Picked my 10 yr old up from school today, and he ran to the car in tears, horrified and embarrassed that he was crying in front of the school. The PE teacher came to my car, insisting I roll down passenger window, she then went off on my son looking at him in the back seat. She said that he talked back to her when she told him to sit down on the asphault of the parent pickup area. He dared ask her why do they have to sit down. It was all a shocker, my child in crisis, in tears, and she berates him further. "Tell Mrs. Moore OK and you understand," I said.

We drove away and he bawled his eyes out. He said she had been yelling "Ethan sit down! Ethan sit down!" My son didn't know she was talking to him because his name is Ian, and there are several Ethan's. She has been his PE teacher in our small school for this the 6th year.

He also told me they had the presidential award for physical fitness testing today. He has been training hard to pass, it's been important to him. He said that she made the class applaud when other kids passed or didn't pass, but she was silent when he finished. I believe this because this woman had a problem with my older kids years back. And I let the school walk all over us, I had no clue about IEP's or our rights back then. But Ian is well behaved, outgoing, athletic, I don't understand why she is singling him out.

Ian also told me that she has made some other kids cry, and strange thing is that these are the kids who are in special ed with him. There is a new girl who was shy and cried because she couldn't run the mile, Mrs. Moore humiliated her in front of the class and patronizingly said, "Now tell the class then about how you think you have asthma!" And then there is Milo, autistic and overweight, usually having the longest mile run time, and she humiliates him in front of the class, making him stand up and say his mile time, he says it quiet because it's horribly embarrassing for him and she yells at him to say it louder. Ian also told me that for himself and some of the larger boys like Milo, sitting "criss-cross applesauce" is very uncomfortable, makes their legs and feet fall asleep. He says they're not trying to be disobedient and I believe him because this woman is scary.

Our school is public but elitest, and prides itself on being called the "Running School". There is no individuality celebrated when everyone is expected to be a runner, it's just not everyone's thing.

I am so confused and I have to find a solution. I think firstly I should talk to Mrs. Moore and ask what's really going on, or I could go straight to the school board. I am scared to talk to any of them, they are so intimidating, but I must before this sort of thing ruins Ian's future and education, and love of physical fitness too.

So many moms and great teachers here in our group, please help. What would you do? I'm worried.