Gossip is bad, unless you tell me

I have issues with a conversation that took place at my daughter's school the other day. The teachers rounded up the 5th graders to talk about having boyfriends and girlfriends.

No, not THAT kind of talk. As far as I know. It wasn't an "ed" session. From my interrogation, um, conversation with my daughter, the teachers had a platform that went something like this:

• some of you are starting to "go out" with each other and you are too young to be dating
• if you start to have boyfriends/girlfriends your friends will get mad at you for ignoring them at lunchtime
• the gossip about who is "going out" with whom is getting out of hand
• we do not want you walking behind the blackboard and kissing because we will see your feet (this apparently was a problem last year with the 8th graders, who are now gone)
• we do not want you working with your boyfriend/girlfriend during class when we break up into groups. If you do that you will both get extra homework.
• We expect all of you to tell us if you see someone in a group with the person they're "going out with"

That last one really fries me. Don't gossip, unless you have a chance to screw over one of your classmates (friends, enemies??) by going to the teacher and ratting them out so that you can make them get extra homework.

I would have preferred that they remind the children that when we are in (this catholic, elementary) school we expect you to behave a certain way, and that includes no holding hands or kissing, etc.

Leave it at that.

More than half of the class is not "going out" at all, they were bored to tears during the conversation, and insulted when the teacher tried to end on an "upbeat note" by singing "if you're happy and you know it, clap your hands" - I kid you not. Hello? They're not 4 years old.

Telling a child who is somewhere in the beginning of puberty that they "shouldn't" be interested in dating because they're too young is like, well (I can't think of a good analogy here)... you can't tell someone how to feel. You can tell them what behavior you expect, and what consequences they may face if they don't behave, and that's all.

I also think that they are not the ones who should be telling the children they're too young to date. I have questions as to why a 5th grader's mother is letting her go to the movies with a 6th grader who's known to be a troublemaker, but whatever, it's not MY KID. The parents should decide as they see fit what they allow their children to do outside of school.

I'm mulling this over but for now I have pointed out to my daughter that gossip is gossip even if you are gossiping to the teacher, and the other kids WON'T like a tattletale.