A boy who was among more than a dozen students sexually abused by their school teacher in Sydney's south-west has spoken of his fears no one would believe him if he reported his offender's crimes.
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"I felt everyone really liked my teacher and I felt very weird around him," the boy said.
"Everyone loved him so much, why would they believe a kid like me over him?"
Shane Andrew Matthews, 31, sat with his head bowed as he listened to victim impact statements written by four of 15 male students he abused when they were aged between 10 and 12.
He pleaded guilty to 33 offences, including persistent child sexual abuse, indecent assault and procuring a child for unlawful sexual activity committed largely between 2012 and 2015.
Matthews taught at Wattle Grove Public School, where most of the abuse occurred, and was later assistant principal at Woodlands Road Public School in Sydney's south-west.
He has been in custody since police arrested him at his Bradbury home in late 2016.
Parents of his victims sobbed, gripped each other's hands and hugged their teary sons during a sentence hearing at NSW District Court at Campbelltown on Monday.
The boy said he had always worked best in class when he sat next to the teacher. But when Matthews moved both their desks to the back of his classroom he had tried to move away.
"I felt scared and frustrated. I didn't know what to do and I spent a lot of time trying to figure out how to stop it happening.
"I started to think to myself, is this just what happens? Is this normal?"
He got angry when he confided in his friends about the abuse and they called him a liar, made jokes about him being gay and said, "You wish."
"You are supposed to be safe at school, and I was let down.
"The opportunity to be young and live without fear and be able to trust people was taken from me. I am a different person now."
At one stage, the boy broke down and his father went and sat behind him in the witness box.
"I would have loved to have been strong enough to talk about it sooner," he said.
"If I had, I might have been able to save others who were affected after me."
Another boy said he sometimes acted out because he needed to release "the crazy shit that's going on in my head.
"Don't ask me to explain it, I can't.
"I don't trust anyone, I feel ripped off all the time and I don't know why."
The boy said he had trusted Matthews had wanted to help him, but now knew he had helped only for his own gratification.
"Mr Matthews destroyed that innocence in me and I don't know how to get it back.
"I knew what you were, my voice just wasn't strong enough."
A third victim said he had trouble sleeping around the time he was abused because he worried about what Matthews would do to him next.
When he did get to sleep, he would often wake screaming.
"It made me angry it happened to other kids as well."
Another boy spoke of his anxiety and thoughts of self-harm.
"This has made me feel insecure about myself; he made me feel like a nobody."
The hearing continues in front of Judge Jennifer English on Tuesday.
