A lesson in anger control

TV REVIEWER Christopher Stevens described the children featured in Channel 4’s Excluded At Seven as modern-day Just Williams.

Yes, children should be free spirits, have personality and be able to express themselves, but not at the cost of other children in their class.

I have worked in education for years and have witnessed the number of ‘problem’ children increasing. These children can be destructive and violent — I have seen doors kicked through. And I don’t work in an city school; it’s a small, semi-rural school in an affluent area.

All the staff are caring, well trained and compassionate, but they are not paid to be verbally abused, kicked, bitten and spat at.

In my class of 30 pupils, there are three ‘difficult’ children and 27 others, who should be able to learn, play and interact without worrying about violence. You can see the fear in their faces when there is a sudden outburst from one of these children who will refuse to do the right thing.

Schools are for learning, but more and more time is spent on control.

Certainly it would be nice to have a greater number of specialist schools that turn around problem children and have only seven pupils in a class with four members of staff, but in the real world there is one teacher and, if you are lucky, a teaching assistant.

Maybe we should find out why some children start school with so much anger.

Name and address supplied.