Why do our kids hate secondary school?

[noblegiraffe]

Together with the news from PISA that our teens are the unhappiest in Europe, new research shows that engagement and enjoyment of school falls off a cliff once kids leave primary and start secondary.

https://schoolsweek.co.uk/revealed-the-school-pupils-who-disengage-during-year-7-dip/

https://www.thedeveloperlive.co.uk/opinion/opinion/why-do-uk-teens-have-among-the-lowest-life-satisfaction-in-the-oecd

"It found that while engagement declines through school “in almost every country”, the magnitude “is more pronounced in England”, suggesting disengagement is not just a symptom of age “but something atypical” that is happening in England.

There has been lots and lots of discussion about the impact that social media is having on teen mental health - what about the impact of having to go to secondary schools that they clearly don't like?

Not at the height of summer. Our local catholic school where they wear blazers,need to ask permission to remove them.

@hiredandsqueak exactly! The more detentions that are given out like sweets for minor/ silly things the more it detracts from the seriousness of getting one. They are as you say no deterrent which in my day they were!

The negative attitudes come from a lack of understanding, mostly. It's the same tired old clichés every time, "how will they socialise?", "how will you teach them?".

You can block numbers on your phone.
You can take phones away at night and let the parents look at it before the child does
The parents can, and some have to, counteract this poison. You have to build resilience in a child.

Absolutely parents really need to take some control over phone use. I’ve been through this with my DD, complicated by the fact that all the kids in her school have social and communication difficulties. She doesn’t have her phone overnight, I check it morning and night and remove/block posts and posters. Yet there’s always something that gets through and, even if she doesn’t see it she knows there are kids in her school who think she should die.

That knowledge impacts her happiness at school (which is the subject of this thread), as it would anyone. She’s one of the most resilient kids I know, and has overcome huge disadvantages already but there’s only so much resilience in anyone. And resilience doesn’t mean not being distressed or upset, she’s in school doing her best to thrive despite significant bullying.

I can control her environment to some extent, I can’t force other parents to parent their kids well and my DD bears the brunt of those kids behaviours. Of course that has an impact in school - I’ve not said it’s the schools job to deal with out of school
parenting, it is their job to support her in school, which they’ve been spectacularly shit at doing.

I agree. There are so many threads like this, yet when anyone says they’ve taken an alternative route (home schooling, independent schooling etc) people love to tell you why you’re wrong.

This. One of the reasons we removed DD from her primary was because of one little shit with the most useless parents ever. DD doesn't have Snapchat, WhatsApp, anything like that - her phone is used for Audible and DuoLingo.

When she was 9 (in Year 5), we were made aware by the school that a boy in her year had taken pictures of her at school, edited them with all sorts of horrible comments and sent it out to his huge contacts list, including adults and plenty of people he didn't know. The school were alerted by the parents of another girl in the year who'd received it on Snapchat.

The school did everything they could, putting a total ban on him bringing his phone to school, but his mum kicked off and wouldn't accept that her son was a little prick in the wrong. We appreciated the school's efforts but couldn't have her in the same class as him anymore, and as a one form entry school, we had no choice.

I cannot stand parents who think it's everyone else's responsibility to monitor and alter their child's behaviour.

I agree of course, but you'd think the state of schools, would inspire curiosity for the alternatives in a broader section of society.

It's interesting reading this thread and thinking about the differences between now and my own state schooling (2000s). Many of the issues are exactly the same as we had: massive queues for the canteen, disgusting toilets, noisy corridors, stupid uniform rules, loads of GCSEs etc.

However, the main differences seem to be:

• More pressure. We didn't start thinking about GCSEs until year 10, we had end of year exams before that but no one took them seriously
• Different approach to discipline. There was a clear distinction between forgetting your homework (easily done, not a big deal) and mouthing off (absolutely unacceptable).
• Smartphones. I find it really sad hearing teachers describe playgrounds full of kids sitting looking at their phones. We were playing games, setting up little hair salons, making up dance routines etc. I think we also had more time just to socialise and hang out in general.
• Limited "fun" in learning. The intense focus on exams and rote learning means kids seem to be having much less fun in lessons. I can still remember the joys of making posters for the classroom walls, having unstructured debates, performing little plays on a topic etc.

You'd have thought so. I point out the dire state of local secondary schools when people ask me and I still get a "yeah... But socialisation..." 🙄🙄🙄

Interesting that France scores more highly than the UK in most of the counts. I'm British, both my kids are in the French public system (now 14 and 17yrs) so well experienced in it. French education is no walk in the park, so I'm guessing that it's cultural to a great extent and goes beyond school.

What do we have that isn't in the UK system?
Middle school / collège here. So Primary 6-10, Collège 11-15, Lycée 16-18. It does allow for a more gradual progression up to lycée, there's a visible 'growing up' between each stage - by the time they are in the last two years (the Baccalaureate years) they are expected to be and treated like adults.
No uniforms. I am a total fan of this, and DH (teacher) loves that he doesn't have to have endless, tedious battles with pupils about skirt length, shirts tucked in, blazers on or of. 99 percent of kids wear some variation of jeans, t shirt, hoody and it's just not an issue.
Long / lots of holidays so teachers and students get a proper break. Two week at October, Christmas, February, April, most of May is bank holidays, then 7-8 weeks over summer. Even longer for lycée kids as they basically stop after their exams, so could be 9 or 10 weeks off. It also means that kids spend a lot more time either at family (grandparents) or in the countryside (really normal here to have a 'country house') with family / friends.
Strict-ish sorting between vocational and academic aged 16. I think that a lot of Brits would see this as a negative. The whole 'helping every child to meet their potential' thing does not exist in schools here, they are absolutely not aiming to be comprehensives - instead they aim put children on the 'correct' path, and it's for their own good. At the end of collège, children have to choose between academic lycée and more vocational lycées. While parents can push back against the school's advice, it doesn't necessarily benefit them because a less academic child really will struggle to keep up the pace / pressure at a more academic lycée, and there is little to no support if they are struggling. Students are expected to be very self-motivated and driven to succeed if they choose the academic route. So, harsh though it seems, maybe it means that more of them end up on the 'right' path, earlier, and the less academic kids can go and do something more interesting to them at this age, rather than being bored and disrupting classes? I'm not completely convinced, but that's how French society has organised this.
French parents / teachers are strict and French children don't throw food. Well some do, of course. But my experience of France vs Uk is that parents are far more strict with behaviour, and far quicker to punish any child stepping out of line. Ditto teachers. There is no hesitation to give a bollocking to a child who's out of line. French children are left home alone from a much earlier age, and walking to school alone earlier than in the UK - so they are trained to do this safely and correctly.
Everyone goes to maternelle - and it's mandatory
Nursery starts age 2-3yrs, many kids go full-time in large classes, and they spend three years learning how to be with their peers and in a group. It's just drummed into them. Primary starts a year later at 6yrs. And students can easily re-double i.e. retake a year if they have struggled academically.

And one other thing... France is traditionally a very Socialist country, where the 'working man' has an excellent social security net and other benefits to fall back on. Taxes (including wealth taxes and inheritance taxes) are significantly higher, redistribution of wealth is a priority, families (the larger the better) are positively encouraged with subsidised childcare. Not so in the dog-eat-dog capitalist UK where it really does feel like it's every man for himself. That must add so much stress and unhappiness to households, and onto pupils in schools.

I've always thought that a University style "modular" system would be better. Instead of having to do, say, Music for the first two years, have a single term "music" module in the first year, as a "try out", likewise with the tech subjects, drama, languages, arts, etc. Then the pupils can make an informed choice as to what interests them to actually "choose" which ones to spend more time on. Spending two full years on subjects that you've not interest in is a massive waste of everyone's time and just causes disruption etc out of boredom. Just make a "core" of subjects that everyone has to do at different years, and have options for all the others. We really shouldn't be forcing kids to do two years (or even longer) on "niche" subjects they're not remotely interested in and no good at.

On a different matter, I also think that pupils should be exposed to more different teachers. At both my own school decades ago, and my son's over the past decade, we've been "stuck" with "bad" (in our opinion) teachers for 4 out of the 5 years aged 11-16 - just pure bad luck really. I got a crap Maths teacher for 4 years and despite Maths having been my best subject at primary, I ended up leaving school with a U grade! He was a "Doctor" and was no doubt a genius in maths, but he simply couldn't control a class and couldn't teach. It would have been bad enough having him for a year, but 4 years is dire! My son suffered the same with a couple of his teachers. These weren't tiny schools, they were big schools with multiple teachers and it was just luck of the draw, but there should be more flexibility for pupils to "choose" different streams/options etc to have some element of choice to avoid the ones they don't gel with.

It was second year at my crap comp being the only year I got a good Maths teacher - the difference was chalk and cheese. I did remarkably well, clawed my way back to being competent at Maths, and was getting quite hopeful again. Then I saw the "Dr's" name on the third year timetable and I was crushed. Same happened with our Physics teacher who I suffered for years 3, 4 and 5 - I'd been doing OK in the first two years, and went downhill in year 3, but 4 and 5 were dire for the same reasons. And I wasn't a disruptive pupil - I always did as I was asked, did home works, etc., but the teaching and teaching style just didn't work with me. After leaving the hell hole, I did A levels at college by evening classes (one lesson per week for a year!) and got both Maths and Physics A levels at pretty good grades, so I did better with less teaching but it was proper teaching at a level and in a manner that worked.

Oh yes well I'd like children not to be allowed smartphones at all (in school or out of school) until 16+ or for someone to create a child friendly phone which has tracking etc but that protect our children - some are being developed now (personally I'm not into tracking as what does it really achieve? if they were kidnapped wouldn't the first thing the kidnapper do would be chuck away the phone? and on a less extreme level kids could just leave them somewhere and pretend they are there, it's a false sense of security).
A basic brick phone is enough to keep in touch.

I think if the government actually banned normal smartphones for children the majority of parents would go along with it (obviously not all but that happens with other things like smoking etc). The statistics that 75% of 15 year olds have seen a real beheading online, and that children as young as 9 are seeing pornography on phones should make us all stand up and get on with protecting our children.

Even if you ignore the safeguarding incidents (which we shouldn't), 8 hours a day on phones is not healthy for anyone, especially children!

This sounds awful. Imagine drastically narrowing a kids educational choices at just 16. I was still dealing with childhood trauma at 16. I was academically several years behind.

I caught up rapidly through FE,college, went to uni, and now i'm a software engineer with twenty years experience. I'm very glad I didn't have to decide upon a non academic route at 16! And mandatory nursery from two, is that for real? Each to their own I guess.

Do you think your experience is typical, though?

We reduce educational choice drastically at 16 here as well, with only 3 subjects studied at A level.

Overall, I think the French system sounds much better than what’s going on here. And clearly it’s working better as their children are not as unhappy as ours.

Something needs to change in England. Slamming the door on suggestions simply because it might not have been right for you personally, without looking at the bigger picture, doesn’t help.

I'm in Ireland and glad my kids get extra time at primary, they start secondary at 13.

Also no blazers here, it seems crazy to me that kids are not allowed to take them off.

Also a LOT less private schools here, local schools are usually very good.

I would like to see more continuous assessment though and I hate that Irish is a compulsory exam subject. There is so much pressure on kids for Leaving Cert ( final exams) and I know lots of adults still have nightmares about it. Broader range of subjects studied for Leaving Cert than A levels which has pros and cons.

Like with healthcare, I do think the UK needs to start looking at other countries as our education system, like the NHS, is no longer fit for purpose and some other countries are doing things very differently. We can't carry on with our isolationist thinking that we're best because historically we were previously the best with this kind of thing. Other countries have caught up, learned from our mistakes and are now doing better than us. These are areas where history is dragging us down and we're reluctant to change.

I work in a private school and I'm not sure whether the data would back up that the kids are happier, but I think the sources of school based stress are probably lower. It's a girls school which conditions a lot of this - I've worked in a private boys school and it was still pretty dog eat dog.

Where I teach they wouldn't be coping with disorderly corridors or poor behaviour in lessons. Noone shouts at them (unless they do something idiotically unsafe) and they don't do endless testing. No two sets of mocks in Year 11 for example.

However, they are still horrible to each other despite the school's best efforts and their sense of wellbeing has been hugely eroded in the era of social media. Taking exams aged 16 is idiotic for all kids, both high and low ability. They feel a huge sense of pressure about their results which I'm not sure was really there when I was in a very similar school environment 20 years ago and is not coming from the staff - I tell my sixth formers constantly that they are not their grades, and how capable they are! Help them do well but don't emphasise in any way the importance of their results.

I'm not sure if they are happier. I think some of the issues are schools and some are societal. I have boys approaching secondary age who are in state primary, and I would chop off my own arm before sending them to the local state secondaries available. They look and feel like prisons.

We've home educated from birth to university level, so I think the French model came as a bit of a shock to me. I hadn't ever heard of it before.

In the UK you used to be able to go to an FE college, and do as many A levels as you can handle. Has that changed? I did mine as a night class alongside a BTEC in computing.

Home education is also basically illegal in France, so choices for your child are apparently largely in the hands of the school system from the age of three.

I couldn't personally wash my hands of my responsibility for my child's development to that extent.

Well it’s definitely something that fits in the French context which is very different to the UK. I’m afraid that here, your childhood trauma would be expected to be dealt with by your family, your medical team, maybe your psychologist etc. Schools do not have the same pastoral care role as in the UK. Teachers are not expected to be social workers, therapists etc in addition to teaching. They might tolerate part time attendance, extra time in exams, a quiet room to retreat to but that’s about it.

there are increasing routes which allow students to switch from vocational to uni at a later stage, which I think is good - I totally agree not everyone is ready at 15 🙄.

Sorry that was @FigTreeInEurope

One other difference is no equivalent of gcse. It’s pretty much continuous assessment all the way to the last two years, when they take their Bac. There is an exam at the end of college but since pretty much no one leaves school at that age now, it really doesn’t count for much: it’s seen as a practice run for the real thing.

We live in Italy now, and I do see similarities both culturally and in the school system. I'm lucky I didn't grow up in France.

Academically we are doing well compared to other countries so our education system isn’t failing in that regard.

It’s the happiness of our teens where we are failing.

What about the huge number of kids who leave school with barely any "passes" in GCSEs which I believe is nearly a fifth of pupils?

I don’t know if any other country deals with them any better, PISA doesn’t measure that.