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Terrible standards of chaperoning

Posted: Wed Oct 21, 2015 7:37 pm
by paulears
I'm in the second week of dance shows. Last weeks mums and chaperones were great but this weeks are awful. Only interested in their own kids. I just caught a group of kids backstage playing chase games against a wall with. Dry old photos and posters. Three ripped and hanging form the seventies and one destroyed signed photo of rod hull and emu! They just let the kids do it. I was really cross and they just looked sheepish. They let kids wait next to doors that people will burst through and I see teeth being on keenly a possibility. They just look at me as if I'm mad. One chaperone hung a costume on a brake lever and knocked it off which could have been very dangerous. I suspect none are licensed and I doubt they even have a license for the kids to perform. My two male crew got sent a pile of kids to fit radio mice to with nobody to supervise. They didn't want to put themselves in this position and resorted to getting some older girls to do it. I've seen some poorly organised things but this is awful! The dance standard is high but there is no supervision at all! Just grumpy I suspect after spending most of the day on kids protection policies for another show!

Re: Terrible standards of chaperoning

Posted: Wed Oct 21, 2015 7:55 pm
by Katymac
Sounds like fun!

DD's last show was awful for parents but the chaperones seemed OK

Re: Terrible standards of chaperoning

Posted: Wed Oct 21, 2015 9:01 pm
by Irishdancer
I was to Chaperion a dance school for 3 nights 1st night we had one of the mothers help the next night there was only going to be me and another Chaperion with about 15 children 6 and under most of them where on in the second half the other Chaperion said we need another Chaperion to be safe I said to the lady who ran the school that we needed another Chaperion as to look after 15 6 and under it was not safe I got a email from the agency I was working for to say they did not want me back talked to agency said it was not safe she said that every one who worked at the dance school was a Chaperion but they would not be there. It was in the summer so hot the kids would not sit down it was a night mare was so glad I did not want to go back was glad they did not want me. I told the Chaperion agency to take me off there books as felt that they did not give the Suport they should have. Makes me cross I look after the children I Chaperion make sure they are safe treat them like I would my own kids, have trouble getting work yet some chaperions don't look after children like they should and get work all the time

Re: Terrible standards of chaperoning

Posted: Fri Oct 23, 2015 8:48 am
by paulears
Yep. One thing I always notice on here is how you all have the kids interests at heart, and when you are concerned, it's half because most are mums, but the other half is because you know what you are doing. If you see a problem, and get dumped because of your concerns, then that is terrible. Chaperones do make themselves difficult sometimes, but I always put up with it if their concerns are genuine. Inconvenience to me is not a reason to get rid of somebody. What really annoys me is where a pretend chaperone has charge of say ten kids, but ONlY really looks after one, their own! They watch their child exclusively, ignoring poor behaviour from others, or in my case not even noticing a child taking a brake off and trying to tug a rope! The loud 'Oy' from the flyman got a scowl, not a panic. During the rehearsal all the kids were being signed in, but this person didn't stop a load of passers by who came in and sat down. When I asked, she said they didn't have any children with them!

Grrrrrrrr

Re: Terrible standards of chaperoning

Posted: Fri Oct 23, 2015 5:14 pm
by Gatesheadangel
I work in the office of a primary school. I can just imagine what you are seeing paulears. I'm also horrified by hearing a chaperone who knew what they were doing losing work by really having kids interests at heart.

Re: Terrible standards of chaperoning

Posted: Sat Oct 24, 2015 9:18 am
by fartoomuchtodo
Being a chaperone mum is a hard balancing act. You have to make sure things are right for your child but you don't want to end up with a 'moaning minny' label. I chaperoned my DS for 14 weeks this year and production often tried it on - even suggesting at one point that they put us in a taxi and we drove round the block for an hour to 'get us off the clock'. Sometimes I felt they took advantage because I was a mum. However, the professional chaps also have it hard as if they make too much fuss they just don't get invited back for any more work. On the other hand I watched some of them just sit reading a book completely ignoring their charges as they threw stones and ran around, completely failing to keep them quiet during filming. It's like everything I suppose - good ones and bad ones everywhere.

Re: Terrible standards of chaperoning

Posted: Tue Dec 29, 2015 3:22 pm
by Livy2
Hi,
This has been interesting reading this. I've been a licensed chaperone, paid and unpaid, on and off for last 8 years when my dd first got into panto aged 8. Have worked with lovely chaperones and one or two awful chaperones (including one head chaperone who only wanted her sister and daughter chaperoning with her so not a lot of extra sessions for the rest of us mum chaperones). I didn't know there was a training for chaperones, guess that's if you work through an agency? I agree some chaperones do use the time to chat with their best mates as they have obviously worked with the other chaperones if the same kids get into the same shows, year after year. It is hard splitting yourself from Mum to Chaperone especially when your DD is younger or might be feeling poorly. There have been kids some years that I was quite glad to hand back to their parents at the end of a session! But there have been far more really good kids who know performing is serious and they have to behave because they've been told that enough times by chaperones and directors.

One chaperone (and I wasn't there so this is secondhand) apparently gave one of the boys a real telling off because she thought he had done something wrong, I don't think he had but he was young and it was his first theatre run. Next day, the panto director hauled all of us chaperones in and bawled us all out and said the children were not to be upset in such a way and if we couldn't control them, then we should report back to her/or head chaperone, it was not our right to tell them off. Unfortunately that mum/chaperone was still around the following year but I didn't ever have a session with her.

On the plus side of it, I still see some of the children, now teenagers etc and they are lovely and some have gone on to professional training and my DD is now auditioning for Drama schools, fingers crossed for the next two months !

Re: Terrible standards of chaperoning

Posted: Wed Dec 30, 2015 1:14 pm
by paulears
I've made the fatal mistake of going out with a bunch of my chaperones to an Abba tribute evening after our show ........ Too old!

I'm always amazed by how some behave - watching the kids, chivvying them up, and pointing out mistakes and getting them do sort it - keeps the boredom down in the dressing room too, but often I'll see a new face, who seems totally unaware of what they are doing! Somebody tapped me on the shoulder, and pointed to the kids = just come off, and the chaperone had vanished. I always talk to them like a sergeant major, and made them all march back to the dressing room - left, right, left right, and they all saluted as they went in. The chaperone took advantage of them being on stage to go and book tickets!

Because of all the rules - nobody else was willing to even take responsibility for them, and that is so sad. Nobody has ever asked me if I am DBS checked (which I am) - so technically I shouldn't even do it, but when things happen, they happen.

I don't have any unpleasant ones this year - but some of my colleagues from other pantos aren't so lucky!