To think there needs to be a public inquiry into child development

[MaryMaryVeryContrary]

It really seems like we have a looming societal crisis in terms of child development and therefore the quality of the public in 10-20 years time. Experienced teachers across the board seem to be reporting an overwhelming increase in delayed, aggressive and disruptive children. I’m extremely worried about how this will impact society when they become adults - it seems (as a guess) at least a tenth of children will be incapable of work of any kind, and many more will need copious amounts of support to live any kind of responsible life.

AIBU to think we need an urgent public inquiry into this and what is going on? It seems to be the elephant in the room and anybody who tries to discuss it is shouted down.

I’m sure some of it is due to cuts in services but surely that can’t account for it all - it’s very sudden and extremely alarming.

I actually don’t worry about that so much. When my son was at nursery - he had a key worker who was super engaged with him. She wasn’t allowed to be checked out on her phone - it was her job to plan interesting activities, chat to him, engage him.

If a child is in a consistent and well managed environment I think that is better than being at home with a permanently distracted parent.

I see parents in doctors waiting rooms and on the bus all the time - on their phones and only looking up to tell their child off or complain about their behaviour. I see women on the phone while holding their children’s hand on the walk too and from school - ignoring their children in the park because they’re engrossed in a digital world.

I get it. If’s the easiest way to make time for yourself when you’re feeling overwhelmed or touched out. But a lot of people seem to be really unable to manage themselves around it and I worry it’s really really damaging their children.

I see a difference in kids I know.

The kids who have parents who chat to them from birth, whose parents are engaged and interested, whose parents don't deploy screens as a default way to entertain their kids, and whose parents don't spend all their free time on a screen generally seem to be more able and school ready than many of their peers. The kids who are allowed to fail (obviously in an age appropriate way!) seem to fare even better. This has nothing to do with income or education or class btw.

Obviously this is all anecdotal. A public enquiry feels like a step too far, but for sure we need to look at how society treats children and families.

My view is, as a society, we massively underestimate what children are capable of. That's not new - it's always happened - but when that's coupled with smaller families, the "professionalisation" of parenting (e.g. mummy bloggers, parenting 'experts', the idea you only have kids when you're totally ready etc.) and parental guilt about not being present enough it's a bit of a shitshow.

Parents feel that when they ARE around their kids, they need to be on their A game. So rather than the 70s/80s (and earlier) somewhat laissez-faire parenting of "they'll be fine, I've got some roses to manure, go and play in the shed" you have too many parents who constantly hover, feel they have to buy the latest gadgets, and who structure time to the Nth degree to ensure Junior is getting the utmost exposure to X.

The net result is kids who've never really been given the space to just be kids.

This isn't a criticism of parents btw - most people are trying their very best. It's a criticism of society. Shit pay and shit housing mean that parents who'd love to spend more time with their kids simply can't afford to while we simultaneously denigrate and underpay those who work in early years. It's a very sad state of affairs.

All that being said, most kids I know are great. And while there are real problems with not enough kids being school ready and with discipline, and the effect social media has on kids I maintain that the vast majority of children are doing well. I work with a lot of Gen Z and the way in which they advocate for themselves and their needs is impressive; I wish us Gen X and Millennials had been like that!

For the last time, a diagnosis isn't enough to get any disability benefits!

I dont think people became less tolerable of DC in public, I think more parents became entitled and supported by forums like MN, refused to do anything like try to take their DC outside to calm them or feel slightly awkward or embarrassed when their DC were disturbing everyone during a wedding, church service, school performance, cafe restaurant, museum or even in a theatre or cinema.

So people got less tolerant about DC in 'public spaces' because the parents didn't GAF about how their DCs behaviour was ruining everyone else's experience. It was their 'right' as parents to continue to access the things they wanted to despite having an antisocial tiny human with them, and their tiny antisocial human DC 'right' to access anything they're not legally excluded from.

Tiny humans are inherently antisocial btw. I'm not blaming them, I'm blaming their parents.

Same as the whole entitled dog owners thing. Most people didn't give a shit about dogs in public till they were expected to not complain about dogs behaving badly in the spaces they previously weren't in, or were behaving well in. Or just complaining about dogs behaviour in public became taboo since they're 'part of the family'.

In my opinion, we are living very unnaturally now in so many areas and alike zoo animals we are expressing our unhappiness through many self destructive ways.

Exactly

Add to this, many more single parents who often have little support, financial or otherwise, many more acrimonious splits, where children are often used as weapons, blended families, which can work, but often don't.
I'm generalising massively but at a population level it is also an upwards trend.

Parents not talking to their kids - prams world facing no interaction.
Screens on all the time for an easy ride.
Not even greeting them after school - just carry on on their phones.
Excusing everything as them 'not being ready' when it means the parents are ready for the effort it takes.
Parents expecting every problem to be snowploughed out of their child's way preventing kids developing any kind of problem solving skills or resilience in the face of minor issues.
Excusing behaviour and not holding them to account with consequences.
Bullying staff.
Inability to say no so kids struggle when they meet someone who does (teachers).

I'm autistic and I disagree with you.

In order to get my autistic son to engage with learning, whether that's academically or otherwise, you have to appeal to his interest.

He is interested in technology.

He is in a mainstream setting at school where all materials available to him are books and paper and pens and social carpet time, and nobody can get him to sit and write and spell, or practice reading and phonics.

At home, on his tablet he spells and writes and uses a stylus.

We've read every day to him since he was born and his interest in books is limited and self led. We can't always read to him because he would like to just flip the same page backwards and forwards.

We sing songs, he engages, but it doesn't teach him practical applicable life skills.

I don't think he would be talking like he does now if we hadn't eased up on the no screen time rule, because that is how he picked up on his gestalt and before he was allowed access to technology he had several injurious and harmful stims because of his boredom and inability to engage with many things that did not interest him at all.

I'm not advocating for absolutely unfettered access to screen time for all children but simply pointing out that technology is advantageous for learning, even self directed learning from being young and I think it's very closed minded to assume otherwise.

If technology didn't exist, my son would certainly have a lot of damage from self injurious behaviour and if he was born in a time from the past he would have been institutionalised.

I don't think COVID can be blamed for the behaviour in early years now. I do think has effected teenagers though. My son suffered with school refusal after lockdown, as did many other kids. His mental health hasn't been the same since.

Stimming is done for an autistic person to regulate themselves. Toddlers move their hands and show excitement by moving.

a formal education system isn’t good for autistic children. I still don’t think addictive screens are good and they should be doing hands on learning, physically doing something that they can see and interact with

@anxioussister but your getting a snapshot of a mum whose probably with that child 24 /7 and the bus maybe her small breather?

Children also need plenty of down time to just potter around and watch a parent and have that solid connection.
Being in a nursery from a baby, every day from 7am to 6pm is a long day isn't it.
For one and two year old that a long time day with some one paid to care for them and the others.

What I don't get with these threads is the general overall lack of acknowledgement of lockdown on everyone. Of course there would be a sudden shift in behaviour after all spending a year or so completely divorced from anything social. Not to mention all the people who just didn't resume normal social behaviour after it all finished.

Not at all surprising we are having all these issues with children and young people now really.

I don’t think it can be underestimated how much of an effect Covid had. I called it at the time - the country had people living in fear, getting them to follow crazy arbitrary rules to keep them ‘safe’ (these kept changing), kids would have been scared for their own lives and also worried that their families could suddenly die. It was very similar to how I lived my life in an abusive relationship…and I can tell you that over a decade later my mental and physical health never recovered. It’s easy to think oh well it’s over, let’s just get on with it, but when you stop and think about what an enormous headfuck it would
have been for children old enough to understand, it’s really quite chilling.

The ones that weren’t old enough to understand missed out on crucial social interaction, and only ever saw people wearing masks out of the house.

And also for the kids already in school, the break in education that Covid gave kids with the lockdown showed them a different way. They had been institutionalized into just going to school and that was the end of it, but all of a sudden school wasn’t a thing and I think some kids could just never get back into the groove of going.

I definitely don’t think this holds much truth..

Crossed post!

Then UK DC would be even more fucked since we're taking in part, about DC going into reception at 5 extremely behind.

It's tedious and unhelpful when people try to compare the UK or Scandinavian or Nordic countries.

They're in no way similar.

Children aren’t being given age appropriate freedoms and responsibility and are missing out on building life skills.
The blame culture that stops parents giving children freedom also stops schools and voluntary groups doing activities pushing children outside comfort zone.
My girlguides did an outdoor trail activity and we were very wary re parents complaining - RA fully, nice village, leaders at strategic points, younger ones in group with sensible 13 yr old etc. First message I opened after was x age 10 has never been out without adult supervision…rest of message was she’d had a great night and wouldn’t stop talking about it!! but it could easily have been other way.
My dc had friends at sixth form not permitted to get train to nearby city but going away for uni. I’m in that uni parent’s facebook group and some of the helicoptering is frightening it’s no wonder the 18 year olds are anxious at being dropped in at deep end.

Couldn't agree more

Why? Not only is intelligence hereditary, but if parents have low levels of literacy, numeracy, language skills, don't or can't read, haven't researched child development, don't talk to their children, don't know how to use play, don't engage with their children etc, then their children are at another disadvantage.

I haven’t RTFT - only on page 8!
But I watched an interesting lecture once on how IQ is correlated with various outcomes. So, on average, the higher someone’s IQ the more they earn, the better their health outcomes and are usually of a healthier weight etc. But the lower the IQ the more children you are likely to have. Your IQ is inherited from your parents and you’ll definitely learn from their environment.

This. The Finnish education system simply would not work here. The people are completely different.

We've been teaching a play-based curriculum in Wales for 3-7 year olds since the late 90s. Pedagogy is based on a lack of formal teaching as in Finland. Guess what? Our attainment levels have fallen dramatically. Children are being failed. More and more children are illiterate. It does not work here. For many reasons.

You've got to be pretty extreme now to rebel as adults are falling over themselves backwards trying to prove how down with the kids they are, lol.

The age of the child is very relevant here.

Up to 3 or 4 years old, a child needs the full attention of adults, not adults on screens.

Presumably you are recalling later childhood, say six years old or more, in which case, yes, being able to play with friends without close adult supervision is essential.