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?

Puberty and teenagers are generally horrible to each other? Bullying culture? It was ever thus. I went to high school before phones and the Internet and hated it. My parents also hated it for the same reason. 6th form much better as everyone had grown up and done Puberty.

I had blazers & no lockers but I still loved school, it has to be more.

Poor discipline and the not integrated communities that stick to their own.

Bullying and other vile behaviour from boys.

I believe a huge number of them have screen addiction and during school time and lessons they are actually in withdrawal.

My DS works in a school and says that they close the toilets during lessons because before they did, huge numbers of children would be in the toilets vaping. They really need to get stricter on vapes. I don’t think that depriving children access to the toilet is the best way, but I’m guessing they don’t have the staff to constantly monitor the bathrooms.

Yes I agree. I think the contrast between primary and secondary is too stark.

I chose a 3 form primary school and a 6 form secondary. Some dc go from 1 form to 8 forms which is a huge shift.

And of course screen ridden, overscheduled childhoods mean that they have no ability to focus, so poor attention and no ability to tolerate boredom lead to further poor behavior, combined with disrespect towards teachers and limited options teachers have in controlling behaviour. Also so few people want to teach now that very unsuitable candidates are able to get teaching jobs and then the discipline and learning are even worse.

This! Plus tired underpaid and over stressed teachers.

As well as the size, even how the teachers interact with them. One main teacher per class at primary and usually very nurturing, almost parental vibe...wow, well.done, that's amazing, gold star for you type thing to suddenly teachers not knowing them and handing out detentions for every minor infraction. It must be such a weird change for them

Someone mentioned funding upthread.

My local high school (US) spends $32,540 per student per year. This expenditure is spread between teacher salaries, educational costs, building costs, food service, non teacher staff salaries, student service staff salaries, facilities maintenance, and overheads (and more). Teacher salaries and student service staff salaries get the biggest chunk of the annual expenditure.

I've been pondering this since I left school in 1974.

My conclusions are that infants schools and primaries teach education for education's sake (which is - or can be - fun).

Secondaries teach what is required to pass the public exams. They are cramming institutions, nothing more, and consequently any sense of fun or learning is totally driven out of them.

I loathed my grammar school and bless the day I left it.

I did have some fantastic teachers that made learning the curriculum fun & engaging but some of my teachers were crap.

So discipline. Poor discipline.
Uniform, big jump from primary to secondary, strict rules (long rulers!), exams etc have always been there.
Children used to learn in classrooms of how many, controlled by just one teacher, no teams of TAs.
What's different now is the lack of discipline.
Look how many whinging on here about their kids hard done by by the "rules' or uniform.
And almost everyone who would have been in a special school is in mainstream now, many of which disrupting education for others and can't be handled in the mainstream.

My child thought secondary was so much better than primary initially. Academic type who loves learning. Loved being able to do subjects like history properly. Loved the structure of different lessons and knowing exactly when they were starting and ending rather than the more free flow primary curriculum. Even enjoyed switching rooms as it gave a little bit of a break.

But it didn't last. Describes it now as being on a treadmill with no way to get off. There's no chance of going off tangent on interesting discussions in a lesson because the content heavy curriculum doesn't allow it. And the exam heavy approach means everything is so focused on GCSEs and doing well enough to move on to the next stage and then the next stage after that. Whole life, or so it seems at that age, mapped out already and you have to conform.

Add to that puberty, petty school rules taking up so much focus, lack of time for fun things and low level disruption and why would you enjoy it?

I wish we would dump GCSEs and A Levels and switch to ongoing assessments, a broader curriculum and time to do things like art, drama, sport, etc. As well as the chance to learn something in History just because it's interesting, not to pass a test. Or do a cool science experiment because the science teacher loves it rather than them having to tick a box.

I wonder how much the year 6 SATS pressure continues negative feelings into the secondary school years? Over the years it’s got worse and worse and means that a lot of year 6 is wasted on prep.

We have some largest class sizes in the developed world

The behaviour of other pupils is awful and it’s generally a crap environment to be in!

The best case scenario is a transition to a much larger, busier and very impersonal environment at a time when you're going through all the awkwardness of adolescence. I mean that's usually the least of it for most year 7s.

1.Lack of fun. At my workplace we have regular ‘special’ days where we have food, quizzes, dress up days etc. My DC don’t even have any fun activities at Christmas now. Even their Christmas lunch is in the normal 30 mins so there’s no time to eat it properly.
There doesn’t seem to be much out of the ordinary to look forward to. We used to go on an end of term trip every year (mostly Alton Towers) they have nothing like this.

2.Lunch time is only 30 mins - how are you supposed to eat properly, relax and socialise?

3.School starts too early. The first lesson starts at 8:20 and there is no registration. They are expected to start learning straightaway.

4.They don’t walk to or from school so less opportunity to interact with friends. My DC get a lift with friends and I’ve covered the school run sometimes. They don’t talk to each other at all. How much are teens going to chat with a parent there? It alters the whole dynamic.

5.Having to do subjects you don’t really have any interest in. We had this as well, but it’s worse now. The ‘options’ choices were really just 2 subjects. History/Geography and 1 tech. Everyone has to do Spanish. I went to school 30 years ago and we could choose from a whole range of options like IT, Business, Law and Media.

My DS is at sixth form now and likes it much better. I feel sad seeing my DD going to school with no enthusiasm at all. She’s in year 8 and all seems so joyless.

• Bullying
• Extremely dry texts
• Focus is all on grades and not actually on learning
• The days are too long and then you still have homework in, what is supposed to be, your free time.

School just sucks the joy out of life. Even things I used to enjoy, such as reading, gets ruined because you have to do it for grades and often times you can't actually choose which books you want to read. There is also no longer enough time in your life to relax and recharge till you have to do it all over again the next day.

Accountability fucked education.

When results and outcomes were the responsibility of the individual child, there was less pressure all round. The curriculum had more freedom and choice, adapting to the class in front of you, not the GCSE spec.

I'm a primary school teacher and my DC are at secondary school (one whi is autistic hates it so much they can no longer attend). Primary school is much more dull than it used to be due to curriculum changes and there are many challenges in meeting the increasingly high needs of all pupils. However, fundamentally, they remain nurturing and treat children with a softly softly approach (perhaps too much so?). Most secondary schools seem to have fallen down the Mossbourn/Harris academy rabbit hole and have decided the best way to get reasonable results in the league tables is to turn schools into prison camps with incredibly strict and rigid rules.

When I hear about the way my quiet and well-behaved DC are treated at their secondary school, I'm not surprised they hate it. Yelled at for opening a water bottle in class, detention for missing a red pen in one lesson, not allowed to use the toilet more than twice in the day. I would be hauled over the coals if I treated any child at primary school like that. It's easy to see why children struggle with the transition.

Another difficulty is that there is a shortage of teaching staff at secondary schools which hasn't filtered down to primary to the same extent. An endless stream of different teachers and mash mash of cover teachers doesn't lead to a feeling of security and well-being.

This ^

Its also very interesting to see how some of the responses are the opposite of each other.

I will also add in to the mix piss poor management.

My hardworking, keen yr7 DD is slowly having the enthusiasm sucked out from her in secondary with constant threats from the (student) teacher that everyone gets a detention for bad behaviour, regardless of who it actually did it.

So, if that’s the sort of thing that they are teaching future teachers, I don’t think there is much hope for student happiness to improve.

Before the changes in society over the last few decades, one teacher with no teams of TAs used to successfully control and teach classes of 45.
Without Twinkle sheets and every imaginale resource, downloadable and entertaining lesson plans, a video or some app for every single concept, and everything from homework to assessment materials for any level just a click away.
There was none of it, one teacher to 45 pupils and the behaviour was much better and children used to go to school to learn and socialise.
Now many have had their brain destroyed by screens from birth and overstructured childhoods, having travelled half the globe by age 4, and raised like gods by equally entitled parents. No shit school is no fun and misery. They are old and tired of life even before they start secondary.