If you work in education, what do you think is causing the current attendance issues?

[NeedAnUpgrade]

I’ve read quite a lot on this recently. DD1 is 10, she’s always been reluctant to go to school. She had a spate of UTIs, stomach aches, headaches etc. She’s had a bit of time off sick but we only triggered the attendance letter recently as it went below a certain threshold. DH and I have always done our best to get her into school, being reassured that she’s ‘been fine all day’ by her teachers. It all came to a head this year (yr 5) after a complete meltdown, several anxiety attacks and refusal to leave the house. She’s now on a reduced timetable at school and on the waiting list for an ASD assessment.
Academically she’s ahead but just can’t seem to cope with the school environment.

I’m just wondering what those who work in education think the issues are. Am I just a terrible parent? Although I’m not sure what else I could do. I suspect a complete lack of funding in education has had the biggest impact on schools and students. Especially those with SEN.

Well I can only speak for my children's (primary) school but :

Violent and disruptive kids are put in a "nurture room" where they are pandered to for the whole day rather than being punished.

Violent and disruptive kids are allowed to slam the classroom door over and over again as hard as they like to "get rid of their anger".

Violent and disruptive kids are allowed to sit and eat Gregg's in class next to the other children who are getting on with their work - because eating Gregg's apparently "calms them down".

Violent and disruptive kids are allowed to skip tests (SAT's etc) because the school know they'll bring down the school's average score.

Violent and disruptive kids are given certificates and rewards when they do one tiny thing decently - whilst the regularly well behaved children are overlooked for such treats.

Violent and disruptive children aren't allowed to be restrained when they are having a melt down and assaulting other other children, because their parents then come into school complaining that the teacher has hurt their child whilst trying to stop them hurting another.

Violent and disruptive kids are allowed to use the toilet whenever they want while the other children have to ask the teacher or wait until break time.

Violent and disruptive kids are allowed to rip up textbooks, throw things at the teacher, and tip out every single one of the work drawers with no consequence.

I could go on and on and on here but you get the jist. The brats are mollycodled and the well behaved, decent, hard working children are overlooked and pushed to the side. This is happening across all different year group's in my children's school (I have 4 all primary age) and all of them have been a victim of assault and/or bullying by these kids that cause problems on a delay basis. My children see the preferential treatment that they are given and quite rightly question it.

My son's bully got punished by "missing his lunchtime break" but was allowed to pick a friend to stay in class with him so he had someone to play with! This boy is 11 years old and knows exactly what he's doing. The school is full of them, getting older and bigger and stronger each year, working their way up to year 6 where they are allowed to continue to do what they want.

It would be laughable if it didn't infuriate me.

If I had the time and means to home school, I would.

I genuinely feel like my daughters school do not care about the children's wellbeing. My daughter is in year 6. All her school cares about is attendance and results. If the kids are ill they won't ring the parents. My daughter says her teachers don't care about her. The school has lost touch with reality. It's awful.

I have 2 friends with children who are school refusers. Both of them work from home so I think it’s just too easy to not have the battle in the morning. Both start work early to allow then to take a break for the school run but that means they have only a very small window in their schedule to get the kids to school. There’s no time to deal with arguments.

And once the kids are staying home they can entertain themselves all day on devices. In the past kids would have been quite irritating to have around. Not now.

We both work out of the house and our kids are never off. We’d lose our jobs.

Agreed. Sadly, exclusions are frowned upon and seen as a failure of the school not as a deterrent for the child. Schools have nothing to fall back on other than keeping children in at break and lunchtime. There are no consequences anymore. Children know this so get away with it and don’t care. These children are the workforce of the future.

Misposted

A lot of the points made such as

Draconian sanctions for equipment
Academic curriculum
Massive focus on progress and attendance ( as they are correlated) were also present pre pandemic

Since COVID

Parents working at home so kids kept at home may be a factor
Less funding for sen, mental health support etc
Genuinely higher levels of illness. This is true for staff also

Wow… just wow

I think the education system needs an overhaul especially secondary. There are kids who will happily sit and do a lesson from a book/board and then there are kids who need to learn “on the go” you can tell who fits into these categories. There are kids who would benefit from learning a “trade” that they can use straight from school. I don’t think I have ever used algebra, art, French, geography or woodwork in my life. If there was subjects the children would actually use in life and kept them interested the attendance issues would probably change.

I home educate mine BECAUSE I value education. I removed my DC from school a few years ago precisely because school was putting them off their natural love of learning. Trust me children who are allowed to follow their own interests are motivated and happy and keen to learn.

I also removed myself (ex primary teacher) as I couldn’t be part of the system any longer.

This thread is breaking my heart. I wanted to be a teacher and I’m about to start my studies. Now I’m not so sure.

😞 primary or secondary ?

I was a teacher. I actually loved teaching back in the ‘golden age of education’ as someone called it. I left a few years ago to home educate my own children. It’s so sad. Education has lost so many good people. I don’t know what to tell you.

I used art every day of my working life.

Imagine having a child who desperately wants to go but can’t. Who doesn’t sleep all night, gets dressed to go but can’t leave the house.

Yeah you’d lose your job. Or you’d have to resign. What do you think those of us who are coping with this have had to do? It’s fuck all to do with gaming.

Anxiety is an issue in Irish schools too. The educational psychologists are so taken up with it that they have little time to deal with other issues.
As a long term teacher l feel the absolute pressure coming from the government onto the teachers takes all the fun out of the classroom. When l was in school we could go off on a tangent if something arose so there was always something fun happening and academic stuff wasn't the be all and end all. I was fortunate to be in a lovely school. I got a fantastic education but enjoyed school too. Now everything has to be planned to an inch of its life and there is no going with the flow if the opportunity arises. Teachers are burnt out from all the pressure and this has to impact schools.
Also it seems in the UK kids go to school too early and get into very serious stuff far too soon. They are probably sickened before they get going at all. Everything needs to lighten up.

The majority of children I work with who have attendance issues come from dysfunctional households - often parents/siblings with MH and/or addiction issues. There is then another group with anxiety/EBSA often linked to ASC.
There is another, smaller group, who often have busy, working parents and attend activities/after school clubs after school. They show separation anxiety and struggle to say goodbye to one or both parents.
The reasons are often complex, and often not exclusively linked to school.

'Workforce of the future'

Can you imagine some of these little sociopaths being employed looking after the elderly or children?

This country is so fucked.

We have one! My son started at a 90 child intake in 2020 5 mins walk away from our house we moved him last June to much smaller village school that my older son attended 10 years ago 15 mins drive away. His mental health was not good he was aggressive, tearful we had bullying coercive control from so called friend and actual violence. Very little was done. My youngest is unfortunately still there she’s top of the waiting list for year 1 at the village school. But currently she’s not coping well the staff don’t supervise the massive amounts of children in there care they let lots of things go little one summer born age 4 was pushed over hit screamed at things snatched off her and worse I have made several complaints they gas lit her in front of me and said things didn’t happen and they put an advert on Facebook page for supervisors but nothing changed. My son has had a total turn around he’s kind and happy and enjoying school I can’t wait for somebody to move house. They do exist but take massive amounts of pta help and money. And good kind teachers. If anything else happens I will be homeschooling until a place becomes available it’s awful and upsetting for all of us I see why children are refusing to go and good teachers are leaving. Massive overhaul needed.

I know for me I hybrid work. Pre covid if the DCs were under the weather I might risk it, send them in so I could go to work and hope I don't get a phone call. Now I err on the side of caution and keep them home as I can wfh if needed with anyone making a fuss. Like wise if I would have kept them off for a day I maybe now keep them off for two to make sure they are 100% better before putting them back to school.

There’s no time to let anything percolate anymore. The curriculum is too packed and developmentally inappropriate. Year 6 children are doing maths I did in Year 9. They’re no cleverer than Year 6 were when I was in Year 6 so I have no idea why they are supposed to be able to do harder work.
Year 1 having phonics shoved at them having to learn all these mad alternative pronunciations for letters, like doing g saying ‘j’ like in gem and gym and magic. They’re 5 and 6 years old. Loads of them don’t get it and then they feel like they’re failing. The phonics books they have to read have a story shoehorned into the sound they’re supposed to be learning and are boring- the language is completely unnatural.
English lessons are from a scheme and really prescriptive- there’s a massive push on reading for pleasure so schools dedicate loads of time and money to pretty book corner displays, but the children never get a chance to actually read the nice books. They also never get to write a story about something they feel like writing a story about from a picture or other stimulus. Everything has to be modelled and grammatically correct.
Massive pressure on teachers to provide constant feedback so any work the children do produce gets annotated all over and analysed and every spelling corrected.
Ofsted want academic rigour in the foundation subjects so it’s all about covering this or that objective from the national curriculum, not having a Greek feast or a Roman day.
At my school we try to make it better when we can and mitigate these problems, but I know at some schools the children don’t even get time to meander over to a bin and sharpen their pencil for a little brain break during the school day. Their pencils get sharpened for them. There are Year 4s who can’t use scissors because their work is always cut out for them (looks neater). It’s just a lot of pressure and I don’t really know what it’s all in aid of. I’m not surprised children are sometimes too anxious to go in.

Fuck off!

This is literally the most stupid thing I’ve ever heard. Can’t be arsed to take kid to school but can be arsed to have a kid in the house all day?

Sometimes it’s an issue of no places but also general policy at the moment is to help SEN kids integrate into society where possible, starting with school, and not being separated away into special schools. An approach which probably has pros and cons both for SEN kids and the non-SEN kids they are integrating with

We’ll kids w working parents aren’t going to have attendance issues are they so are you just putting that in here to antagonise? Send your kid to an after club and give them separation anxiety? Jesus

Attendance is a complex area and there are a multitude of reasons:

• parents projecting their MH problems onto their children
• little or no aspiration
• education holds no value for some families
• parents not willing to go into conflict with their children about not going to school
• a lack of support offered by local authorities, who tend to give up after one or two hurdles
• parents/children use the anxiety card as a shield
• poor behaviour in schools as a direct result of parents failing to put in place boundaries/expectations/consequences from day one
• children fear that they don’t fit in - many don’t and kids are ridiculed as a result
• the minority who constantly fail to adhere to school policies, and their parents support their defiance, absorbing a disproportionate amount of time. Lashes, nails, jewellery, uniform, equipment. It may not be important to some, but if you let the little things slip, it quickly escalates
• social media, it’s relentless and can be very toxic
• a fear of failure
• pressure to look/act/behave a certain way
• a lack of respect for education which comes from every echelon of society including the government

I could go on and on. I worry about those not in school and not receiving a decent home education. The outcome for these children is very poor. We have to bring about change, urgently