Please don’t get caught up over spelling mistakes or improper grammar I’m just on my phone trying this out..
I’m a Sunday school teacher and have the wonderful opportunity to have a very tightknit community within the church. I’ve been concerned about one young girl (she’s 11 now) in my class for quite a while. She has always been socially awkward and hasn’t had many friends over the years. Two weeks ago she asked me if this four-year-old girl had heard about the show in Inuyasha just because this little child said the word Kiki. I’m sure that she brought it up to me just to make herself look more mature and therefore more desirable as a friend. She is very interested in my friendship which has put me in the position to be able to influence her in positive ways. But having her mention that really made me worried because the show is very violent and sexual. I myself had an issue with it while I was growing up with being attracted to two of the characters. With that said this last week she told another teacher in our class that she had a “special friend” that she met over a gaming website and now communicates with over some other website. She said he’s nine years old... i’m sure that this is a pedophile. What nine-year-old boy knows how to type First off and would be able to create an online friendship with someone across the country and direct them to a different site to communicate (unless she did which I doubt). I’m sure that she sexually curious as she has already been exposed to sexual content as I mentioned above. I spoke to him the show last week to which he informed me he is aware and is hoping to create an environment in the home so that she is not overly sheltered and shocked when she encounters these things elsewhere. I personally don’t think it’s a very good way to go about doing what he intends but that’s his household and his decision. All the same I’m going to inform him of this new information. I just don’t know how to go about this without her getting in trouble (causing a bigger problem in the future) or totally blocking out us adults that are watching out for her..
Note: she also became very defensive when the teacher was asking a little more about her friend before my co teacher was suspicious. It also appeared that she had spoken quite a bit about this person to another girl in the class.. Again I’m sure there are very few 9 year old boys that would cause this kind of reaction from a 11 year old girl
The “mandated reporter” comment got me. Yes, you are whether it’s codified legally or not. We went through a ton of checks as child volunteers (my kids attend parochial school and I was a Cub Scout den leader) to ensure that the kids are safe. Warning bells would be going off like crazy if the child was my responsibility.