So, we’re now on the forth week of term, and I’ve just had to send my first email to school – think that might be a bit of a record since our youngest hit double figures 3 years ago. But, on the other hand, we’re not even at the end of January, and I’ve had to send another email in.  Whether the glass is half full or half empty, the glass is in my hand, and it’s definitely not full, and that’s not great.

It’s the usual problem. Our youngest is sensitive, hard working and a stickler for the rules.  If you have to be quiet in a lesson, he expects everyone to be quiet.  Teachers deserve respect, at least until they lose it from you by being a@*%s. You are at school to learn, so you behave in lessons & you learn. However, he is 13 in a class with other 13 year olds. Some are very similar to him, others are full of hormones & are pushing boundaries, challenging teachers & making a nuisance of themselves. Neither type of 13 year old is doing anything unexpected, neither type is doing anything particularly wrong, but neither type gets on well with the other.  If our eldest was in the same class as our youngest, they would hate each other and would moan about each other all the time.

At work, we still get the clowns & the jokers, and the ones who get on with work. We get the ones who follow the rules, the ones who make the rules & the ones who don’t give a damn about the rules. We also get the ones who aren’t aware there are any rules, and don’t really do much at all. We also get bullies and gossipers and the ones who stir up trouble at every opportunity. If there are too many of one type in our place of work, we have choices; we can move department, we can choose to ignore them, we can look for another job and leave.

At school, in years 7-11, it’s a weird cocktail of hormones, opinions, forming characters and boundary pushing. I can remember how horrid it could be at my all-girls school, and I can also remember how hard it can be to teach and control these years (and I’ve only really taught years 10+, those early puberty years have avoided me, so far). Even if our youngest changed schools, he would just meet another group of similar characters. If I home schooled (which he is adamant he doesn’t want), we would avoid this, but then when he goes to college or university and then to work, he will have had limited exposure to ‘difficult’ or ‘challenging’ personalities, and will have no idea how to deal with them.

So, right now I have had a lovely email back from the form teacher, agreeing with what I said, and we will have a meeting before half term to discuss strategies. But, to be honest, I am torn.  These kids who are disruptive are no worse than our eldest probably was, and they are behaving exactly as teens & pre-teens should. Our youngest is also behaving exactly as a teen should – he’s being true to himself, and is pushing his own boundaries in his own way.  What is the solution? Is there a way to keep everyone happy as they find their way through the teenage & puberty minefield? And when is enough enough? When does the angst of other’s behaviour become something that needs action? And what if the actions of our son (getting on with his work, doing well in exams, coping with his learning barriers and being quite anti-social at times) are upsetting one of the other students and making their behaviour worse because they have undiagnosed learning barriers or SENs? Or maybe they have issues at home that are bothering them?  Or they are just finding the changes that are going on their bodies too much to deal with, and so they lash out & cause problems to distract them from the real issues.

I have no idea what the answer is, but I know that we have only just entered this teenage storm – and from experience, I think it’s time to batten down the hatches and hold on tight!!