To think change is desperately needed in schools?

[GibberingPeck]

I work with young children. Today I was hit twice and scratched on the face so hard it drew blood. This has not happened to me before and I’ve worked in schools for many years. I was trying to stop a child hurting another child. The school’s stance seems to be that I shouldn’t have intervened or somehow dealt with the situation badly. I think they saw I was bleeding, but ignored it as they have so much to deal with. This year, I think I’ve seen more violent and aggressive behaviour from children than I’ve ever seen. And no way of dealing with it - it seems to have become acceptable or ‘the norm’.

I’ve reflected a lot on all of this. I’m an ex teacher and now unschool my DC and I honestly think what a lot of all of these issues boil down to on these school threads is the huge incongruence between school and how it hasn’t at all moved with the times (in fact Gove positively moved it backwards in 2014!) and the massive changes we’ve seen in society over the last couple of decades with the advent of technology and the fact that we’re in the very late stages of capitalism.

I know of a neighbours child in my dcs class who has an EHCP which says he can never be punished for anything.Worse, the horrid brat knows this and goads the s hool staff with it all the time!
Madness! What sort of adult will he become. At 9 he has already sexually abused a classmate
DN is a primary teacher and in her school, the kids with sen are not allowed to be punished.Fair enough of course f or things which are out of their control, but most isnt

And who is going to to have time to do that? People who don't work or are retired, hardly a good cross section of society.

I know of a neighbours child in my dcs class who has an EHCP... At 9 he has already sexually abused a classmate

That's shocking. I'm surprised you and other parents haven't removed your children from the school.

I just mean discussing on a thread like we're doing now.

Then they come into the workplace and have no idea how to behave. We recently took on a large number on new graduates, they act like children, we’re in an office and they’re having conversations loudly across the room while people are on the phone to clients, they can’t turn up on time, they dress inappropriately, they scroll on their phones all day long when they should be working, and they’re downright rude to managers.

DS has developed an aversion to screen-based teaching because of all the nastiness he has seen on screens in school. He can't bear powerpoint teaching or youtube learning because he never knows what he will be exposed to next and was having paralysing panic attacks

What?
Who has shown him in appropriate video content? The school? Why? Everything is usually filtered to the nth degree.

I will PM you. I can't give details online in case it out myself.

I think this is a big contributor. All people have sensory needs and limits (both ways, lots and none), not just those on the SEN spectrum. A lot of children are having high levels of visual and auditory stimulus with little input from parents. Babies and toddlers are routinely given screens in buggies and on journeys, rather than taking any of their surroundings in. Even in nappy change, they’re distracted by a screen rather than feeling the sensation of the change and interacting with a parent.

There are lots of other contributors too. Families are often stretched to the limit, there are high levels of poverty, parents and children are struggling to access health care, early intervention services are gone or overrun, both parents are often in full time work and trying to cover childcare and the cost of living is really high.

SEN provision is a nightmare with the process set up to be really complex. Agencies ignore that many of the parents are ND as well, so need clear pathways. There’s a struggle to get help for children who are non-verbal and have severe learning difficulties and physical disabilities, let alone children who are high functioning. As the parent, you can put in place everything and still feel blamed. We’ve been parenting with therapeutic parenting and PACE for years, our ds masks at school, the school believe us but there’s such a nightmare trying to portray this (common) situation via the process. In our situation no one even seemed to be able to clearly tell us next steps until the school got hold of the psychiatrist who will eventually assess - and we’re lucky as we have a supportive school. Parents have to go on a parenting course and a workshop for ADHD - which if done together are two full mornings a week. Obviously, you do them, even if you’re aware of what they’re teaching already, but the reality is it’s hugely stressful to balance that, full time work and parenting an ND child plus all the paperwork you need to write. The forms are crap (fit early development into a 5cmX8cm box for ASD), so you end up writing a huge document to attach. IDPs are like gold dust and there are strict remits that don’t suit children that appear to function but are highly affected at home.

Equally, the ADHD workshops are too light on the risks of screen time (lots of correlation between addiction risks with screens and ADHD) and huge numbers of children are isolated with their screens without the support they need to educate them or help them manage their symptoms. There’s a huge focusing on adjusting parenting techniques, but no advice when you’ve done that prior to all of this and that’s why you sought support and diagnosis in the first place. I appreciate course leaders say parents in that position are in a minority, but there must be plenty of others who have done this and, for them and for us, there’s just a very punishing process in which the child’s voice is often lost and the parents are blamed for trying to advocate for a child that needs support.

There is a lot of parent bashing here. The rhetoric that these parents are lazy is in fact lazy and self-congratulatory.

My son has a speech delay. Otherwise no development issues and well behaved- nursery often comment on his good behaviour. My husband and I both work full-time but have organised our jobs so he only goes half days to nursery so we can have more 1-1 time with him. Very little screen time. Read, sing and talk to him. Good joint attention, concentration and attention.

Did lots of reading into how to support him and implemented what I learnt. Advice from HV was read/sing/talk/play with him, narrate your day, which wasnot helpful as already doing those things.

Speech only improved when we paid for speech and language therapist to see him privately. She said what she commonly sees is parents of children with speech delays doing too much trying to help their children with language which is counter productive.

So yes, their are many parents who are trying so hard to help their children getting dismissed as bad/lazy parents being told to "talk/read/sing/play with child" and that "nursery/school are the best to monitor child development" when they seek help. Not dismissing schools or nurseries at all but parents are the best for monitoring development because 1.they care about their child more and 2. They have more 1:1 time with them.

Our son improved because we could go private but what do people think happens when they are on a long waiting list. I think a lot of these children think they are saying words properly and get frustrated when people can't understand them which understandably leads to behavioural issues.

So for all those who are solely blaming lazy parents, stop. You have no idea the work/effort/time researching/worrying these parents do and they don't need your judgement.

I agree. Clearly there is a serious problem with parenting as documented on this thread and others but blaming working parents (and let’s be honest this means working mothers as no one ever challenges working fathers) is poor form and misguided and I call bullshit.

I’m not a teacher, a TA or a social worker so not at the the front line of this but I and the vast majority of my female friends have careers and none of our kids is violent, delinquent or disrespectful to the levels described here. They are not perfect kids by any stretch but nothing like this.

I’m pretty sure it’s not the hard working families who have high aspirations for their kids and where both parents work where discipline is breaking down, it’s more likely to be families where there is endemic worklessness. Or families with low aspirations or other problems.

The sorts of behaviour issues described here don’t generally correlate with families where two parents work and it’s irritating and misleading that this sweeping judgement of working mums is being roped into this debate.

@Thepeopleversuswork and @Theright1
Agreed (both posts). It sounds to me as though there are a huge number of different factors all meeting together here, and the first thing we need to do is to stop blaming and start working together on fixing.

Coming at this from another angle as the heavy rhetoric of blaming lazy parents on this thread is not the full picture.
Sometimes it is the culture of the school at fault (not teachers on an individual level) and strength of leadership is woeful. My son started primary school at a school with a strong structure and behavioural policy. Leadership was very robust. No issues. We then moved and from the day he started a new school his behaviour fell apart. He was aggressive, impulsive and emotional 85% of the time. We despaired – introduced play therapy, listened to the school’s concerns about SEN for him. But something never sat right with me – he had completed a year of school already with no issues and didn’t display this behaviour in any other setting. I volunteered at the school a number of times to gain some insight and the behaviour and way the class was conducted was shocking. I would try to lead my son but it was like he was on drugs, he completely spun out in the environment. Spending longer with the kids and parents socially, I learned that 8 out of 10 boys in that class were problematic, put on (poor) SEN provision, but yet didn’t display the behaviour at home. Another boy also joined mid year with no previous issues and rapidly declined in behaviour. The leadership and consistency of expectations and rules in the school was very weak.

After a full year I pulled my son from the school and put him in another with a reputation for structure and high behavioural expectations, with a known strong leadership team. From the day he started (and now 8 months on), he had no issues. The mother above also pulled her son and moved him to the same school – he improved immediately and dramatically.

There was NOTHING I could do with my son at home that would improve his behaviour at school. We tried everything and did everything the school asked of us. And after time I’m sure I became one of those belligerent parents because it became very obvious that the school culture was the problem – not just for my son but for the majority of those kids. And I got completely fed up of the school not taking any responsibility and their continued narrative that they were unlucky in receiving a high number of children with undiagnosed SEN.

For most of them, they had started in reception, so the parents knew no different and could only deduce it was SEN coming to light. We luckily had the previous experience and it was easier to see that it wasn’t that simple.

I sympathised with the teachers, A LOT, but in our case, for whatever reason, the problem was with the school environment.

this

@OldChinaJug is so right.

Do you mean £54 per month? 54 per session is insane! I thought I was paying a lot for £30 per month!
I agree with what people are saying about young children being given things like iPads isn't good for them Especially seeing as some parents have no limits and will literally let their kids stagnate All day in front of it.
But I disagree with some posters saying it's the parents fault if a child is quiet/shy, when I was young I was extremely shy and would barely speak to anyone until I was about 8. No exaggeration. I really hope no one ever blamed my parents or made snide comments to them because they really were good parents.😞

This is not designed to get people's backs up - my own kids go/ went to nursery. But as a society, we are now putting most kids in full time or close to full time childcare. The nurturing mum and child or family and child time that most kids grew up with is now replaced with 40 hours or more institutionalised childcare from about 1 year old. I do think that is having an impact on child development. Kids are being 'looked after' and not 'brought up' in these places, often by ever changing staff (young girls usually). It is bound to change how children behave as they grow up. I feel this is potentially one of several factors causing a mass decline in behaviour. I am in my 30s. Mosy people my age did not grow up.in childcare like most kids do now.

People are saying change needs to happen at home first but how and why has it got to this? We are not always talking about deprived and vulnerable families. Often the worst behaved children are the ones from comfortable homes with professional parents (I’m a teacher). For change to happen we need to know the issue and I have no idea what it is anymore.

I will probably leave in the next few years too. I’ve had enough.

I think we live in a society which coddles parents.

I have colleagues who cheerfully admit that their kids don't eat vegetables and eat chicken nuggets and chips most nights. The other parents immediately do the "as long as he's got food in his belly, nothing else matters" thing. Same with allowing hours of screen time - "a relaxed mum is a better mum".

They all exchange intel on which local nurseries are known for being able to fully teach toilet training, and which are known for being able to get kids reading if they've never been read to.

My parenting friends say similar things and absolutely heap praise one another for what seems to me to be little more than ensuring the vulnerable people they brought into the world don't starve. Any hint of disapproval and they turn on you with "mums' mental health is important!"

Parenting is hard but it's also a choice to undertake it. We just seem, as a society, to accept people doing the absolute least possible on the basis that at least they're not belting their children. I'm not surprised that these kids go into school and can't adhere to expectations, because they've never had any expectations to adhere to. And society says that's fine, because parenting is haaaaaaard.

It was. Our classrooms were safe for the staff and the pupils. We all managed to learn. We could all read, write, count and spell. We all managed the transition up to senior school. We could go to the toilet ourselves, do our coats up, tie our laces and even tell the time. We also knew that if we had dared to misbehave in class we would have to face our parents and would get a rollicking from them too.
We have swung to far and it is time to find the middle ground.

@fitzwilliamdarcy Exactly. You can see it with any new policy or rule put in place, adults are reacting just like these kids.

I do not condone hitting kids, ever. But kids feel unsafe nowadays. There is far far too much choice given to them. I'm shocked at the amount of parents on this site that cook different dinners, that give their 10 year olds the responsibility of choosing a school but at the same time won't let them play outside or walk to school alone. It's so twisted and kids really don't have any safe boundaries. It's the reason why so many schools are having to resort to military style behaviour policies. I genuinely don't think most schools want to take this approach, but they've had no other choice.

So many issues contributing to this that people just don't want to talk about because each and every one of us would have to take some of the blame and question our direction as a society.

Like the appalling lack of respect displayed throughout society as a whole. The me, me, me attitude that puts the individual before society. The lack of pride in community, lack of unity, everyone having an us against them mentality.

The fact that womens' rights and equality has been hijacked by the greedy and unscrupulous to ensure that two working parents are unable to provide a decent standard of living where previously one could provide for the whole household. How can anyone teach their child all the life skills they should be learning at home when they're barely able to get home on time to put them to bed?

The norm in the breakdown of the family, not only between parents but also extended family. The attitude of many grandparents/aunts/uncles etc. that feel they have no responsibility towards the next generation of their own families and the parents who reject that help when it is offered because they don't want 'people interfering'.

Teachers who are forced to spend more time on admin than actual teaching, heads who are driven to suicide by ofsted reports, an inept government whose educations policies are not fit for purpose.

A society which spends most of its time looking down at a screen like sedated zombies instead of actually looking at what's going on in front of their faces and interacting with real people face-to-face.

I could go on but I'd have to write a book. Are we seriously baffled as to why schools are in a mess? Isn't it painfully obvious?

Nothing good can ever come of a society that can't care for its young or its old and we're failing on both.

There's no discipline or boundries. Obsession with happiness. People want their kids to be happy 24/7 and are surprised when they break down at the slightest bit of discomfort because they've not been taught any resilience. They've never heard someone tell them to just get a grip and get on with it.
We've (rightly) become a lot more accepting and informed of things like high functioning autism, ADHD, Dyslexia etc but it has open the floodgates for wealthy parents to leave £3k at the doors of a dodgy Harley St psychiatrist that'll give them a piece of paper which absconds them of any responsibility. These parents would not be doing this if it's wasn't socially acceptable. Oh he/she has xyz you've got to make allowances. You can't even use the word disabled anymore but they're happy to quote disability discrimination if they need to. It's all a joke and people aren't prepared to take any responsibility for their actions. It's also causing kids who come from homes where there are those expectations in place, to resent their parents as 80% of their peers have parents who will go to lala land in their defence.

In Scotland standard started to plummet when the dire Curriculum for Excellence was introduced. As if that wasn't enough, everything has to be play based now up to P3 and some suggest for the whole of primary school. Our school was very traditional in the early years, teaching children their sounds, numbers, reading etc. Now everything is to be play based so children choose what they want to do. The teacher isn't meant to intervene and steer them in the direction of something educational so they can literally play all day. My ex colleagues absolutely hate it and can see standards falling since this was introduced.

In my last years, I was an SEN teacher, giving 1-1 or small group support to the ever increasing numbers of pupils needing help. As there were virtually no supply teachers available, I was continually made to cover for absent colleagues so the children never got their time with me. I wish their parents had gone to the press as that's the only way our LA does anything.