Misfit
06-22-2012, 01:55 PM
Dear mum, don't cry but I'm dying: Fury over school's creative writing assignment that left a mother distraught | Mail Online (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2162632/Dear-mum-dont-Im-dying-Fury-schools-creative-writing-assignment-left-mother-distraught.html)
The words in her son’s homework left Vicki Walker numb with shock.
In a letter which began ‘Dear mum’, Wesley, 14, assured her he loved her, made a request for bright colours at his funeral, and listed who should inherit his most prized possessions.
Horrified, she ran to his bedroom praying he had not taken his own life.
In fact, Wesley was sleeping soundly in bed – and the death note turned out to be the result of a creative writing assignment set by his teachers.
Last night his parents demanded an apology from the school, furious that teachers could have set such a piece of work without informing them. But while the Discovery Academy in Stoke-on-Trent, Staffordshire, apologised, staff insist the task was justified as an exercise in ‘expressive art’ and an opportunity for pupils to tell their mothers that they love them.
The school said it would ‘review how we communicate to parents in the future’.
Mrs Walker, 42, and her husband Mark described the horrifying moment they read the note at their home in Longton, Stoke-on-Trent and thought their son might be about to commit suicide. Mr Walker, 52, a warehouse worker, said: ‘Wesley came down before going to bed and handed his mum this piece of paper.
The words in her son’s homework left Vicki Walker numb with shock.
In a letter which began ‘Dear mum’, Wesley, 14, assured her he loved her, made a request for bright colours at his funeral, and listed who should inherit his most prized possessions.
Horrified, she ran to his bedroom praying he had not taken his own life.
In fact, Wesley was sleeping soundly in bed – and the death note turned out to be the result of a creative writing assignment set by his teachers.
Last night his parents demanded an apology from the school, furious that teachers could have set such a piece of work without informing them. But while the Discovery Academy in Stoke-on-Trent, Staffordshire, apologised, staff insist the task was justified as an exercise in ‘expressive art’ and an opportunity for pupils to tell their mothers that they love them.
The school said it would ‘review how we communicate to parents in the future’.
Mrs Walker, 42, and her husband Mark described the horrifying moment they read the note at their home in Longton, Stoke-on-Trent and thought their son might be about to commit suicide. Mr Walker, 52, a warehouse worker, said: ‘Wesley came down before going to bed and handed his mum this piece of paper.