Julie Jay: Children should not be shielded from their mistakes or ours

Before having kids,I swore I wouldn’t be one of those parents who would automatically side with their child, no matter the circumstance, but when it comes to our children it’s hard to be Switzerland

"If I get short and snappy with my four-year-old son, Ted, I will always apologise. And I don’t know if that’s the right or wrong way to do things."

I recently received a DM from a former student, informing me that I had reported him and his friend to his year head in first year for calling me a name that, let’s say, would hardly be described as a term of endearment.

‘You were wrong,’ he wrote. ‘I didn’t call you that.’ It was so rare that I attempted to channel disciplinarian in the classroom that I immediately recalled the incident, because I could honestly count on one hand the number of times I ever followed through on anything.