I’m a teacher who can’t be arsed... AIBU?

[EffYouSeeKaye]

... with all the Emotional Well-Being shenanigans these days. Honestly, it’s overkill. Can I just TEACH please? With the usual (already massively time consuming) actual pastoral care included but not this whole new level of FAFF.

They don’t want it. They don’t need it. They don’t want to think about it all. the. time.

They need the normality of lessons. Learning. Keeping their brains positively occupied with acquiring useful skills and knowledge.

They don’t need an overload of (often crap and patronising) storybooks and colouring activities.

Pleeeeease???!? Enough now.

AIBU?

I teach year 1.

What would increase mental and emotional wellbeing in my class?

More time playing games, sports day type activities, forest school, outdoor stuff. Swimming.

What are we being asked to do?

Drill them on phonics often on screen based programs. Making them write in books 3 times a day. No mixing outside our class bubble so relationships are intense. Relentless catch up accelerated learning interventions.

These kids need to be kids. They haven't been to a birthday party for months. Some aren't back in after school sports clubs yet. Many of them had huge amounts of screen time during lockdown. They haven't been sitting on proper chairs at home so their core is weak and sitting on school chairs is exhausting for them. Turn taking, sharing, empathy, listening skills, concentration, manners are massively affected in some children.

Catching them up needs to be about addressing this.

My bugbear is teachers (usually senior management) who have done a two day MH first aid course (which in itself is a great thing) and think it qualifies them as a therapist.
Worse, they start trying to run INSETs on it.

Another teacher here fed up with the tokenistic approach we have to health and wellbeing in schools at the moment. I have spent more time on this nonsense since schools went back than teaching numeracy. The latest nonsense is every child decorating a plastic cup for their desk and other children can write a compliment and pop it in the cup. How does it feel to be the kid with no compliments in the cup? How is this helping anyone? How much time have we wasted?
LET ME TEACH! I want to improve their literacy and numeracy skills, not faff around making emotion word clouds in 3 different formats, drinking tea together to show we are all in it together (I hate tea) or any of the other waste of time activities dreamed up to help the children who really just want a bit of structure and normality in their lives!!!

I also think it's becoming a brilliant way for some kids to avoid anything they don't like. I don't know about other schools, but we have a large number of kids who suddenly can't go into classrooms, sit where they're told or do any work because of their anxiety. One girl casually told me, as she drifted around the corridors, that she couldn't go in, as she was having a panic attack. Her calm composure and ability to talk impressed me, as the (mercifully few) panic attacks I had in my early 20s left me unable to breathe and curled up in a ball on the floor.

Incidentally, do kids still faint? It used to be a bit of a thing when I was in school. Especially in assembly. Bit of it when I started teaching. Panic attacks in students only really started a few years ago though. Ihave a paramedic friend who said lots of his call outs tend to be teenage girls having panic attacks. Why is that? More pressure?

Yanbu
my nephew is involved in social services and has a lot of 'help' at school. The teachers ask him how he is constantly, how he is feeling, does he need time out. if he is in a mood its clearly a problem at home. Granted he needs someone watching out but the constant 'is it this?' from the teachers is making him not want to go to school, making him feel he is being treated differently (he is) and causing stress at home in an already fragile family home.
He wants them to treat him normally and not remind him of the hard times in his life. these are his words and I think it really is overkill. he is 9 and they have been involved since he was 4 or possibly 3. needed at 3, all he needed was to be told to come to xxxx if you need to or have something you want to discuss. that is enough

I came from a similar background with a lot of domestic violence and all that comes with it. Atschool I was a child. like the others. I didn't feel different if social services had badgered me like they do my poor boy I think I'd have broken and been a lit less resilient.