Hi all,

My daughter is aged 9 and in her 3rd year of elementary school.

She does well at school, she is behaved, she does sports, she's a great kid.

Her class, however is not an easy one.

A lot of her classmates have troublesome behaviour. Namecalling, hitting, bullying,....

We've been contemplating about her switching schools for a while now but she also has friends there and doesn't want to switch schools. We don't want to force her abondoning her friends but we do talk about it with her regularly so that she knows that the option is still there.

As her classmates become older I can see the dificult behaviour become more physical. this year alone she came home with marks on her troath as somebody grabbed it and another time someone wanted to hit her face with a (pointy) stick but luckily her sister stood next to her and grabbed the stick before it could hit her.

These 2 are the worst instances.

We talked about it with her school but we're dissapointed in their bullying program.

The kids that are out of line get a note for home. That's it. Maybe some time out or whatever by their teacher but nothing more. It's also a school that is unable to expell kids so besides those notes there is hardly anything they can do.

My daughter wants to stay with her friends and I also don't feel she should pay a price for being a victim.

But her safety is my number one concern. So I started training her a bit on how to defend herself.

Now, I am in no way a martial arts expert but I did teach her how to punch properly and how to bring somebody to the ground. I told her to only use this when she feels threatened and that if she uses it, properly, I will defend her. I would not care if she gets a not from her teacher if the reason was self-defence.

The reasoning behind me teacher her was two fold : to defend her now and to prevent her from being bullied in the future. I was bullied throughout my school career and I can see how this starts. I don't want her to either keep getting picked on by some of her classmates or to have her self-confidence shattered and to become an easy target.

Last week, she came home with a note. One of the kids that always get in to trouble was not happy about her doing well on a test so she lunged at her wanting to rip up her test. My daughter saw her running towards her angrily and punched the kid in the face. She didn't have anything major, except a nosebleed.

I read the note and tossed it away, telling her that I did not mine as she defended herself.

The day after the teacher confronted me at the school gate about me telling my daughter that it was not bad behaviour. I still defended my daughter and told the teacher that since I can not trust the school with the safety of my daughter I took matters in to my own hands.

I am now getting called in to the principal's office with my wife to discuss this. Which I think is total BS as the disruptive classmates get a note for home weekly and have never been called in.

I plan to make a big fuss at the principal but I wanted to get some outside perspective first as I fear maybe I'm overreacting because I was bullied myself.

AITAH?