School readiness survey - surprising?

[GirlfromtheNorthLondonCountry]

https://www.theguardian.com/education/2025/jan/30/some-children-starting-school-unable-to-climb-staircase-finds-england-and-wales-teacher-survey

Is it really the case that 4 year olds (absent disabilities) are unable to climb stairs or sit on the rug because of too much screen time? It just seems so extraordinary to me.

Off topic now - but this can be really frustrating. It’s not helpful for those with low functioning (and I would prefer they didn’t remove the labels because it’s a useful way to distinguish needs in a way almost anyone can understand) the non-verbal children with significant delays are not going to be able to relate to the experience of a woman who can drive and set up a business.

I saw an information sheet she gave one school - if they had implemented it for my DC it would have been a complete disaster as it just reflected her presentation/preferences.

But it was very eye-opening how little due diligence the LA seemed to have performed before contracting her business to provide training. Either that or they didn’t care because she filled a space. I have since seen similar in other areas. PSHE is one of the worst with groups where no safeguarding experience and clear agendas are invited into schools to push their ideology and teaching them stuff which breaks the law and undermines safeguarding, and exposing children to age inappropriate material. There needs to be much much more control over who has access to children and materials used in schools.

Not an expert, just someone with experience of family members with autism and working with children with autism.... some have very rigid notions and think that their experience of the world is the one everyone sees. I've been told by another person with autism that my child couldn't do one thing because they couldn't for example. I'm fact DD is the exact opposite in that regard.

Basically, when you've met one person with autism, you've met one person with autism.

It’s really annoying, my relative can’t do any self care, needs support for everything. Needs 24-7 supervision, can’t read or write or even communicate very well. But people say “oh they must have a talent”

Yes normal state primary school in a deprived northern town.

Also occurred to me that the children with SEND and unmet needs are probably being included in the school readiness figures which is going to impact the accuracy of the figures cited.

How long has "school readiness" been measured in this way or is it relying on self reported teacher observation?

I also think there's been a real terms rise in severe developmental disabilities, in addition to the increased awareness, rate of diagnosis, visibility of disabled children in society etc.

Both my children were given developmental disability diagnoses in infancy and went to special schools straight away. You'd think it was exceededingly rare but even in our "mainstream" communities (mainstream nurseries, professional jobs) we have met lots of families in the same situation. There is definitely something going on as there was no way these children I am referring to could have been parented into this presentation of need.

There are more children surviving medically complex pregnancies, births (including prematurity) and infancies that would once have ended up as infant mortality statistics.

I grew up with a relative "brain damaged at birth" 60+ years ago. He had better access to appropriate SEN education and services than families do now. He grew up in the family home, was bussed to school and day centres then ended up in an excellent, homely residential setting. Their budgets in the 80s and 90s were much better than they've been in the last couple of decades and staffing was more reliable. The constant in/ outs of temporary agency staffing started in the 2000s.

Today, hopefully his birth would have gone better with better procedures to prevent the situation escalating, but also better postnatal care could potentially have reduced damage and improved his level of function closer to mainstream levels. There were residents in his home (often with Downs Syndrome) that probably would have ended up in mainstream schooling today.
It's all what-iffery though. Since my son was diagnosed autistic, it's also not impossible that that was in the equation. There were traits there but that's hard to separate in the face of significant LDs and Global Development Delay.

There are also more children being born to older parents (older father theory applies to autistic DS1), and maternal health in pregnancy is becoming more complex which can affects on childrens physical and developmental health.

Either way, the numbers are increasing and provision is declining.

Meanwhile there is a core of neglectful, passive parenting that results in children mimicking some traits of children with additional needs. My TA friend was regularly beaten up and attacked by a huge 6yo (deferred a year) that was wildly and aggressively out of control through parenting. He'd been assessed but not met any diagnostic criteria. That situation was diverting diagnostic process time and classroom support from children with SENs.

There is one specialist school in our area. It is relatively new but has less places than the school it replaced which was already oversubscribed. Yet twenty years ago the school it replaced was just one of at least four specialist schools - the others have all been closed, as have at least five specialist bases in schools. These provided specialist support for those with learning disabilities, dyslexia, autism, behavioural difficulties… (different schools/bases had different specialism). The specialist school remaining is for those with profound disability. Other children are put in mainstream and teachers expected to cope.

I disagree with the clambering for specialist schools because I spent my DD's 13 years of schooling fighting for mainstream. My dd was diagnosed with autism and dyspraxia at 2, non verbal until 4 and very very clever, she could read chapter books despite not being able to talk (we realised when she could talk at 4) her maths was secondary school level at age 5 yet the sen school her mainstream school wanted to ship her to had kids rocking and no significant academic learning. What my dd needed was a quiet organised classroom ideally in rows and highly academic, the noise from the unruly students in her mainstream school upset her and she would need to leave the room. Every year or two the school would try to offload her but every option had no academic rigour, the suggestion when she was 13 was a unit where no child had sat GCSEs, she ended up with 6 a stars, 6 A's and a B by staying in mainstream but having a bespoke arrangement (desk at the back of the school office). Sen provision is not right for highly academic students they need to be in mainstream with modifications

It Is not that specialist provision was wrong for your child, but rather the tyoe of specialist provision offered. A desk at the back of the school office is not inclusion in mainstream. specialist provision should include schools for academically able children who cannot cope with the mainstream environment. There are schools like this but also private schools often fill that niche - in England an EHCP can get a council funded mainstream private school place.

Yes - I know many schools have started to have “units” so mobile classrooms with designated SEND provision, these are often autism units. Which is also unhelpful. My relative for example, wasn’t diagnosed with autism until he was 9. I asked at the time why he needed another label and was told because more support opens up to him. He is/was the same child with the same needs, but the diagnosis meant he could now access respite for children with autism, which he couldn’t before. My point being, that children with obvious and challenging SEND can be excluded from these units on the basis they aren’t autistic like autism is the one and only SEND diagnosis.

@BogRollBOGOF exactly. It’s rarely I see this point acknowledged, IVF, higher maternal ages, better care in pregnancy and neo-natals. The consequence is children that wouldn’t have survived in previous generations (probably failure to thrive) are now surviving and so there are a greater range and demand for children with additional needs.

My point being, that children with obvious and challenging SEND can be excluded from these units on the basis they aren’t autistic like autism is the one and only SEND diagnosis.

This is one of the central issues with send and "inclusion."

Many children do not have a diagnosis of anything specific, due to the diagnostic criteria, and yet the approaches designed for those with autism are what they need.

But you are right, they are therefore excluded from provision they need.

When the diagnostic criteria expand, they're included. Hence diagnostic rates go up.

But the opposite argument is that mainstream educational approaches and curriculums are increasingly excluding wide ranges of children who are now being seen as "having send" because school expectations are too challenging for them as individuals.

Had a chat with DH yesterday about the going to the park aspect of this. We both brought kids up in the 90s/00s. I wasn't a park goer there wasn't actually any nice ones to go to. So we both concluded parks weren't something we both did with the kids. We went to play areas indoors and sometimes to pubs with play areas outside.

Nice parks started to be built on housing developments and in our city we now have a good park fenced off play area but it gets packed and isn't always smelling nice! The old weed whiff that's everywhere these days. Dogs off leads are an absolute pain in parks.
Some better kept parks about now but in some areas there still aren't any. I think it's a bit hit and miss to take kids to the park and have a good experience!
Ironically our good city park the council workmen park up in the car park and leave their diesel engine pumping it's pollutants into the air on their hour long tea breaks and two hour lunch sessions. Not great either.

Yes this is exactly what send schools have been experiencing for the last decade.

Children who would have gone to a setting for severely learning difficulties are coming to my setting. Those who would have been with us are in mainstream.

It's having an impact on what we can provide as our setting wasn't set up for these children.

I've posted this article many times on mn; from two years ago.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-64418797

mitogoshigg yes I fully agree with what you're saying for your daughter, based on your description of her. Send schools aren't for every child with send.

There's a huge amount of flexibility and individuality within inclusion. It's not a blanket approach.

Plus first-cousin marriages.

Excellent points also TickingAlongNicely and NewYearStillFat

Many children with learning difficulties also have autism and ADHD.

Many children without learning difficulties have autism and adhd.

Yes, I work across schools, this is not a shock.

School readiness is about all children though, a general decline in expectation of children in their usual development. Communication and language, creativity, learning and social behaviours, self help including toileting.

The decline is apparent in my 30 years in education.

One piece of evidence/ data that Adam Grant uses early on in his book i mentioned upthread was research on the experience of a kindergarten teacher and the pupils' earnings as adults.

The pupils with more experienced kindergarten teachers had measurably better earnings/ careers as adults.

Link here:

www.povertyactionlab.org/evaluation/effects-kindergarten-classroom-earnings-united-states

Abstract:

The long-term impacts of early childhood education can be difficult to study given the scarcity of data linking a child’s education to his or her outcomes as an adult. Researchers measured the effect of class size, teacher quality, and classroom quality on earnings and other future outcomes for children participating in the Student/Teacher Achievement Ratio (STAR) project in Tennessee. The study found that smaller class sizes raised college attendance, more experienced teachers increased future earnings of their students, and higher quality classrooms improved both college attendance and future earnings. Researchers found that the positive effects of early childhood education on test scores diminish over time, but positive effects on non-cognitive outcomes persist through adulthood.

(My bold.)

The U.K. has some of the largest class sizes in the world by the way.