An English teacher has been banned from the classroom after sending explicit messages and photos of her naked breasts to a former pupil. 

Gemma Cooper, 44, who taught at Notre Dame High School in Norwich for 13 years, admitted developing an inappropriate online relationship with the student she had previously taught after he contacted her on Facebook.

A teachers’ disciplinary panel heard she had been arrested in 2018 after her behaviour came to light though a police investigation was ultimately closed.

However she was sacked by the Roman Catholic secondary school and sixth form in July 2019 following an internal review.

The Teaching Regulation Agency panel, which heard the case earlier this month, was told that after she had accepted a Facebook friend request from the ex-pupil just over a year after he had left the school and that his messages to her had become sexual in nature.

She admitted exchanging explicit messages and sending "inappropriate images" to him including topless pictures of herself.

The disciplinary panel report said Ms Cooper had admitted it “quickly became out of hand” and that her behaviour had shown “awful judgement”.

“She further recognised that these were inappropriate because she subsequently asked him to delete these messages and commented in a message to him that she could lose her job,” the report adds. 

“This demonstrated to the panel that she was well aware at the time she exchanged these messages that her behaviour was wrong.”

In her submission Ms Cooper said she had not been not aware that the former pupil, who was attending a separate sixth-form college at the time and denied any sexual relationship, was aged under-18. 

Despite her behaviour being “at the less serious end of the spectrum” and having not progressed beyond online contact, the panel found “unacceptable professional conduct” and recommended she should be prohibited from teaching.

She has 28 days to appeal and can apply for a review to become a teacher again in two years.

In a statement the St John the Baptist Multi-Academy Trust, which oversees the school, said: “Notre Dame High School always gives the safeguarding of children the highest priority. We take any accusation seriously and will always take appropriate advice and action. 

“We will make no further comment on this case.”