Parents in dc's class lying about homeschooling!!!

[Pastasau]

On both dc's WhatsApp groups, a certain few parents have been going on & on about how their kids are doing the bare minimum, no time to do the extra work set & they are absolutely not pushing the schoolwork & do not force the kids to finish any of it...
However dc had a social zoom call with some friends from the class, one said she wasn't allowed to go on as she had a zoom with her tutor, the other friend whose mom is the one appearing most relaxed & nonchalant about the school work has her dd up at 6.30 to do 2 hours work before the actual schooling begins! Her dd told my dd her mom recaps all the lessons for an hour after the live lessons, insists all work is done, all extras plus the schedule of work she sets herself!
Aibu to think some parents are blatently lying when they say they are relaxed & easygoing about the work? And why lie?

I think people say what they wish they felt. So they wish they felt relaxed about homeschool and were confident enough to let their kids free play. But they’re not. So they lie to you so they can feel the sense of pride about being relaxed. But they actually aren’t. It’s some kind of cognitive dissonance. I’m not in any school WhatsApp thank god.

@BigBadVoodooHat

And why lie?

Because if you admit to doing extra work in an attempt to mitigate some of the damage caused by your DC missing almost a full year of proper schooling, people get snarky. 🤷‍♀️

This.

It’s made me feel quite upset as I thought we were all init together but it appears some of us have different values.

What a bizarre post. I can’t tell if it’s a joke or not.

Why would you be a homogenous group with the ‘same values’? Why do you need to all be doing exactly the same and telling each other in detail in order to be part of the ‘all in this together’ gang?

Do people really live with strict adherence to ‘comparison-itus’ and group-think, having to declare exactly how you’re organising your daily life and structuring your day in order to be deemed ‘acceptable’?

Sorry if I’ve missed what is meant to be sarcasm. I just can’t believe people would do vehemently lambast others for not adhering to the self-declared ‘group rules’ on how diligently you are ‘allowed’ to school your child.

I do this on the class WhatsApp

A lot of the other parents are struggling and looking for solidarity. I think it would be a bit twattish of me to say "well I'm not working so I have plenty of time to do the work with DD and she's pretty clever so she doesn't struggle to do most of it"

So I bend the truth. I say that we don't get all the work done - true, but it's because I'd rather sack off a couple of non core subjects so that we have time for long walks (if we did everything we'd run out of daylight) as I think getting out is more important. And I say that DD doesn't want to do the work either - she's fine with doing most of it but she hates writing and it can be a real battle.

Most of the time I keep quiet or try to give help or support. I don't want to be a knob and write some stupid showy off messages about how well DD is doing because I don't want to make other people feel like shit.

You do you.

Help please - Im new, what is DC, DD and AIBU?

Im new, what is DC, DD and AIBU?
Search mumsnet acronyms it'll give you breakdowns.
Echoing others this competitive parenting is mind numbing.

Why do you care, OP? surely you should only be interested in how your own DC are doing? I'm a parent with teenage DC and I am not even vaguely concerned with what other parents are doing or not doing, it's not my business.

For me it's to make other parents feel better. There are lots on my group finding it really hard. My dp and I are qualified teachers as are a couple of others in the group and we're probably the most vocal about how hard it is and how little we're actually managing to get done (for me this is completely true. Being a teacher has not helped me with homeschooling a defiant 7year old at all)
Other parents in our group know that we're teachers and look to us to be the best at the homeschooling so feel a bit better hearing that we just aren't managing certain tasks or are sacking it all off to go for a walk. Or in my case putting the tv on for a bit so that I can get some of my own work done and not get sacked this week.
I'm pretty sure at least one of the other teachers in the group is getting everything done beautifully and perfectly but also has the good grace to minimise this and express empathy with the strugglers instead.

The cynic in me would say it's because they're highly competitive and they want to lull other parents into a false sense of security about doing less with their children whilst they do lots allowing their children to get ahead!!

@SpaceRaiders I fully understood your post, and I responded. My point is that I can see why you might lie if someone directly asked you a question you didn’t want to answer for whatever reason. What I don’t understand is why you would choose to lie about something when you have the option to not say anything at all (ie on a group whatsapp chat). It’s a bit weird to accuse someone of failing to mind their own business if you have gone out of your way to tell them something that isn’t true isn’t it?

Honestly this is such crap! Lying about it out of the kindness of your hearts and for the benefit of others, hilarious.

In life you only lie if you’re embarrassed about something, you know it’s wrong, you know it’s sly, or you intentionally want to mislead people.

Because you know what, it’s not kind and it does affect other people. When those parents you care so much about then get told that their children are “behind” they’re not going to appreciate your “grace” then are they. No - and that’s exactly what you want them to be told, because it’s the knock on effect of giving your own kids extra help in order for them to come first. Which is all you really care about.

Otherwise you wouldn’t lie about it.

@Tier500 Are you discussing a hypothetical person or are you implying that I’ve lied? Because if it’s the latter I haven’t. It it’s the former, ask the person you’re referring to directly.

Ultimately unless this person is a close friend or family member, ignore it. Again, it’s non of your business.

tawnytowel, so if the parents told the truth and said their dcs are doing great, do you actually feel happy for them if you were struggling?

Yabu. Its none of your business.

I think though these groups can be very pressurised to all say the same thing.
I've been on a group where I'm struggling and everyone else seems to be whizzing through no problems.
I've been on a group where I'm finding it easy and everyone else seems to be struggling.

In both cases I have given fairly non committal answers which people could take that I am the same as everyone else.
Also in both cases, off the group I've spoken to people who felt the same way as I did but didn't feel able to say it. It's because I don't want to sound like I'm showing off, or look bad.
It's like AIBU, the first few responses often set the tone for the whole thread.

But also the fact one has a tutor indicates that maybe the mum feels she's struggling and needs extra help, so she could be struggling and have a tutor.

And the other:
the other friend whose mom is the one appearing most relaxed & nonchalant about the school work has her dd up at 6.30 to do 2 hours work before the actual schooling begins! Her dd told my dd her mom recaps all the lessons for an hour after the live lessons, insists all work is done, all extras plus the schedule of work she sets herself!
This is from the dd though. This isn't necessarily the truth. Maybe it happened once, maybe it was a threat if she didn't get the work done, maybe it didn't happen at all.
I'll tell you my story.
I got a call about one of my dc from school. Apparently we were stressing her out about her school work and on at her to revise the whole time, making her get up early etc.
My response: "Okay. We have mentioned revision. She has one GCSE (done a year early) at the end of this week. Last week I asked her if she'd done any revision for it. She said that she'd done an hour during her IT lesson because it was boring. I said that wasn't really enough for a GCSE and she needed to think about doing more."
That was the entire conversation and only conversation we had about revision.

But at any rate, as everyone else has said, stop worrying about what others are doing and just worry about your dd.

Because she doesn't want to be ostracized and bitched about for doing her best because her doing her best isn't a slant on other people doing their best.

In a world of Facebook memes screaming thst it's ok to do the bare minimum and "you do you hun" is it any wonder she is keeping quiet. Case closed.

The DC are probably exaggerating the amount of work to your DC.

@SpaceRaiders I’m speaking hypothetically. I’m not in this situation at all - my kids are babies. I just clicked on this thread and think it’s completely mad that people are justifying lying to friends/acquaintances for no reason.

Of course it doesn’t affect me if someone decides to spout some rubbish in a group chat, but I do think it is odd behaviour and I would certainly think less of them for it. (To which you may say they don’t care, in which case why bother lying in the first place if they don’t care how it is received.)

HA yes I wonder what my dc tell about me, because dc talking to their friends are always telling the truth...

Because she doesn't want to be ostracized and bitched about for doing her best because her doing her best isn't a slant on other people doing their best.

This would be my guess, too.

Kind of seems some PPs are missing the OP's point. Parents may well not wish to admit to their DC doing all / extra school work so as not be knobs. That's fine. It does seem odd for DP's to then stress how DC do absolutely no work / make up stories about time on Minecraft?.

Reminds me of one DM dictating a shopping list to her 3 yr old DC. I was genuinely amazed that this child was 'writing' as a 3 yr old. DM finally admitted she'd been intensively coaching DC weekly for a year. My conclusion: she was a ultra competitive DM but did not want to admit to this + liked the glory of having a 'naturally' brilliant DC.

1. They don't want to make other people feel bad.

1. They're trying to fit in and think this is what others want to hear.

1. They're trying to 'trick' the rest of you so their children can get ahead while yours fall behind.

Just mute the WhatsApp group, OP.

In life you only lie if you’re embarrassed about something, you know it’s wrong, you know it’s sly, or you intentionally want to mislead people.

People may lie for all of the above reasons. They may also lie to save other people’s feelings or to avoid an awkward or unpleasant situation: these ‘white lies’ are the lies that allow society to function smoothly. Everybody knows that. Everybody does that.

Only a twat would tell a friend they look hideous in their new dress. Only a twat would tell their friend they’re doing twenty extra hours of schooling a week if that friend was struggling to cover the minimum.

This is a massive thing in London private schools and you have to assume most parents are doing it quite a lot. It is tough on the the children e.g. if you have a crap maths teacher but mystifyingly a large number of the class are doing really well - usually because they have tutors or parents are helping a lot. You do have to ignore it and do it your way but it can cause confidence issues for your child. Some parents love pretending it all comes down to natural ability. Different cultures seem to have different attitudes to this. Some will see support as an indication that their child is struggling and won’t mention any assistance they are giving whilst others see it as practically child abuse not to push and tutor their children and will happily talk about tutoring etc.