Teaching ban for head who left infants in terror

Eirios Hall, 59, subjected nursery pupils to a reign of terror that reduced children who were little more than toddlers to tears of panic when they learned she would be taking their class, a hearing was told.

A litany of allegations were detailed to a General Teaching Council for Wales (GTCW) professional panel and yesterday it imposed a one-year suspension order on the former headteacher at the end of a four-day hearing in Cardiff.

Hall faced 14 allegations including that her behaviour at Ardwyn Nursery and Infant School, Welshpool, amounted to unacceptable professional conduct.

Despite having 28 days in which to appeal against the decision, the ban effectively ends a career spanning more than three decades.

Jacqueline Turnball, the panel chairman, said her testimonials and previously unblemished educational record were all taken into account.

Hall was found guilty of an array of bad-tempered behaviour which ranged from grabbing one child by the back of his jumper and lifting him to his feet, to humiliating a six-year-old at a school assembly.

In total, the panel found seven of the allegations she faced were proved outright and a further four were partly proved.

In one instance she mocked a child with a speech impediment, telling him to “speak properly” and in another angrily shook a child’s arm when he refused to apologise for making a mess.

But she was cleared of mocking a grieving child for being “too wrapped up in himself” after his father died in a road accident, and of claims she violently manhandled a child with serious behaviour problems.

The allegations centred on a specific period in autumn 2009.

Her unacceptable conduct became public after she was reported to the authorities by four other teachers.

Hall was suspended in 2010 pending an inquiry at the school and was dismissed from her job in the summer of 2011.