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.

Yup, I see this too.

But I would also say, the people I know who bucked that and started early had a lot less grief.

But they needed to be able to pay close attention consistently so they caught kids before they went, and they almost all used no diapers during the training time except to sleep. Nurseries in general aren't up for that.

Any given data field from this research is never going to give you a reliable % value, given the methodology (although news media in search of a headline will try to suggest that it can).

The value lies in the fact that it's a consistent survey, carried out on a large number of teachers over several years. It won't tell you what proportion of reception children aren't toilet trained. It certainly won't tell you how many are in nappies. It should tell you whether the number of reception children who aren't toilet trained is increasing, decreasing or stable, and a rough guide to speed of change.

I agree about low expectations, but I'm not sure what the cause is.
I have pondered that it might be smaller families. I know with my younger kids, I had them doing more things, and taking more responsibility, earlier, I was less inclined to baby them.

Many people don't have much experience of young kids and our society doesn't let children do much compared to many others.

Sorry should have read 'they'll be parents who don't work'

I think the sense of pride that my mum had at potty training, children being able to speak well, use good manners etc has gone. I'm
Pleased that we don't have the same pressure on parents but it's gone to no pressure.

Don't want to toilet train my child as they'll scream/ we'll have to stay in a lot etc
Send them to school in nappies.

Don't want to chat to my children?
Give them a screen

Don't want to have them dislike me?
Give in so they can't socialise

I'm exaggerating but you get the idea

It’s not acceptable to send your child to school in nappies, unless they have special needs.
I agree that a lot of people think someone else will parent their child.
I’ve often wondered why some people have children.
The world would be a better place if many people stopped reproducing.

There's enormous pressure but it's all going in the wrong directions.

A Montessori bedroom in shades of beige and oatmeal full of organic wooden toys.
A Valentine's Day breakfast spread with heart-shaped pancakes and gift bags for every classmate.
An Easter basket the size of a small planet filled with chick and bunny themed tat.
Hundreds of Instagram posts showing spotless grey-and-white homes and endless "making of memories" which seems to revolve mostly around buying lots of stuff.

We just don’t know though do we.

It’s too early for real evidence and research done on health.

I mean we were once told that smoking wasn’t a problem and even that secondhand smoke wasn’t for our kids.

Anyway, what about the rest of my post? Any thoughts?

But your daughter would learn all those things more accurately and effectively and pick up other skills at the same time if

• An adult played phonics and maths games with her

• she watched TV on a screen that other people could see at the same time so there could be conversation about what is being watched

• she didn’t learn to expect every phone call to be a visible one and learned the important things and the etiquette around making calls rather than just being able to touch a picture of granny and have her appear.

• had an interactive experience taking pictures of someone else and having someone else take them of her

• had someone read books and meditations

• schools stick to giving out real books that are chosen by a real person with knowledge of the child rather than what comes next on an assigned scheme.

I’m not trying to be critical and I know that my own dc would probably spend too much time on a tablet if they were younger, but there is nothing positive in what you have described.

All those tablet activities are just poor replacements for things that children were already doing with their parents before tablets came along.

Of course children need to learn about technology, but technology includes real phones and real cameras. When one year olds can master using an iPhone, I think we can be confident that using a tablet isn’t a skill that needs an entire childhood. Unlike language development, social skills, emotional regulation etc.

My DD was daytime potty trained just after her first birthday, mostly on her own. She saw some silky panties with ruffles on the butt that she wanted desperately and she potty trained herself so she could wear them.

That’s actually adorable

There's only so much nurseries can do. And a lot of children don't come full time anymore due to cost, parents share days off/longer work days, grandparents help etc.

Sometimes you work your ass off potty training for three days, then they go home for the weekend and are put into a nappy.

Similarly, there's only so much communication work or physical development you can do, when a three/four year old is picked up, a dummy rammed in their mouth, fastened in a pushchair and a screen rammed in their hand.

This

there is so many reasons other than Sen that would be apart of that statistic to.

2 of mine were not potty trained on time with no SEN needs
although 1 didn’t have Sen needs they has considerable health issues that meant they were late in being able to control their bladder and bowels

2nd their dad died just as they were starting to potty train which also lead to a move in house and a whole different life - started reception needing support but we managed to after things settled down for them to potty train with in a few months of starting.

@CarolinaWren I hope this is true that's adorable 🥰

@Happysack I wasn't suggesting that it was state school parents, I was saying that schools are currently a mess and this is the system that Labour want to push MORE kids into.

If kids aren't potty trained / can't read, you don't think they demand even more than already stretched teachers can provide?

Teachers are now basically parenting in addition to teaching

It's funny that on this page alone we have posters talking about diapers and panties. Maybe children are learning Americanisms from their parents rather than YouTube.

You appear to have a lot of judgemental opinions about UC.

FYI, you only have no work related commitments on UC until a child is one year old and are expected to be working by the time they are three. There's only so many children a person can "churn out" before they reach their time limit. Also, you only get paid for 2 children if they are born after 2017 so anyone having them now would also be limited in that sense. But let's just continue spouting nonsense about people who claim benefits. Next you'll be talking about huge TVs and spending all the dole money on drugs and alcohol 🙄

I refute your suggestion that schools are currently a mess. Some are, most aren’t. Of the 5 or 6 primaries in my area of London, all are outstanding apart from 2 which are good.

You tried to shoehorn VAT on school fees into a thread about neglectful parenting.

Labour aren’t trying to push kids anywhere - they are simply removing a tax dodge that a tiny minority of parents have benefited from for too long.

Throwing money at parents how?

Also, parents can work and receive the funded hours from 2 years old. There is just a limit to the amount of earned income a household can receive and still qualify for the hours. Also, if circumstances change at any point after the funded hours have been approved, the funding remains in place. So a parent could actually increase their hours or go back to work if they haven't been employed and earn above the income limit and still receive the funded hours for their 2 year old.

I really agree with this! I’ve seen so many toddlers in buggy’s with phones / tablets strapped to the front! Same in restaurants. I think everything in the world is going down hill but that’s another thread!

Extra benefits as the 2 child cap has been lifted which is estimated as going to be costing a huge sums of money every year in Scotland. Whilst I don't disagree with supporting families I think the money could have been better utilised for support services as these have been decimated by cuts.

I don't know what the criteria is in other parts of the country for 2 year funding but the criteria is very low income parents "maybe" eligible. The only people that I know that get the 2 year funding are those that don't work or have drug of alcohol addictions.

It's more done in Scotland for closing the attainment gap which is theory is fine but in reality means working parents are penalised again.

The 3 year funding is much easier to get and open to everyone. I couldn't afford to work until we got the 3 year funding as we didn't qualify for 2 year funding but my wages didn't cover childcare either as I had 3 kids under 7 at one point.

That can be an autistic trait.

I didn't know the 2 child benefit limit had been lifted. I know it had been spoken about but didn't realise it had been confirmed as going ahead. I wasn't sure how they could implement that with UC as that's supposed to be the same across the whole of the UK. Are they scrapping UC in Scotland and replacing it with something else which has no limit on the amount of children people can claim for? Although I don't really think the amount of benefits given are linked to children having delays in essential ife skills really. I don't think the government give people benefits to try and tackle those kinds of issues? I don't see the connection really.

As for the 2 year old funding, again I was under the impression it was across the whole country and every council I've looked at has the same criteria for qualifying for it. It can be a household income up to a certain amount (so ot just for unemployed) or other factors such as being an asylum seeker, child in care etc would also mean qualifying for the hours. I have 4 children under 6 so believe me I've looked into it all 😂

I wouldn't rely on ofsted ratings to know the schools are doing well. Ofsted outstanding are only rated every 5-6 years and lots can change in that time.

My daughters outstanding infants school, had 20% of the children joining reception still in nappies. My daughters year 1 class used to have 2 TA's and there was rapid progress, now their 2 TA's are spending most of their time helping out with nappies and behaviour challenges in reception, to the point my husband was called into school last week to support with an activity usually done by a class TA, or my daughter would have been unable to participate.

Agree. COVID is a red herring. It's parents and children both being on screens that is causing this. Along with breakdowns in mental health, attention span, behaviour, resilience, physical health and fitness.