Keir Starmer "sick and tired" of hearing about children who aren't school-ready

Only parents on benefits are lazy?

The 2 children benefit cap started in 2017, alongside many other benefit cuts and a scarcity of council housing. So how come things are getting worse? 15 years ago what you say might’ve applied BUT apparently this wasn’t a problem then. So how does that work out?

I’m sick and tired of hearing about how Reception teachers with 1 TA have a cohort of 30 where at least 5 have severe complex SEND, as in they’re non verbal, in nappies and functioning at a toddler level.

Their parents don’t want them there and send them to try and make sure they will eventually get the specialist placement they need, mainstream school can’t meet their needs in anyway at all and they take up an enormous proportion of the time available to the teacher and TA.

There has always been a small cohort of NT children who are not ‘school ready’ because of emerging or known minor needs or neglectful parenting but reception was always a time to smooth out the issues, put in place support for parents who’d fallen through the net etc so all would be ready for work in more formal Year 1

The problem now is that those children’s needs are overshadowed by the profoundly high SEN needs in the class and this is overwhelming teachers.

Sort out the crisis in SEN education and stop warehousing high need children for their first couple of years to save money and you’ll sort out the school readiness issue.

Yes it's the cohorts of children where parents just haven't bothered because as soon as things get hard they gave up. My son really struggled with potty training for number 2s. It took 6 months of us trying different strategies for him to get over his fear of pooing on potty or toilet compared to nappy. We got there eventually. Another friend of mine is having the same issue with her current 3 year old. It would be so much easier for us as parents to have just said fine don't poo in the toilet, wear a nappy and left it. But we knew we had to keep trying and supporting him. It's these situations that people are referring too where unfortunately some parents do not try hard enough or don't know what is required before they start school. Schools are struggling when more children have SEND and lots of children are not school 'ready' when they should be as no other needs. If the children were actually school ready then teachers would have more time to help children with SEND and wouldn't be feeling this overwhelmed. So if your a parent or a child with SEND please don't feel these are aimed for you. It's not. In fact it's taken supporting away from your child because there are some parents who don't think it's their responsibility to parent their own child.

People sat on benefits and mass bred, and once these people are in a situation where they have 4 kids under the age of 6 they just leave them to it because it's too much hassle and having all those young and dependant kids to get through basic milestones. Often dad lives elsewhere to avoid impacting mums benefits!

Living elsewhere so mum can get maximum benefits and a free council house!

There's too many impracticalities to suddenly changing it to 7, Finland will have never had a benefit culture that encouraged sitting at home and mass breeding,.those unfit parents exist now and delaying starting school until 7 just means another 3 years of developmental damage being done. They need to be away from the parents that aren't teaching them basic things or interacting with them as soon as possible.

Also you are.talking about working parents having three extra years of very expensive childcare to fork out for so the birth rates will drop more.

Maybe with regards to reading and writing but that doesn’t mean they shouldn’t be in some form of educational setting learning key skills until 7, and should have the basics like toilet training, speaking, social interactions and eating with cutlery at 4 . That’s the key difference which is stopping schools from focussing on these additional skills when they get to reception compared with 5 years ago.

My mother was a teacher in the 60s and I remember her telling me she chose to teach older primary, not early years because she didn’t want to do the potty training. So this isn’t a new issue.

I agree. DS was not considered school ready. But DS was autistic and I was left to manage this with no support and on a massive waiting list with nasty comments from the staff alluding to their theory that I was a crap parent. Again with No 2, there were suggestions of shit parenting. No 2 didn’t have autism & high needs. No 2 just had a shit parent.

Contrary to some of the perceptions on this group, there are many people working in early years who have no idea how to recognise additional needs. And when people do not know how to deal with additional needs in a professional context, they lash out & blame the mothers.

Well it is discrimination isn't it. There is no way my three year old would have been toilet trained (autistic) in time. If he isn't toilet trained due to being autistic and then not allowed to attend because he is in pull ups I call that discrimination.

I went to to a large IKEA store a few weeks ago. Has a lovely large and cheap cafe, I was amazed at how many mums with infants were there. What a lovely space for them! But when I sat down with a coffee, I was so sad at how the mums were glued to their phones just shoving pastries in the general direction of their toddlers and then getting exasperated that the kid shredded the dough and made a mess. Poor baby was babbling pointing at stiff. Mum was so busy on her phone she was trying to eat and cut up a fry up with her left hand. No eye contact between the two. What a shame. I think there will be massive fallout with adults and kids having too much screen time. Babies learn from eye contact and interaction. Mummys need to focus on their babies x

I find it terribly sad children aren’t potty trained by school age. I took a week off work and we had cracked it at 2.5 years old (that’s because the advice at the time was not to start before 2.5 - I see it’s now changed - which is fascinating). Stopped wearing nappies to bed two months later.
Wearing nappies means a child will struggle to join any extra curricular clubs -
I couldn’t sign mine to ballet until potty trained and swimming is tricky.

Other than SEND issues there is no reason a child should be in nappies. I also heard from governors that children are struggling with hand dexterity. A number of young children haven’t had the opportunity with sand and water play, real colouring in (not an iPad).

Sure Start Centres were great but Mother and Toddler groups still exist. I wonder if they still attract families.

I’m sorry you had to go through all of that and still struggling without any real support.

Those who know, know , and understand. Those who don’t, don’t want to hear it. That applies to the general public and , sadly , HCPs.

We had similar with DD’s speech delay. Concerns ignored. Wait and see. “If she understood, she’d be speaking” - why the fuck aren’t you concerned she has no speech AND no understanding then? Are you still concerned? Yes!! Wait 6 more months. I couldn’t even get a referral to see a SALT until she was 4 and a half and I started pointing it out since she was 2. Saw the SALT , she noticed some concerns/issues with sounds told me to wait and see if her y1 teacher will raise any concerns and give me a new referral. We were extremely lucky she eventually caught up (I put a lot of work in at home with her).

But people on here are convinced 4 yos will have a bunch of professionals involved, a list of diagnosis and extended external input as “proof” you’re not just a crappy parent or that your child actually has an issue. As if!

I suspect this is part of the issue we had for my son.

We started potty training at 18 months when he started removing his own nappies. We just weren't cracking it.

He is autistic and speech delayed so I reached out for help from the HV team who scolded me for not waiting for signs of readiness.

We waited until 2, then tried again when he was starting to pull his own pants up, again we just couldn't crack it. We tried to go to routine rather than waiting for communication to develop, and he was completely disinterested in rewards or rather, he didn't associate the reward with the behaviour.

Then at 3 we were desperate. We'd had the last 2 weeks of the school holidays with semi-success, but then nursery insisted on a nappies for nursery, pants for home policy as he was still frequently having accidents as they were relying on him verbally communicating (which just wasn't happening as he was non-verbal), he regressed, had anxiety around potties and toilets and then started withholding his bowel movements.

By almost 4 the HV got back in touch and I said he just isn't showing enough signs of readiness, and I got scolded again for waiting for signs of readiness because that's just not how it's done now, we don't wait for signs of readiness, we create routine and structure.

She sent me on an ERIC webinar specifically for SEN kids.

I got told don't wait for signs of readiness, but don't start unless they're ready. Always change nappies in the bathroom to create an association, unless your child has bathroom anxiety. Never ever use nappies or pull ups, unless your child withholds bowel movements and then you always use nappies or pull ups. Always praise them for doing a good job, but never praise them because sometimes it draws attention to what they're doing and makes them panic.

My head was spinning by the end of it.

I even remember at 7-8 months old I asked about elimination communication, and was laughed at for being a "crunchy mum". But I wish I'd bloody done it.

DS is almost 7 and they still won't refer to the continence team.

Can you really blame parents when this is the NHS advice? And this is after being updated!!

Using a potty is a new skill for your child to learn. It's best to take it slowly and go at your child's pace. Being patient with them will help them get it right, even if you sometimes feel frustrated.
Children are able to control their bladder and bowels when they're physically ready and when they want to be dry and clean. Every child is different, so it's best not to compare your child with others.
Bear in mind that most children can control their bowels before their bladder.

by age 1, most babies have stopped doing poos at night
by age 2, some children will be dry during the day, but this is still quite early
by age 3, 9 out of 10 children are dry most days – even then, all children have the odd accident, especially when they're excited, upset or absorbed in something else
by age 4, most children are reliably dry during the day

When to start potty trainingRemember, you cannot force your child to use a potty. If they're not ready, you will not be able to make them use it. In time, they will want to use one – most children will not want to go to school in nappies any more than you would want them to.
You can try to work out when your child is ready. There are a number of signs that your child is starting to develop bladder control:

they know when they've got a wet or dirty nappy
they get to know when they're peeing and may tell you they're doing it
the gap between wetting is at least an hour (if it's less, potty training may fail, and at the very least will be extremely hard work for you)
they show they need to pee by fidgeting or going somewhere quiet or hidden
they know when they need to pee and may say so in advance

Potty training is usually fastest if your child is at the last stage before you start the training. If you start earlier, be prepared for a lot of accidents as your child learns.

Not all school staff are able to spot potential additional needs. My August born started pre school at 3 and was expected to be toilet trained. We had tried everything on earth. It wasn’t until she was 7 years old that she was eventually referred for her toilet issues and wasn’t until she was 10 and almost 11 that she was actually diagnosed as being autistic. The pushing of the toilet early on really worked against her actually gave her a phobia of using toilets in schools. But I was told it was by bad parenting back in early primary school. In sixth form now and basically all the various mental health services have failed in helping us out with this and it’s part of her demand avoidance profile.

And I’ll also add that my second child was toilet trained before 2. Pretty much no training actually required. But definitely not lazy parenting on our part.

One of the general issues though is that the appropriate developmental range gets blurred and pushed back by those who do down what we can expect of children.

Sure, most won't be able to read. But by taking "able to read" off the table, for a lot of parents that means not even trying to lay the foundations.

It doesn't matter if children can't read when they start school. It does matter if no one has taken the steps to get them started.

(Source: I managed the development of a national early years assessment that was extensively trialled with thousands of children.)

See also potty training. I've just trained my son at under 2. All his little friends are learning. Yet on MN you constantly see posts about two being too little, and if you wait until they are magically "ready" it will take a couple of days and one pack of buttons. Sounds comforting and easy, right? The idea that you can skip the effort by waiting. (I think a good half of them are SM schills from Pampers). But there are kids who'll be worse if you wait, and most kids will take a few weeks to nail it regardless.

Lowering the bar is an issue because it drags down kids who can't afford to be dragged down by low expectations.

If parents were expecting them to they’d send their children in pants, not nappies.

I’m a primary school governor. I believe we have 5 (out of 60) this year. These are children with no diagnosed medical issues underlying it.
A few years back this would have been unheard of. Teachers simply cannot potty train on top of all their many other responsibilities, but parents are expecting them to.

"School ready" is a bit of a distraction. Even if kids weren't obliged to start school at 4 or 5, it's still part of basic parenting that by that age you will have taught your kids to follow instructions, behave safely around other children, be able to dress and feed themselves etc. Disabilities and special needs aside, there is no earthly reason why a child should not be able to do those things.

Why do people have children if they don’t want to look after them Children rely on their
parents and follow by example It’s a never ending cycle

If children are not school ready, why are they going to school? Maybe they should go when they're ready to benefit from it, and not because they're hit some arbitrary birthday milestone.

I’m surprised that a child without SEN would be comfortable still using a nappy at school, realising that their peers did not…!

Yup. ERIC, the incontinence charity changed their advice too (they’ve teamed up with kindred after their school readiness reports started coming out)and are quite firm about it.

Shouldn't we wait for 'signs of readiness'?No! Many children and particularly those with additional needs, will never give any signs that they are ready to potty or toilet train.
Very few children wake up one morning and announce they want to stop wearing a nappy! It's a bit like expecting a child to be able to run before they've had a chance to crawl.
You don't need to delay potty training and wait for signs of readiness. Prepare your child by teaching them the skills they need.
What is the best age for potty training?Most children are ready to master potty independence and lead in many parts of the process from around 18 months. The majority of children will be capable of doing most things including wiping by themselves when they start school.
Research shows it is better for your child’s bladder and bowel health to stop using nappies between 18 and 30 months.
The longer you leave it, the harder it can be for your child to learn this new skill and accept not having a nappy on anymore.

Completely different tone and tune.