My child is regressing

Dear RB,

I have a little girl who is six. When she was in basic school she learnt a lot. She knew her ABCs and could spell her name. But lately she says that she does not remember how to spell.

If we point to a letter she can’t identify it. She remembers poems and songs and little things from her early childhood class, but not much else.

I know she is afraid of the teachers at this school and there is one teacher that scares her to death. She is afraid because the teacher hit her and caused her hand to swell.

As a result of all this my daughter is afraid to go to school, though she used to love school. Even so, things are getting worse. We have noticed that since October, she awakens in the middle of the night and will not go back to sleep until 3:00 or 4:00 am. What do I do?

– Concerned

Dear Concerned,

You have a real cause for concern on your hand, and you must act immediately. First, your child’s teacher does not have the right to hurt your child under any circumstances. No matter what happened, the teacher is required to find a way to manage the problem and that does not include hurting your child.

This is not just the action of an unkind person, this is against the law! The teacher is to be reported immediately to the school’s administration, to the Ministry of Education and to the Jamaica Teachers Association. This horrible person may have done incalculable harm to your child and may be doing harm to other children.

Second, insist that your child is taken out of this woman’s class immediately and moved to another. Further, the school is to be made to understand that this teacher is to have nothing to do with your child.

Though I understand the challenge of changing schools in the middle of the term, I would ensure that the child is moved to a new school by the next school year if at all possible.

Very importantly, you need to seek some counselling for your child.

She must find a way to overcome her fear of teachers. If she does not overcome this fear, she will not learn as much as she might and face adverse learning problems later. Please ask your church family to help, or her paediatrician. I do not mean to scare you maam, but this is not a small thing.

Whatever your child has experienced in her short life has left her afraid of an entire category of persons who are extremely important to her future – TEACHERS.

She is choosing to forget things associated with learning and not sleeping at night. Can you imagine how these things will affect her if they are not fixed? Give your child a hug. Good luck with this.

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