Children Traumatised After Primary School Staged an ‘Elf Murder’

Primary school children were left ‘traumatised’ after their school staged an elf murder as part of a writing exercise.

Children as young as eight arrived to find a mocked-up crime scene, which included fake blood and chalked outline of dead body, in a classroom at the Flowery Field Primary School in Hyde, shares Daily Mail.

The headteacher justified the game as she said pupils loved playing detectives in the ‘engaging and exciting’ writing exercise.

One mother claimed her daughter suffered nightmares as a result of the ‘extreme’ project.

The mother, who asked not to be named, said: ‘There was a crime scene in one of the classrooms.

elf murder 2

‘The idea was Elf had been murdered by another Elf. My daughter came home and she was absolutely traumatised.

‘I’m not the only parent who felt like that. A lot of the kids in Year 4 were unsettled by it.

‘I am very open with my children and I understand you can’t protect them from everything.

‘But my child was very upset last night and had to sleep in my bed.’

Ian Fell, headteacher of Flowery Field, said: ‘The children were all excited and they really did buy into it.

‘One of the children said to me “I am definitely being a detective when I grow up.”

‘Of all of the 90 children who took part, none of them showed anything but full engagement.

‘I have been a teacher for 30 years and this is, in my judgement, an appropriate, engaging and exciting thing that children aged eight and nine have done. They have been so up for it.

‘I am really looking forward to see the quality of the outcomes. We are not trying to keep this a secret and we will be Tweeting about the rest of exercise today.’

Year 4 writing detectives are on the case! What has happened in 4VS today? Collecting as many clues as we can find. pic.twitter.com/PyYewMTlpx

— Flowery Field (@floweryfieldpri) December 4, 2018

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23 Comments

- - meedee said
  - 07 Jan 2023
    9:42 am
Everyone is different. My middle daughter would have loved this. Even as a three year old she would love watching things on tv that she thought were scary. She would sit and shake and then jump when the scary thing happened and then she would crack up laughing and look for me and say “Its only tend Mum….only tend” (Only pretend for those that dont understand infant speak)

- - sars_angelchik said
  - 11 Dec 2018
    1:58 pm
Maybe more of a high school activity- kids this age would have thought it cool.

- - ella12 said
  - 10 Dec 2018
    11:43 am
To do this to Eight year old little children is disgraceful!

- - rovermum said
  - 10 Dec 2018
    9:38 am
Ummm yes. If anyone was traumatised absolutely. I don’t have a lot of words for this one.

- - Ellen said
  - 10 Dec 2018
    7:39 am
Wonder if they corrected the teacher ?

- - tessie said
  - 09 Dec 2018
    3:56 pm
The children may have been up for it but I believe the teacher went too far in spreading blood around and, at this time of year, making it an elf that was murdered. Why couldn’t they have thought this through and have the elf go missing and they had to find the elf and solve who had kidnapped him (or her).

- - mom101628 said
  - 08 Dec 2018
    10:13 pm
Sorry this is for children older than 8 in my opinion. This teacher needs to be reprimanded.

- - mom90114 said
  - 08 Dec 2018
    1:29 pm
Oh my that’s horrible. They could have staged it as he’s missing and left little
Clues to find where he’s hiding. I hope the teacher got in big strife for that – that’s nightmare stuff there

- - musicmum said
  - 08 Dec 2018
    2:41 am
What were they thinking? This is just terrible, if this is what they teach in schools now, they are on the wrong path.

- - Blossom said
  - 07 Dec 2018
    7:17 pm
The elf on the shelf is supposed to be fun. Besides at home the parents have to use their imagination and make sure the kids are asleep before do something different.

- - ashna9 said
  - 07 Dec 2018
    5:00 pm
I don’t think my kids would have liked this either.

- - mom206279 said
  - 07 Dec 2018
    2:26 pm
Probably should have thought it through a bit more.

- - MuthaNita said
  - 07 Dec 2018
    8:24 am
I think the activity itself is a good one. I know you his wouldn’t have phase my daughter who’s also in yr 4 at all, but not all kids are the same. I think if he’d distanced it a little from a human murder it wouldn’t have bothered anyone as much (change the blood from red to green maybe).

- - Ellen said
  - 07 Dec 2018
    7:57 am
Yes this goes to far ! Not ok to freak such young kids.

- - mom290396 said
  - 06 Dec 2018
    11:29 pm
Maybe for older kids but not 8 yr olds! It’s a bit graphic and really should have been run past the parents 1st. If kids love playing detective there r so many kid friendly themes out there like who took the money, who ate the cookies, re create Goldilocks and the 3 bears where detectives r called in to solve that crime. A murder scene is totally wrong!
- mom93821 replied
  
  07 Dec 2018 , 5:56 am
  Approval should have been sought for sure. There are guideline and ratings for DVDs and books and there should be for these type of activities too.