Recent study of children joining reception class

[Liveandletlive18]

A recent study by kindred2 of a 1000 teachers resulted in finding a quarter of children today joined reception class when still in nappies. Many children are unable to climb a staircase or sit properly on the floor due to lack of exercise & muscle tone. The children used expressions more common in America such as trash & vacation due to excessive screen time. Teachers stated covid is no longer an excuse. They say a lot of this is due to busy parents working & having less time to interact with children & teach them basic skills. Is this a worrying trend.

Anecdotally people have always told me the opposite in the run up to potty training - that girls pick up potty training easier and boys are more stubborn and that’s when the “wait until they are ready” is pushed.

This

My Mum and Dad both worked fulltime. My parents, mainly Mum, sat with me every school night to listen to me read my allocated library book and then they read me a night time story. I played in the garden with other kids, we built dens, climbed trees and played games. It brings your imagination on leaps and bounds and teaches social skills. You had arguments with your mates and you got over it, forgotten in two minutes, not repeated and expanded upon in social media.

There were still school bullies but once you were home, you were generally safe. Now they can reach you in the privacy of your own home. Arguments/disagreements are commented upon by anyone and a dog and kids are just not equipped to deal with it. Just look at the variety of comments on this subject alone on Mumsnet

I went to my mates for tea and she came to mine. We were taught to respect the invitation and to eat what ever was put in front of use and thank the host for the food, even if we hated it.

For Birthdays my mum made a cake we had jelly, ice-cream, sandwiches and butterfly buns. We only invited 10 max and it was who you wanted to come, not the whole class. We played pass the parcel, sleeping lions etc. The gifts you took to parties were colouring books, packs of knickers or socks, maybe a jigsaw - nothing expensive.

School outings were to the woods, museums or farms and school trips away were generally camping of some type of kids camps. You got lots of exercise and so you slept well and ate anything that was put in front of you as you were ravenous.

Having said that, school dinners were proper meat and veg, with a pudding. We didn't get junk food. Well that is a slight lie as Friday lunch was always fish and chip day. When my Mum and Dad split, s Mum was working, she made sure we had a good school dinner and we had something like beans on toast for tea. My grandkids get burgers, fries and pizza's at school dinner. It doesn't give them thte nutrients they need and instills them with bad eating habits.

Not only were we taught to respect the school dinner ladies but also the teachers. One look from your teacher and you were quelled. We accepted their authority. Teachers are damned if they do and damned if they don't now. Its almost as if they have a semi parental role without the associated parental rights.

On the plus side, kids have more choice now, an ability to explore on the internet and form their own opinions with broader horizons but I do think we need to rediscover some of the family related ethics we used to hold strong on.

My original post pointed out that survey is statistically questionable as few than 4% of teachers in primary schools in England and Wales were interviewed... to be of value with a number concerning more than a 1000 you would be looking at at least three times the number that they interviewed. No one is doubting that a survey took place, what I am doubting is the validity of the survey... and I write this as a school governor with over 30 yrs service and a former Ofsted Inspector.

I have boys and both responded well to being trained but if I had waited till they showed readiness signs, they would have been at least 4

I am being thick or does this make no sense? How on earth can you know when they would have showed signs if you trained them before they did? I trained pretty early by the way, I am not disagreeing with your approach just don't understand your assumption here.

It's just guesswork really - I waited and waited with DS1 and ended up training at over 3 because I still hadn't seen any readiness signs and all my friends with girls the same age had been done for ages.

DS2, I just went for it at 2.

I am absolutely convinced that the majority of this is down to screen time.
Im not talking an hour or so a day in the home or watching films together as a family - I am talking about the number of small children I see out and about, at restaurants or being pushed around in their pushchairs or at other events with their noses buried in an iPad or phone.
I see young ones way passed their bedtime in pubs watching Peppa pig while their dad is drinking pints with his mates. Kids being taken to see older siblings at sports days whilst watching shite on their phone.
How do they learn to interact with others if they don’t ever see it being shown to them because they aren’t paying attention?
There was one child in that report who couldn’t even sit up straight as she had spent most of her life so far propped up on the sofa with a tablet.

Parents are so quick to blame Covid or time constraints but it’s bollocks.

Even if this is true, it does not follow that the report is totally inaccurate and can be completely discounted

It'll be the same slobby parents who take their kids out of school because holidays are more important than their kids education/prospects.

Fun fact: The campaign to "wait for readiness" came from Pampers marketing team. There's zero evidence behind it. Average potty training age has risen from 18 months to 3.5 years due to "waiting for readiness" and the absorbency of modern disposables.

I've got to say I havent noticed any of these behaviours in my child's school either (exceptions for kids with disabilities) he goes to a normal school I'm sure someone will slide into say I must live in an affluent area and if I lived in a poor area it would be different but I became a mum at 15 so according to many on here must be a complete peasant living in a shit hole.

Either way haven't noticed all these children still in nappies at school who can't climb stairs I do wonder if these studies are exaggerated tbh

Or they do know but it's physically difficult to tear yourself away - as you say it's an addiction. Almost every parent I know in my admittedly middle-class bubble makes at least some noises about a "screen-free childhood" but are often on their phones in front of kids.

It's a different problem from kids growing up in poverty and stuck in front of insta reels (at least a Peppa Pig episode has a plot, and lasts longer than 7 seconds, I assume?!) but I think phone addiction is something that affects all social classes.

I take my hat off to you. I know people cope and get on with it because they have to, but you’ve put an amazing amount of effort into raising your son and you should be so proud.

Do you have evidence to back up your claim or is this just your opinion?

Thank you so much. This means a lot to me actually.

It's really easy for people to look at us at a glance and think it's just a lack of effort.

Screen use by parents and screens for children.
Remove those and parental input would multiply 1000 fold and children would develop.

I'm one of those "slobby parents". Unfortunately, I can't afford a holiday outside of term time. We took a term time holiday to Butlins. It was £180 instead of £890.

My older primary child does phonic, English, and mathematics with a class 2 years older. My 4 year old can also read and write.

On school holidays they have homework every day. They have visited the Science Museum, Natural History Museum, Horniman Museum, London Museum, Transport Museum and the V&A. They go to the park. I do as many educational activities as I can afford to do, but even the cost of transport and pack lunches can become too expensive.

Average potty training age has risen from 18 months to 3.5

*AVERGE is now 3.5? Wow. My first son (nearly 26) was over 3 when he trained and that was really late and I was very conscious.

It's not a study, it's perception.

I wonder whether the fear of letting children outside (or the inability to let them outside in some cases) has a hand in late potty training? I live very rurally and our back garden led out into fields. When I started potty training (and I was very very fortunate in having kids who were all trained by 2) I could leave them without nappies, noodling about in the garden or in and out of the house. Nowadays I can imagine that parents wouldn't be too keen on their bare bummed babies playing outside (fear of paedophiles seems to have also increased massively since mine were small, but then our rural isolated location probably helped me lack this worry too). But I found it helped mine to train, as long as the weather was warm enough; no nappy, bare bottom and potty within easy reach.

I know because the teacher has a habit of coming out to talk to parents about potty training and she has a very loud voice that is impossible not to hear. I know one of the parents and her daughter doesn't have additional needs she just can't get her to use the toilet. I know one of the others has suspected autism and as far as I'm aware the other two don't have any additional needs.

It's got much later in the last 15 years or so. I worked in a private nursery 20 years ago (and stayed there for 6 years, so 14 years ago) and it was extremely unusual for a 3 year old to not be potty trained (excluding additional needs) I think I can only remember maybe 3 or 4 kids over the whole 6 years not being trained by 3. It does make you wonder.

When I was potty training my DD shortly after she turned 2, several people said to me that I should just wait until she did it herself, and even suggested that using star charts/ sticker rewards was emotionally damaging to her development. In "gentle parenting" circles you will frequently hear people saying that "forcing" potty training too young will result in your child having bowel/bladder issues for life.

I've said it on here before, but when my children were small (they are now between 28-36), they were not ALLOWED to start at Playgroup, which was normally attended from the age of 3 until school start, until they were out of nappies. My friend, whose son has autism, couldn't start him until he was 3.5 because he was slow to potty train, as they simply wouldn't let him attend in nappies.

It provoked many who might otherwise have delayed, into getting their child toilet trained.

Perception of the small number of teachers asked? I just don't know, you can Google articles from 20 years ago where they claim a record number of children aren't potty trained at school there seems to be an article saying the same thing every year. Outrage over children picking up American accents has been going on since Hollywood first started releasing films.
It just feels like outrage bait at this point.

I grew up in the eighties. My mum was adamant I was potty trained before 1 !! But she was a sahp, I probably spent a lot of time on the potty.

I had two dc early noughties both in disposables and both fully toilet trained around 2/2.5. I worked part time and dc went to mils house when I was at work so lots of 1:1 time to work on it.

I can't imagine nurseries/childminders having the time to train and if parents work all week then it must be hard so makes sense to wait until they are 3+ so it's a quicker process .