Not only do their students act up, but their parents too. Teachers recall the most entitled and delusional parents they’ve ever had to deal with. Content has been edited for clarity.
A Mother’s Insane Threat
“I teach English at a private school in China where some of the parents are VERY rich. We knew one parent who had at least 5 identical Porsches. Some of their children have servants at home and from an early age are used to ordering people about like they are little emperors or empresses. In fact, the ‘little emperor’ syndrome is well known in China.
I have seen children being walked to the front gate by an ‘aiyi’ (aunty) who carries their school bag; when they reach the school, she will put it on their back. I have also seen some of these children hit their aiyi, who will cower away from them. She is afraid to do or say anything; one word from that child and she is out of a job.
Anyway in my first year of school, this one little girl was very much a little queen. She tried to tell all the other children in her class what to do and where to go and ordered them about. Unfortunately they, too, are all quite rich and as a consequence shunned her. Within a few weeks neither the boys nor girls would talk to her.
Her mother came to school and threatened to have the other children killed unless they made friends with her daughter.
Who told me this? The school principal, who was stunned at what she said to him.
Sadly, the little girl herself was actually pretty and clever and could have been quite a decent person if only they weren’t raising her to think she was the ruler of all she surveyed.”
Crazy Note
“Teacher here. I got a note from a parent once that said, ‘If the kids in your class struggle this much with the way you teach, do you really think you should be teaching?’
That one was definitely the worst. She had written the note on a test that her child had failed. I’m assuming her child said everyone had failed, but the class average was somewhere in the 70s and I had held extra study sessions and offered a rewrite that the child hadn’t taken advantage of, so I had done what I could.
I showed the note to my principal and he met with the mom and asked her to write an apology, which she did. The student’s grades also improved so everything turned out ok in the end.”
The Jerk Dad
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I’m a kindergarten teacher in Hong Kong, and parents here can be insane. On any given day, there are upwards of 300 kids. We have a policy where every child has an ID card that the parent or caregiver shows to the teacher, who then hands over the child. The thing is, it’s easy to become lax, especially when dealing with kids who are always picked up by their mom or dad. Recently, we decided to tighten it up and insist that we see the card every time, with no exceptions.
Well, one of my co-workers was checking cards at the door when this one dad, notorious for being a pain and a terrible parent, walked in. He refused to show his card, and my co-worker, a very caring and good teacher but also an ex-bouncer, had to physically block his way and insist. The dad just kept walking. Then, the dad snapped and shoved my co-worker, who grabbed his arm and pulled him back to the lobby. This led to a full-on shoving and screaming match in full view of parents, teachers, and students. Both of them lost control. Others stepped in and pulled them apart. The police were very nearly called by both parties, with other parents chiming in as witnesses.
So now, my co-worker avoids that dad by staying in his classroom with his students at home time.
The jerk dad still refuses to show his student card.
There was the grandfather who shouted obscenities at my boss for hours, called the police and an ambulance, had to be held back by the police from assaulting four women, and finally insisted that the school pay for his granddaughter to see an ophthalmologist because she fell and bumped her eyebrow. This happened on Friday, and by Monday, there was no visible mark. It was nothing.
Then there’s the parent who douses her kid in ‘natural safe disinfectant’ spray and makes her wear a surgical mask to school now because we recently had the standard minor outbreak of hand, foot, and mouth, a common childhood disease usually less dangerous than chickenpox.
Or the mother who won’t let her three-year-old son carry his own schoolbag, even though it weighs less than a kilo, because “it will deform his spine.”
