To ask teachers and parents if Covid still has an impact on kids four years on

[Backtoit123]

Just that really. Four years on don’t still notice a major effect on children from the pandemic. I’ve heard teenagers say they feel a few years younger due to their ‘pandemic age’ but my DC are grown up and I don’t work in teaching so it’s hard to know. Do you recognise a major difference in kids now compared to kids of the same age before Covid? AIBU to ask if the pandemic still has left a legacy on children’s development?
YABU- no it doesn’t
YANBU- yes it does

I've been a primary teacher/HLTA for 20 years and absolutely - Covid has had an absolutely enormous negative impact across all year groups in so many different ways. More than I think most people realise.
I also had a baby in May 2020 and don't think it really affected her much because she was too young really at that point to be socialising or to understand. I do feel incredibly cheated of my mat leave which I will never experience again (I'm 43 now!)
I think to myself well we obviously struggled as adults to make sense of what the hell was going on, so is it any wonder our kids have been so badly affected?!

I feel so sorry for the kids who were starting secondary school or university when lockdown came. My friend’s daughter basically met no one and had zero university experience. So much of school and education is also about socialising and having opportunities outside of academics. Of course it must still affect many of them.

I thought at the time and still think the great harm from lockdown outweighed the benefits- which we will pay for in many ways for years.

Regarding school, I have gone from being a parent who would never ever let the kids be off school to simply not caring that much. After all it was suddenly deemed acceptable that they lost huge chunks of their education so quite frankly if that’s ok then it’s also ok for me to let the kids have days off more easily. I don’t play truant, but I am quite happy to take them on holiday in term time, and certainly softer on them if they are under the weather in allowing them to stay at home. They are primary age though, so perhaps I’ll feel differently at secondary.

As a teacher I could go on an on.about this, but will limit myself to saying that the cohort last year suffered from the grade boundaries being whacked right up again in Englans (Scotland and Wales were fairer). And they are likely going to go up again.this year. I find this quite heartless given that these are students who were at home for such a long time in the real building block years for maths and english.

The amount that failed last year was daft. Kidd that would have got the 4 in maths the previous year were suddenly 20 marks off. It has vastly limted what they can do and this will be the same for the next few years.

It's very interesting you say that as just this week I've met with a psychotherapist who agrees with you - I did try to raise this concern with a GP (when I could get an appointment) but she dismissed it as separation anxiety! Thank you, it is reassuring to hear that even strangers hearing a tiny bit about her can see the potential for her to be ND.

and it might have been picked up earlier if she'd had been in school solidly!

I work across the entire primary phase. So my current receptions were babies, and my year 6 kids were Yr2/Yr3.

I had a Year 1 class at the time of the first lockdown, and they are in Yr5 now.

This is true, but austerity and cuts also come into this.

I think Covid has exacerbated things, school attendance is the big one. And many children (particularly y2-6 now) missed really sensitive periods in their development. We had reception kids starting immediately post pandemic that didn't understand pointing - that's a really distinct theory of mind development.

Teenage emotional problems were increasing pre pandemic (recent research on this) but yup, the pandemic has made it worse for some.

Some probably realised they were happier studying at home, hated school and even though they're now school avoiding their wellbeing is actually better- as it was for some during the pandemic!

But as for services being overwhelmed... we have to go back to austerity policies for that one. Sure start etc too.... infants from disadvantaged backgrounds were already losing out pre pandemic, and that effect becomes gradually apparent over a period of years.

It's complicated.

I totally get this from am individual level.

The problem is it doesn't work on a population level. We can only educate kids on ratios of 1:30 with massive levels of compliance and attending to that social contract.
Covid absence was different because they were all absent! If theyre all absent at different times it's impossible to get large groups like that to progress in the same way. If they had a 1:1 tutor that tutor would pick up where they left off. It doesn't work like that for whole classes. They need to be all in, or all out (I.e. homeschooled).

I had one baby in Nov 2020, so right in the middle of the pandemic, and one in Aug 22 so after most restrictions had lifted. The difference in the pregnancy /birth and postnatal experience was huge but I wouldn't say it's had a lasting effect now.

Am sure it'd have a much greater impact on older children that were more aware of it.

My son thrived in lockdown and because my business was closed I dedicated all my time to educating him one on one he went back to school in a much better place with his reading/writing/ spelling being improved dramatically. It gave him a new confidence. I really feel for parents who just couldn’t do this. My husband was frontline worker and worked flat out and if we both had been in that position it would have been a very different story. So can see how different situations would impact children differently.

Teens who couldn’t socialise for 2 years have missed a huge amount of key milestones. I have two who are much less independent than I was at the same age. The little things that help build confidence in early teen years (days out with friends, using public transport, mixing in groups, part time work, learning to drive) were delayed and they’re catching up on things now and doing some for the first time that should have been regular occurences. I feel lucky mine haven’t suffered major mental health issues - I know lots have, but there is an underlying anxiety that my generation never experienced. The day schools closed left my eldest in shock and unable to sleep for days. The pandemic was unsettling for many adults who had much more life experience than kids to draw on.

This thread is like seeing sanity return, I would have loved more of this at the time. It was horrendous if you spoke up

This thread is making me feel better. I'm in secondary and the amount of parental complaints is through the roof about perfectly normal things , like a late detention.
Also students email staff directly with complaints or perceived slights from other students , but they report it as really dramatic. I have never known anything like it. Its making the job unsustainable

DD is 6 and thankfully largely unscathed. We were lucky; DP and I took a very laid back (some would say lax) approach to covid, and as an ex-teacher with a good grounding in child development I was hyper aware of the potential impact of lockdown, so we did everything we humanly could to mitigate this. I consider myself incredibly fortunate to have been able to be at home with DD during this period.

But for the other children we know it’s a very different story. I am a governor and volunteer at DD’s school. They are massively struggling with the children across the whole age range - lots of anxiety/MH issues at the upper end, and lots of social and developmental issues and undiagnosed special needs (especially speech delay etc) at the lower end.

Observing parties and play dates with DD it often feels like the other children are 1-2 years younger than her in terms of social development and general maturity - still lots of meltdowns and tantrums, children unable to communicate their needs effectively or cope with change etc.

I don't think my own children were affected at all. They are year 1 and year 3 now. DC1 missed a bit of reception due to lockdown but we did OK.

But on a population level I'm sure it's different. Not sure why the current year R that are being referenced would affected though. They were still really little when everything was open again.

I don't get that either. Masks were only in public areas, not at home with the primary caregivers presumably speaking to their children as normal.

Maybe some childcare settings wore masks, ours kept to those clear visors so no impediment but even if they were masked it's still such a small part of the time spent with people not wearing masks and speaking.

CYP mental health issues seem to have rocketed, but I'm not sure if that's due to Covid or increased awareness, CAMHS delays, cost of living or other factors

Strangely, it's benefitted my children academically. They were both 5 & 7 during the Covid times and when they returned to school instead of being "working towards" one was "working at" and the other gets top marks out of the whole class!

I don't think my children got smarter

Sorry! Didn't get chance to finish...

I think that the lack of schooling made my kids catch up with everyone else xx

Covid is classes as a. ACE - and adverse childhood experience.
For children who had protective factors - eg stable home, parents financially secure, no SEND needs, No health needs. The impact may have been minor.
However covid lead to other ACES - parents out of work, parents poor mental health, lack of health care services. Also some children will already have been experiencing multi ACES.
I work in a SEND school and the general picture is not great.
Another impact of Covid that no one talks about is the fact that lots of caring and school staff left the profession. They can get better wages for less stress in retail, this has had a huge impact

Haven't rtft.

Ds1 is 18 and in his first year at uni.

He is struggling with anxiety beyond belief, and I dont know how much longer he will last there.

He is anxious literally about everything. About having to cook fir himself, make friends, socialise, work independently.

When he moved into size flat, it took him 2 days to leave his room and go into the kitchen, even though he knew that there was no one else there.

We're struggling and we don't know what to do for the best.

My son was 4 when the pandemic started and my daughter only a few months old. My 4 year old has felt the effects more so than my daughter! His whole class is behind compared to the national average where as my daughter is well ahead.

You are absolutely right @napody, the difference here for me is I have always educated my kids outside of school and will continue to do so. I am lucky I have the skills and means to do so. They often are unchallenged at school because so many resources have to be directed at ensuring the ones who are falling behind are brought up to at least the minimal expected standard. And before anyone goes on about how I’m making it worse by educating them at home too I’m really not. I’m simply responding to the fact that there are not enough resources to keep them particularly engaged at school.

It didn't affect mine at all. With the exception of being homeschooled when the schools closed, we just carried on as usual.

I'm a SALT. Pre-pandemic there was already a lot of discussion about increased pressures on services due to cuts. We were finding other support services e.g. Children's Centres, portage services were depleted, which meant there often wasn't anyone else to work with us and support families, so children made less progress. We were also seeing increasing numbers of referrals and more complex cases, I'm not too sure why.

Obviously in the pandemic there was a reduction of service for a while. Also a reduction in referrals, as children weren't seeing their Health Visitors or other professionals as much.

Post-pandemic we have had to play catch up. This has been impacted by:

• Backlogs on waiting lists
• A continuation of increased referrals - partly due to lockdowns but not completely, as the trend started earlier
• Ongoing impact of austerity cuts
• Massive recruitment issues - there has been huge difficulties recruiting to posts, with trusts holding huge vacancies. A lot of international locums have left the UK, although some are returning. Possibly some staff have moved to work privately, not sure on this. Rents are increasing, so junior staff are priced out of certain areas. So even if there is funding for posts, there is no-one to do the work.
• Some staff who did their training during the pandemic missed out on face-to-face placements and have needed more support in their first years of work.

So we are partly seeing COVID impacts, but it's too simplistic to blame it all on that.

In relation to the OP, I personally think that individual differences have been highlighted. I have a Reception and Year 3 child. I don't see massive impacts in either of their classes. However I see much more impact at work. I suspect there is a socioeconomic difference. I work with a lot of families who live in poor quality accommodation and money is a big issue. That's going to make lockdown harder than for families with less money worries, gardens etc. (Obviously this is a huge generalisation).

Covid is classes as a. ACE - and adverse childhood experience.

Well this was suppressed at the time

So bad.