible horrible woman

OK????

I read the article and it said she punished them...... punished them for what? Having long hair, talking in class, being late?

Regardless of what the young boys did what the teacher did was a form of assault/battery. I hope that they not only fire her but that she has either jail time or community service and that her teaching credentials are stripped from her so that she can never get another job as a teacher.

Zounds! What a world.
Mabon.

I can just about understand the pink ribbons but cutting their hair?! Thats just taking it too far.

I would suggest Universities and Teaching Academies around the world, start to screen potential teachers for psychological and mental problems, as teaching is one of the most important jobs in the world.....

This psycho shouldn't be around young innocent children.......

Hello Mum,

I've been saying that to anyone who would listen for years!!!!!
I wonder what that teacher would do if the parents of the children she did this to would shave her head??? Why she would have them up on assault charge quicker than you could say jumping-jacks!

still fuming!
Mabon.

isnt that what school is all about, punishment, mind control, training them to be submissive and not allowing them to think for themselves!

Some schools in other countries actually do not allow students with long hair. E.g the fringe cannot touch the eyebrows, no sideburns, the back of the hair cannot touch the collar, etc.

And this method i feel is ok. If the student really does not comply, he should be punished. I think the boy is overreacting, just to get even with the teacher.

Hello Hafizbms,

I think that you might be missing the point a bit here. Having a well established dress code is one thing, personally determining that you as a teacher have a right to enact punishment that goes beyond the guidelines stated by the school board is something else. This lady did not punish a child she used her status as a teacher to abuse a student. Humiliation is not discipline. Have you ever tried to cut a child's hair that didn't want it cut? I have, a squirming child and scissors don't mix! The only way that a teacher could have pulled that off was to bully the child into sitting still. Fear, humiliation and intimidation! Wow what a wonderful thing!

If there was a dress code a note sent home to the parent letting them know it was time for their child to get a haircut would have sufficed if that was the real issue.

OT. Chemical licker I love your avatar! and back OT it does seem that way doesn't it.


Mabon.

Hi Mabon,

I agree..... This is assault in my opinion as well and I just couldn't imagine how the students and their parents would be feeling......

As a mum myself, I trust my kids' school and the teachers to look after my kids and provide them with a safe, nurturing and educational environment.....

If we can't feel good about sending our kids to be educated in a public school these days, then there's no hope for anyone or anything......

Thanks Mum.

I'm not that kids parent but I can imagine how I would feel, cheesed off to the max! (and I don't even have children. I have nieces and a goddaughter ) Lord help the idiot that touches one of those babies!

Yeah, we do trust the schools to look after (I'll say this in the collective sense of the word) our children and that they should be guaranteed safe from the staff with a reasonable expectation of not being abused by the students either.

Regards,
Mabon.

sp... arrgh

Those poor boys were humiliated by her, and that to me is a form of child abuse. Teachers do not touch students, period . I say she should be fired. How would she like it if someone did that to her kid? If I were one of the parents, I would go to that school and demand they fire her. If the boys were acting up she should have had a talk with them, and if they didn't want to cooperate, send them to the office and let the principal handle 'em. Not do something as humiliating as putting pink bows in their hair and then cutting their hair infront of the class.

crypto

Trust me, these kids today need a good smackin. They don't know what respect is. when I was little I got a math question wrong and got slapped for it.

I think people are overreacting just a little bit , she cut their hair & tied a ribbon in it . That's it , my god it's not like she cut of their tongue's or something.

Yea. People over react alot these days.

If the teacher were to issue him a stern warning, it will fall onto deaf ears.
If the teacher scolds him infront of the class, the parents will come and complain that the child is emotionally hurt.
If the teacher were to sent a note home, the parents will come and complain that their child's hair is not long.
If the teacher sents him to detention, the parents will come and complain that it's ridiculous.
If the teacher did what she had done, the parents will complain and call it child abuse.

No wonder kids these days are so rebellious. Their parents let them get away with everything. Seems like over-protective to me.

people have no sense of humour now-a-days. But yeah... if more teachers were like her, I'd be glad I'm not in school anymore

the ribbon thing i don't find to be that serious, i would have taken it as a joke..but cuttin the kids hair is a little ridiculous. i know i wouldn't let a teacher get away with cuttin my kids hair if he didn't want her to.

also, hafizbms, it doesnt really say anywhere in the article what exactly they were bein punished for.

A teacher ever smacks my child and I'm suing. They also better never cut their hair or put ribbons on my boys. My mother inlaw cut my oldest sons hair once without my permision. Only once, believe me she will never do that again.

Thats a bit extreme....if that happened to my child, I'd be p1ssed.

A friend of mine is a school teacher, her way to deal with unruly children is to write their name on the board; three check marks after the name no film on Friday. The children that she teaches 4-6th grade know at the beginning of the school year what that means for she tells them the rules of her class and she rarely has a child miss more than one film. She never raises her voice in class, she never has discipline problems with her students and she gets the ones that are deemed incorrigible. She lets the students know that the ones that can't follow her rules which are simple (and fall in line with those of the school board) it is their choice to follow them or face the consequences of their own actions. The student that misbehaves in class will be sent for the duration of the film to sit with the principle and work on their studies.

This may sound cheesy and I questioned her about it when she started teaching several years ago why she adopted this method of correction and she said that it was the only option that she had to discipline and create order in her class room. There is a strict NO TOUCHING policy in our school area. She also said that if you have to raise your voice you've already lost (her personal opinion and I agree). The kids test her and the first few days of the new school year she will go in class (after going over the rules) and of course the kids will be raising Cain in the class room. She looks at them and smiles and walks to the board and starts writing names. Doesn't take long and the kids figure out that she is serious.

Long ago the school boards did away with corporal punishment in my area after a child at my school was paddled and the teacher who paddled the child missed the kids bum and hit him in the back repeatedly. The kid had kidney damage and was bruised like I never want to see again. I was a small child and I witnessed the event. It was horrible! Yes the man was fired that did it and rightly so and what this woman did relates precisely.

She changed the child without the parents approval.
She touched the child in a way that is inappropriate.
She used a cruel and unusual punishment, public humiliation.
I don't care if his hair was long enough to sit on she had no right to touch the student period.
If you are an 'adult' and can't outwit a 4th grader..... Wow! that says a lot.

When children or their rights are violated, I have no sense of humor.

Mabon.

Disgusting teacher.

Very well said.

LOL but I was in another country when it happened, so it was legal, and trust me, there, the teachers get REAL respect.

There is a big differance between fear and respect. I'd say in this case (adult teachers who have permission to hit children and the children themselves) its more along the lines of fear. Just my opinion though.

like many have said pink ribbions are fine but cutting the hair take sit too far

Hello Jesspy,

You post a lot of interesting articles.

I'm going to have to disagree with you on the ribbons though... The ribbons were a form of ridicule. What are pink ribbons for? (other than cancer awareness? which is only recently.)
Little girls hair.

It's sexiest and I dislike it but almost everyone on the planet will make the connection that pink ribbons/bows in the hair are for little girls. The things this teacher did went beyond the bounds of good taste and good sense.

Regards,
Mabon.

first of all, LONELY_1, your avatar is awesome! gave me a good laugh...

anyways, i think the teacher had no right to put any ribbons in the kids hair or cut it. The hair cutting was the thing that got this in the local news for sure though. When I have a kid going to school, if a teacher ever puts ribbons in his hair I'll be giving the school a call. If a teacher cuts his hair, you better hold me back.

It's not a teacher's job to care about how long/short a kid's hair is. Their job is to teach.

If she wants to cut someone's hair, she's in the wrong profession. It's as simply as that.

"If a teacher cuts his hair, you better hold me back." hee hee I like that.

LOL, whatever it was, it sure made the kids pay attention lol. Anyway, it wasn't that bad, I mean my own dad used to hit me, I still love him though.



LOL thanks, and I agree with you.

... i think that is just shameful...

... in my days all they did was cain our backsides till we burst into tears in front of the whole class...

...on a serious note i think people take things a bit too far nowadays (not implying the teacher)!!!

remove her damn liscence! ahahaha. so she could not teach anymore.

Oh WOW SHE CUT HIS HAIR that soumds so terrible but seriousely people have been over sensitised tio this sort of thing i meen they used to beet you now that would get attention and so what if they fear the teacher some people don't have the ability to respect things. People just have to either learn to not do things or not get caught.

Well like I said fear and respect are completely different. Why should a child ( or anyone) respect someone who uses fear of a beating against them?

... coz it works buddy...

Learned that the hard way

hmm so its ok for a teacher to physically and/or mentaly abuse children? Not in my world.

i was physcically abused by my PE teachers and i was mentally abused in maths and english
stupid school

I am very sorry that happened to you "Jesspy" Stuff like this makes me so angry.

im fine i went through 6 years of abuse by teachers and students alike and im fine sure i have scars but they only make me stronger i guess.

I'm sorry that you went through that too!

I had bad experiences in school too and they sucked. What angers me about it is at the time I didn't know enough to tell my parents how bad things were. I thought that I should just 'suck it up and take it'. When I did tell my Mother as an adult how bad things had been, she was furious!

Several people that I know had teachers bully, abuse and in a couple of incident molest them. Ironically the same teacher involved (in one of the cases) at two different schools, didn't find out about his abuse until high school.

No child should have to suffer emotional abuse, physical abuse or trauma from a teacher. Children most often don't report abuse because the person is an authority figure. A teacher, minister (or equivalent), police officer, doctor are all seen by children as persons of authority after their parent/s. The teacher spends the most amount of time with a child after the parent. For those of you who haven't had a teacher single you out for a year of torture count yourselves lucky, and try to put yourselves in the place of the child/children who were.... if you can't do that think of your own child, or your sibling, or best friend. Those of you who have been a victim and still are making the comments that the kid is a whiner... think Stockholm Syndrome.

Mabon.