Swedish teacher taped toddlers mouths shut

A teacher at a kindergarten in Hyssna in the west of Sweden taped shut the mouths of four children because they were being loud.

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"This is a question of violation and physical assault," Sussie Pettersson and Sandra Börjesson, the mothers of two of the boys whose mouths were taped, told the Expressen/GT newspaper.

"We can hardly believe it happened," they continued.

Börjesson found out about the incident when she picked up her three-year-old son from the kindergarten. The teacher joked about having taped his and other children's mouths because they were being noisy.

"She told me how she had first said to the children: 'If you don't calm down I will tape your mouths shut'. When they didn't calm down she wanted to follow out the threat," said Börjesson.

A few days later the three-year-old told his mother that he wanted to tape her mouth shut.

"What if he had a younger sibling and tried to do the same to them? It could have had devastating consequences."

Pettersson said the teacher had told her about taping shut her four-year-old son's mouth, too, but she was too shocked to react on the spot.

"I work within child care myself and this is completely unthinkable. My son told me it hurt when the tape was pulled off his mouth," said Pettersson.

The two mothers feel that the kindergarten principal has not taken the incident, which occurred in September, seriously enough.

A protocol from an internal meeting at the kindergarten cites the principal as saying that the teacher should not have told the parents about the incident.

The principal and the teacher, who is a recent graduate, have expressed regret over the incident.

The case has been referred to the union which will determine whether or not the teacher will receive a written reprimand in addition to the verbal warning. According to the principal the teacher has also been assigned a mentor.

The Local/nr
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