To think extending the school day is a terrible idea

[footballdisharmony]

Apparently Boris thinks that extending the school day is the 'right thing to do' (as reported in the Guardian today) I think this is an awful idea. I'm interested what others think?

I think keeping them at school longer is a mistake and is unlikely to be properly resourced to really make positive impact. Why not just invest in more more teachers/TAs/targeted help. A longer day just eats further into time with friends and family, and time to do other extra curricula activities that children actually really want to do and get a lot from. My primary DC already have homework, spellings, times tables and reading to do after school - surely they need a bit of time to just relax and play!

The only ones who miss out with shorter days are the ones with financially struggling families, or parents who don't care.

It's quite sad.

All that will happen is that the same amount that is currently being taught will fill the extra time so no gain in terms of education and a detriment in terms of all sorts of other things. Homework clubs might be worth a think though. DC get a snack and then someone to help with their homework/extra reading practice etc before they get picked up. That way kids that don't normally get support have some and it's no extra time really on the child as they can go home having completed everything.

I think it's a great idea. DS moved from a school that finished at 3.15 to one that finished at 4. The difference is that his day is now more relaxed. He has time to play, time to eat a proper lunch. If it's sunny they go out in the garden for an extra play and lessons aren't a pressured rush.

@pointythings

I have no issue with extending the school day as long as the following happen:

• Staff pay is adjusted accordingly (won't happen)
• The focus is on enrichment, not more academic drill (won't happen)
• The amount of homework is reduced accordingly (won't happen)

Basically this is just trying to recover from the pandemic on the cheap. The UK is spending about £50 per child on this. The Netherlands is spending £1500 per child. Want to bet which country will have better outcomes?

This !

Plenty of countries have longer school days than we do, many are considered to be done of the top education systems in the world. Completely agree with others though, way more to it than just hours in the building, it's got to be quality not just quantity.

MY 1970s school finished at 3.45 but I seem to remember lunch being longer- enough to eat and attend lunchtime activities such as choir practise, chess club etc.

I don't see the problem with longer days in themselves. Indies have a longer school day already and none of the kids drop dead.

But if it's just box-ticking and that extra time isn't put to enriching use, then it's pointless. I'd love my state-going youngest to stay on til 4 if she was actually doing a language, sport, art, drama, music. When my kids were at an indie primary, that long day was packed full of FUN things as well as schoolwork, with some form of organised sport/PE/swimming 4 days a week.

However, it does seem right now (and I don't know the ins and outs of it) that the kids who need the catch-up tutoring right now are missing playtime and are eating a sandwich at their desks and then getting right to it all through the lunch break. That's not fair on them at all. They should get to play with their friends and the catch-up work handled elsewhere in the day.

Knowing BJ this is probably just a random idea not thought through properly! He would need more teachers/Assistants and so on surely? Also children would be very tired ,and some older ones having to walk home in the dark during winter? I was a primary child in the 60s/70s .However we had a 2 hour long lunch break ,and many DC went home for lunch .We left School at 4.15 and had longer School holidays as well .3 weeks apiece for Christmas and Easter and a 2 week half term .Children have had a bad enough time as it is without disrupting them any more!

Another one of Boris and cos crappy ideas to win more votes as it would save parents childcare and more women would be encouraged back into work. The problem with their harebrained schemes is that no thought of funding seems to go into their ideas, they don't appear to consider how their proposals would work in reality. Teachers have a lot on their plate already and will already be doing lesson planning after school finishes, marking and prepping resources so where will they get the extra time to supervise activities. If ypu think TA's will do it then many more would need to be hired and where is the funding for this?

It could work but depends on so many variables that require money. For instance an 8am-6pm day is way too long for a 4 or 5 year old so consider raising the age kids start school or keep a shorter day for younger kids. This then causes childcare issues if you have older children doing longer days.

You could include more enrichment programmes so funded swimming classes so all primary school children learn to swim. Art and craft classes, music classes, gardening classes, homework club so all children's homework is completed before they get home. Would either a snack or a hot meal need to be provided if kids are at school for so long, again implications for caterers, dining room staff all lead to further costs!

Realistically if they don't finish till 6pm, home by 6.30pm, dinner, bath and then bed (assuming a 8-8.30pm bedtime) there isn't much time for family time in the week.

I just don't see how it would work for secondary school pupils, especially with the amount of homework kids receive. I had friends who would stay at the school library to complete theirs and I remember trying it bit finding it too distracting. I much preferred being at home and organising myself. I guess an enrichment programme could be provided for secondary kids but they would need more supervision, usually by someone in a position of authority.

@nocturnalcatfreetogoodhome

Fucking abysmal idea.

When do they get to be kids? Imagine a four year old doing 8-5, poor little sods.

I agree. Abysmal. Why not just get schools to look after your children all day and night and for parents role to be to take they out for fun and holidays? Fuck sake.

Another one of Boris and cos crappy ideas to win more votes as it would save parents childcare and more women would be encouraged back into work

Not sure what's wrong with either of those aims?

If you feel the school is such a hell hole for children, I'd seriously reconsider the one you are sending them to.

@onlyhereforthecake

If you feel the school is such a hell hole for children, I'd seriously reconsider the one you are sending them to.

Who has suggested this?

Clue: you used a metaphor, others cited facts.

@Peaplant20

How many more people are going to say ‘private schools do longer days’? They have much longer holidays so you can’t compare the two. They also have much smaller class sizes. A secondary teacher has, say, 8 classes of 30 students = 240 students and 240 tests and books to mark every few weeks. If a private school teacher had 8 classes of, say, 10 that’s 80 tests to mark every few weeks so there’s a huge difference in workload and that’s not considering the different lengths in parents’ evening, time spent emailing individually parents and students which obviously increases the more students you teach, time spent making, printing and setting out resources for 30 students 5 times a day etc. I know private school teachers will have increased workload and stresses in other areas (eg increased pressure from parents, possibly more extra curricular activities), but you just can’t really compare state to private in my opinion.

No, but you can point out that the kids routinely do longer days with no threats to their physical and mental health.

An utter waste of time in primary... !

@RozHuntleysStump

My school day was 8:30-4:30. Didn't do me any harm. Saying that, I took myself there and back across town on two buses from age 11. These days it seems even 15 year olds are taken to school and picked up. Madness.

I'm wondering what times pupils are expected to be at school these days, because the English schools I attended had morning registration at 8.45 am and afternoon registration was 3.45pm. An hour for lunch We live within walking distance of a few schools, and the secondary schools all seem to start at 8.45am finish about 2pm (scores of pupils walking home just after 2pm) Which could explain the numerous posts asking, "Any jobs going anywhere?" when they're of school leaving age.

As noted, private schools keep longer hours.

All children are supposed to receive swimming lessons in KS2 National Curriculum. If your primary school child isn’t complain!

Other countries have longer days I think? So maybe not the end of the world.

I wouldn’t have proposed it personally.

echt

I was replying to Fucking abysmal idea.
When do they get to be kids?

and I have already stated facts why I believe it's actually a very good idea, done properly.

It makes total sense. We have labour shortages caused by Brexit and extending the school day would allow more women who wanted to work to do so. We have an education deficit caused by the pandemic and kids being left behind by their family circumstances .

Extend the school day, allow more creative/sporting activities and supervision of homework. This helps level out the chances to all kids in this country.

I notice that the local comp never misses an opportunity to let the kids out of lessons (stops at 2.30 on a Friday, a week for work experience instead of after GCSEs, snow days etc). Even the standard school days are shorter by 20 mins or so. Over 7 years, this all adds up to about 1/2 a year's schooling they miss out on. My son's grammar is exactly the opposite and it's one of those marginal gains we could easily level up.

@LizziesTwin

All children are supposed to receive swimming lessons in KS2 National Curriculum. If your primary school child isn’t complain!

It can be as little as half a term, or a term at most in ONE school year. No one can pretend it's enough.

So most kids have private swimming lessons. Again, shame for those who cant' afford it, or whose parents can't drive them to the pool.

The difficulty (or one of the difficulties) is that you need either more teachers or teachers with spare hours, neither of which you'll ever find because the government has spent years drumming it into the wider public that teachers are lazy, whining scum, so they're now leaving in droves or not signing up to train in the first place.

Just like in medicine, we're going to face a real crisis in lack of actual trained bodies in the next decade, so this vote-pleasing idea won't get very far.

It's only a good idea if homework is done in that time. Otherwise it's a terrible idea. DD doesn't get home until 4 as it is, then by the time she has a snack and some unwinding time it's almost teatime, then there's homework, bath/shower, instrument practice and before we know it, it's bedtime. At the moment she often falls asleep on her bed before tea!

We're in Portugal and my 8 yr old’s achoolday can often extend to 5pm. She found it difficult at first but it's now very much the norm for her and she’s been here since Y1.

It's not all lessons though, 8.30-3.30 is lessons, then they have a break and play in the playground and eat their snack til 4pm, then go off and do extra curricular activities (or extra language support for her on one day). It seems to work really well but out of school activities aren't so much of a ‘thing’ here.

I notice that the local comp never misses an opportunity to let the kids out of lessons (stops at 2.30 on a Friday, a week for work experience instead of after GCSEs, snow days etc). Even the standard school days are shorter by 20 mins or so. Over 7 years, this all adds up to about 1/2 a year's schooling they miss out on. My son's grammar is exactly the opposite and it's one of those marginal gains we could easily level up

Do you know why they do this? No, you don't. When you do, and when you factor this into your critique, then your critique might have some validity.