Kids still feeling the effects of lockdowns…

[sloanedanger]

I just got caught reading a really interesting thread on Twitter started by a teacher:

“Is anyone else thinking we are starting to see the impact of 2 years of disruption and time at home, due to COVID 19, in schools? Extreme behaviours? Some pupils very emotional and struggling to regulate? Low attendance compared to normal? Winter bugs hitting hard?”

A lot of the comments say Y3 is the worst, others saying Years 7 and 8.

My DS is in Year 2 and often struggles with emotions and self regulation at school. It’s made me think, perhaps there’s a reason why linked to the pandemic. Lockdown was hard, DP and I were home with very young DC, trying to work, poor mental health, emotions high. Very little patience.

Nope. Just explaining I haven’t really posted much and stated what I have talked about and why.

I don’t think I’ve stopped any other discussion, just scrolled past the school stuff.

In any case the first post I responded to wasn’t yours, it was someone else who was upset by it and I was sympathising with them. It was you who jumped on it, got riled and still is.

Hope you can move on and stop responding to me.

So, on the theme of the thread, I think university students were given a spectacularly raw deal over covid. What a miserable, expensive few years. I know many feel deeply depressed and betrayed.

And to add insult to injury, my niece had to walk away from a job because she needed to have a driving licence and couldn’t get a test done in time due to the backlogs.

Young Children might not have been home alone but for many parents were working flat out, trying to hold down a job as well as try to get kids to do school work while entertaining pre-schoolers.

Kids were spending far too much time on screens. Not able to even go out and play.

Parents were under horrendous stress, not knowing what was happening next and worried about job security as well as trying to keep Children happy.

Really nasty to try and blame parents for lack of children's development when it's was a completely unnatural situation families were in.
People would be calling Social Work if they knew of a kid who wasn't allowed to play in a park, isolated from peers, not allowed to leave the garden, punished by solitary confinement from 10 days.

It is just nasty to blame parents

And I'd certainly agree with that. Most of my DD's degree was studied online from her campus room - that's almost three years she spent in virtual lockdown (her city had one of the more draconian lockdowns). My DS' first two years at uni were similar. I can't help but compare my own university experiences with theirs.

I distinctly remember many families keeping their kids at home when they could have sent them to school. Sometimes I felt like the only person who actually wanted their kids in school. Many people could have had keyworker or vulnerable child places but didn't, or chose to keep them home due to safety fears in Summer 2020 and September 2020. And all the hundreds and hundreds of people who removed their kids from school in the lead up to Xmas 2020 because "family time was more important". I'm not trying to be goady, where are all those people now? They wanted lockdowns, and there were a lot of them.

I did this. Could have sent my children in due to being a key worker, but kept them at home. I still think that was the right decision, based on information we had at the time. I thought at the time that under 12s should have been allowed to play together outdoors as some other countries did. I think there has been a tremendous impact on many children post-covid, but lockdowns were a proportionate response to the threat at the time and that the terrible situation with covid is to blame for this, not decisions about lockdowns. People want a decision maker to be angry with, it’s much easier to have individuals to focus anger on than to accept that a worldwide shit situation happened and had a bad effect on our kids.

I was slaughtered on mumsnet for sending my child in for her vulnerable child spot. Told I was effectively murdering teachers.

I'm still glad I did it. I used my brain and minimised the risk in every way possible. It was the healthiest 3 months of school, ever.

We had child A with online lessons in the morning and child B in the afternoon. This left a small window of daylight to travel to find somewhere appropriate to play. The local park was an unusable swamp with puddles on top of heavy clay mud, and even the paths waterlogged. Tarmac sports courts had been padlocked off again. Low lying areas near the river were flooded. I found an old, unused, unfenced rec that we could kick a ball around on together. We only went there the once as it was liberally covered in broken glass and dog shit. I couldn't find anywhere better for us to play outside.

When the extra-curriculars stopped in the November, we'd jump in the car to find a park for things like scooting a few days a week to try and fill the hole that their sports normally filled. We ran out of steam by the last week of November because it was so dark by the time we got anywhere.

I got DS to teach me how to play Minecraft (although months of gamers on youtube on the TV had given me an idea). We Pokemoned together. What I couldn't do was be a 7 year old boy, or a football team etc. I did my best with what was avaliable, but that wasn't enough meet my children's needs. There was a lot more that could have been done with pretty much zero disease spreading consequences that could have helped a lot more children. It wouldn't have solved everything, but it would have eased some of the pressure that many still feel today.

Parents should never be shamed about not being able to meet children's every need. Children need peers and a range of social situations in order to thrive.

all the hundreds and hundreds of people who removed their kids from school in the lead up to Xmas 2020 because "family time was more important". I'm not trying to be goady, where are all those people now? They wanted lockdowns,

Surely the people who removed their kids from school before Xmas 2020 wanted the opposite of lockdowns - the ability to spend Christmas together with their families. They didn’t want a scenario where they couldn’t see anyone, which was a possibility if their child caught covid at school or had to isolate.

It doesn't matter what they were, the fact that they were on other threads and clearly must've related to disagreements because of what you wrote is sufficient. That means that what you are saying here is false. You're welcome.

Blimey, that's awful. I wasn't posting here at that time so I didn't see it, but people are disgusting.

www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-11491871/Chris-Whitty-warns-Britain-faces-prolonged-period-excess-deaths.html

@PerfectlyPreservedQuagaarWarrior

It doesn't matter what they were, the fact that they were on other threads and clearly must've related to disagreements because of what you wrote is sufficient. That means that what you are saying here is false. You're welcome.

Sorry, Perfectly, I've read this a few times and it still makes zero sense.

I'm still stand by my (not false) post. And I suppose if continuing to allude to earlier threads is an issue, perhaps you should stop doing it too. (With greater specificity than me, I might add.)

Such a shame that nobody warned that this might happen 🙄🙄

Well, now we have people panicking about Strep A. A huge increase in the number of stressed people unable to afford good food and warm homes isn’t likely to be helping people’s immune systems, either. And we have been primed to expect the worst. Nobody wants to get ill because they don’t think they’ll get access to medical care.

Every time I read about kids battling these relatively normal common infections, I feel my old anger surge. Why the hell did we shut our young away?

My twins loved lockdown, they worked through their work together, really helped each other. They played together, moved into one room. Didn't feel lonely at all, I've found that it's now caused them to become far to reliant on each other and not really wanting or needing other friends. Not healthy.

What you think or claim to think is immaterial. You made a comment about mine and your interaction, based on what could only have been discussions we'd had in other threads at that point, and you were deleted because that's against forum guidelines. HQ gave and continue to give no fucks whether you accept this or not. Which is funny, really.

Also, the time for you to tell anyone not to allude to this was before you completely unilaterally raised the subject. You talked about me when I had never mentioned you, broke guidance in doing so and chose to post further whining about your deletion. This is your doing and yours only. It's important that this continues to be spelled out to you for as long as you choose to drag this out.

Isn't it.

@PerfectlyPreservedQuagaarWarrior

What you think or claim to think is immaterial. You made a comment about mine and your interaction, based on what could only have been discussions we'd had in other threads at that point, and you were deleted because that's against forum guidelines. HQ gave and continue to give no fucks whether you accept this or not. Which is funny, really.

Also, the time for you to tell anyone not to allude to this was before you completely unilaterally raised the subject. You talked about me when I had never mentioned you, broke guidance in doing so and chose to post further whining about your deletion. This is your doing and yours only. It's important that this continues to be spelled out to you for as long as you choose to drag this out.

This is the last time I reply to you. The pomposity of this post is incredible. I haven't given a thought to MNHQ, actually. Nor have I "whined about my deletion". I could have, but I didn't. What this is about, really, is my post touched a nerve with you and you're pissed. That comes through with every post you make. /out

The end of your wise and not at all incoherent contributions on the subject will be a tragic loss, if you do actually manage to stick it of course. Meanwhile, perhaps now is a good time to reflect on the time honoured wisdom of the concept 'don't start none, won't be none'.

Seeing various contortions to try to pick fault with the content or topic of my posts instead of admitting that it’s just me that people don’t like is quite funny.

You’re right, I and many others don’t like you. Based on the stuff that you have posted in the past and the way you have twisted it since. However, the reason people don’t say this is that presumably this post is a ‘personal attack’ and as such I give this post about an hour before you get it deleted.

I'd like to see the post(s) where this was actually said.
But I suspect it wasn't and that a milder message has been twisted.

@Teateaandmoretea You and "many others" don't like @noblegiraffe?
Whilst you're entitled to state that opinion on your own account, however rude and unpleasant that might be, you cannot speak for others.
My impression of her is that she gives calm and factual information in her posts, inviting rational debate about the worrying state of our schools that many parents are unaware of or simply don't want to face.
She rarely, if ever, is rude to posters, even in the face of intolerable nastiness and twisting of her words and intent.
Don't shoot the messenger, is what I would say.