All these issues with schools!

[Capercaille]

I feel so sorry for schools and teachers these days. All I see on here is contant moaning and whining!

Has it always been like this?!

SleepToad · Today 17:13
"I think that the problem is that parents are too involved in their children's lives. How often do we see threads here about children's friendships or adult children and their lives. Kids are not allowed to be independent or grow resilience so are unable to deal with anything negative in their lives."

I beg to disagree. The children who behave the worst in my ds secondary are the children with parents who are NOT involved. They simply don't care, don't have time, mh problems or other. And they don't see why their children should obey to adults/rules.
They had swimming in PE. In a class of 27 students only 13 showed up with swimming gear! Because it's an outside pool (heated) many didn't "feel like it". And their parents were fine with that. Talked to their PE teacher who thinks about resigning because of the parents who let their children get away with everything..

When I started teaching...

The PP was implying there used to be plenty of specialist schools, but not now.

@LucyLastik yes this feels like an accurate representation across the board. How on earth can you feel satisfaction and achievement working like this. It's awful for teachers. It's awful for many kids.
It must be soul destroying.

Genuinely, turning up each day and seeing their progress is the reason I wanted to teach in the first place.

Progress for all in my class is slow but it's progress nonetheless whether it is academic, personal or directly related to their SEND.

@LucyLastik that's so nice to hear. I hope you get the extra resources you deserve sometime in the near future.

One of my schools is an SEN school and we don't have many issues with the children as compared to the mainstream schools

Issues with parents have become a growing problem.
More parents on cannabis, more threats and swearing, more abuse, more SS and early help involvement. More policies we never needed like searching, . Prevent, Dealing with extensive online bullying, porn, sexual images being exchanged. Bringing in drugs and prescription drugs, Children watching porn at home, massive rise in DV , neglect and mental health issues all in primaries.

We live in an age of blaming others.

Some of it definitely is. Schools and children's services have been completely starved of funding for the last 14 years and that has had a huge impact. How much of the current poor behaviour in primary schools is down to cuts to services like Sure Start? The fact that the 2 year health check is now done by filling out a form instead of the child actually being seen?

At the same time covid has also had an undeniable impact, which links to the collapse in children's mental health services that I mentioned. But the Tories refused the suggested £15 billion children's covid-catch up scheme that could have gone some way to alleviate that.

Teacher recruitment has been below target for years, but has plummeted further since covid. Some of that is down to how poorly teachers were treated by the government during the pandemic, some the obvious result of years of increasing expectations and reduced pay. However it also seems to be an issue in other countries so isn't all down to government mismanagement.

And SEN - provision has been devastated. It started with austerity when the first people to be made redundant were TAs and pastoral staff. There seems to also be a huge increase in diagnoses and needs - EHCP costs are just spiralling out of control and it is sending councils bankrupt. These things put together have been a disaster.

The thing with teacher recruitment that doesn't get mentioned very much is that it is pretty shitty for kids to go to school and be faced with incompetent teachers (heads admit they have to hire teachers they would rather not because it's them or no one), supply teachers who don't know the subjects they are supposed to teach because they are hired to be a warm body at the front of the room, and just an endless turnover of staff. Cover lessons are not generally a great time for either the cover teacher or the class.

The Tories definitely have made a huge contribution to the problems in education, but there are other things at play too.

I teach a core subject at secondary in a department that has one male teacher and about 10 female teachers. Rest assured that we make short shift of even the faintest whiff of misogyny. It is IMO one of the most worrying issues facing our kids at the moment.

@noblegiraffe thankyou. That's a very informative overview. And utterly depressing beyond words.

@noblegiraffe 100% agree with everything you mentioned.

This, to a certain degree. When people are happy about something, they rarely go online to spread the good news.

Misogny is a huge issue in our local Secondary schools and creeping into our Primary schools. Yet another thing schools have to deal with.

And my username sums up another issue!

14 years of Conservative government stripped the school system bare.

In the 90s I disclosed to a teacher I had been sexually abused for 2 years she did not report it she also did not recall my disclosure some 15 years later when I reported it myself, this would absolutely not happen nowadays. A lot more pressure is on school now that was not there 20 years ago, one of the staff had a big box last week and told me that it was full of toothbrushes to show each child how to brush their teeth and to take the brushes home in case they did not have one. Two very extreme examples two decades apart the same town different expectations and roles now.

I have over 70% SEN in my small school mixed year class.The majority of them have trauma in their lives.'Just be firm with them' is not going to work on a 9 year old whose parents are in jail,or the kid who has brain damage from FAS. As an ECT I have another kid in my class who special schools won't take because they can't meet her needs, but I am expected to cope with.
Parents daren't say no to their children, they dont let them experience disappointment, frustration, boredom, They let them sit on screens watching brain rotting things like cocomelon, so they have no concentration span.They don't have resilience or resourcefulness or perseverance .They encourage kids to disregard rules and don't support school's discipline processes.

YABU.

some teachers are dreadful, some are amazing. I feel like only on MN do we make every single teacher out to be a saint!

some parents have every right to complain about the lack of support for their children.

others will find an issue in anything.

it’s not just parents are moaners and the poor schools.

a one size fits all education system was always going to go to shit eventually.

Why is there so much SEN?

SEN can cover a whole range of stuff. The poster you quoted said about parents in jail or kids with FAS. I’m assuming it’s probably a deprived area. Could be why.

My son has SEN and his main need is cognition and learning. My daughter also has SEN though and her main need is listed as SEMH.

Very broad range.

I am a teacher and have a child with SEN and an EHCP.

I am no expert on rising SEN but from my own personal and professional experience here are a few factors.

Social: Covid - needs not picked up early/at all, services closed, no catch-up. Increasing levels of poverty (doesn't cause SEN but certainly doesn't help). Better medical care in early infancy means more premature children survive. Assortative mating (ASD/ADHD strongly heritable); modern life more social (in a bad way) and stimulating - needs more obvious.
Educational: larger schools, crumbling buildings (more DC in class, more crowded corridors, fewer facilities, lower staff to pupil ratio, less experienced staff, younger staff - less likely to be parents). Two facts: we have the second youngest teachers in the OECD and more teachers who are female in their 30s leave the profession every year than the total number of male teachers. Unsuitable curriculum (Gove). Important exams at 16 (unusual internationally). Generally this creates a hostile environment for SEN. Most SEN nowadays is ASD. Many of these kids are academic but have high support needs. Very few schools set up for this. Major transition between year 6 and 7 I often the crunch point; poorly handled in most areas. Year 11 to 12 transition even less studied/supported. Academy chains that drain what funding there is to corporate functions/CEOs. Loss of LA expertise.
Political: closure of special schools. Extreme barriers in the way of parents trying to access SEN support for children (took me two years and two tribunals to get that EHCP - it was like having a second job). Schools and local authorities free to ignore or pay lip service to the law. No punishment for them and no incentive to do well by SEN students who struggle as schools measured on results. General political hostility to anyone different to the norm.

DH is almost certainly AuDHD like DD. Needs well met at rural primary and secondary in 60s and 70s. Degree from Cambridge, good career. Lifelong struggles with depression and feeling different, but education provision and support was there for him - it wasn't a battle. It wasn't politicised.

Long story short: if you have SEN needs and aren't supported/understood, your needs will seem more and behaviours and issues will be more extreme.

Poverty makes it more likely needs won't be identified/met because so much needs to be paid for privately and it all takes masses of time and frankly, cultural capital.

Soon child is EBSA (often year 7-9) and mum is out of the workforce.

Oh and DH's fantastic education didn't cost him a penny. Full grant and actually earned money (degree apprenticeship).

EBSA - emotionally based school avoidance. Huge problem in schools

When I was in school children with additional needs wouldn’t have to do French or 10 GCSEs. They’re set up to fail. I work 4 days in a secondary school and on my day off I do supply in a variety of schools. Last week I was scribing for two lovely ESLkids aged 12 who were so severely dyslexic that they couldn’t read or write. They were answering questions on monotheism and Transubstantiation in the Catholic Church. Why put them through this? It’s cruel to expect every child to do the same.

It did, just less often I think.

My DM was a learning support assistant 30 years ago and it was only the quick reflexes of the class teacher deflecting the chair a 10 year old threw at her from behind that saved her from a potentially serious injury.

The difference is that the school and associated people worked together and that kid was able to move from a mainstream primary to a special school for secondary. He would never have coped with mainstream secondary school. Now he'd probably have had to go to the local secondary.