Should my child have learnt what I refer to as essential life skills at school?

[SunriseSunsetFullMoon]

like resilience and emotional intelligence?
Situations that arise out in the public domain (educational establishments) that lead to confrontation or bullying or disappointment - is it all my responsibility as a parent to solely educate my child, or should the schools be doing it in the classes?
Some educators see what's happening and appear to choose to ignore the situation, and missing an opportunity to teach better behavior as well as incurring the consequences of ones actions. Or is that just to hard a job for them? And if it is - why?

AIBU to expect immediate consequences for behavior that creates fear or annoyance in others?

Has your child learnt how to critically think through situations - not to rebel, but be responsible and making informed choices. I can only do so much from my point of reference - surely the education system has more to offer than what I can see and have experienced with my child.

Would be interested in your thoughts and experiences.

As teachers kids only really listen to our message if parents back it up at home. If I am telling a 6ft year 11 boy that it is upsetting to be called a cunt and his alcoholic father is ringing the school telling us that there's no way he agrees to his son having a detention then it doesn't work, the boy learns nothing about respect.

Or if I suggest to a delicate y8 girl that it's ok to go to French and that her teacher isn't picking on her when she asks questions, she is just trying to do her job but her parent is always on the phone demanding she has a reduced timetable because of her mental health...then my gentle encouragement won't help this child step out of her comfort zone and overcome her fears.

Or if when I talk to my tutee with adhd about how it's not really the being distracted or calling out that's the issue it's the rudeness and answering back a teacher reminds them to try not to which is actually disrupting the lesson but their parents just say oh it's their adhd with no acknowledgment that there is also a huge degree of disrespect going on in some lessons. That child just heard I can do what I want and it's not my fault.

A lot of parents are sadly lacking all these skills themselves, so it's lucky that teachers do teach them.

Schools really are trying their best but with the amount of content that the curriculum demands, there is little time for much else! We're trying to cram in as much fun & enrichment as possible but there's so little 'free' time to do it - we already have to deal with children not being toilet trained, unable to dress themselves, tie shoelaces, use cutlery, etc etc - the list of things that are becoming a school expectation instead of a parental responsibility is growing by the day! 🤦‍♀️

I work in yr6 & the amount of children we have, every year, who can't tie laces, tell the time or eat with anything other than their hands or just a fork, is truly staggering!!

And, maybe most importantly, everything the school does, needs to be supported & supplemented by the parents at home.....which, in a LOT of cases, it simply isn't.

Those responsible for pastoral care - do you have time to follow up on the children who don't speak up or seem to not have "issues" because they don't show or voice them? With there being so many kids in a class is there time? It's a genuine question - not an accusatory one.

Honestly, I am 100% on the side that there is too much expected of an education system when it comes to parenting responsibilities. I feel that there is a significant portion of the current generation who have children now in primary school who have abdicated their parenting responsibilities and expect the education facilities and government to take this on - and I think its totally wrong and is leading to a degradation of society. In addition to that there is the lack of community that singular lives have now become the norm.

My OP referred to "I can only do so much from my point of reference" a situation/scenario/picture has a 360 degree view - I am not able to see all aspects, which is why I made the comment "surely the education system has more to offer than what I can see and have experienced".

So yes I do care - but I don't know, I spend my time working hard for a living and in the view of my personal growth and that of my child's - I shall explore the pastoral care further. Thank you

You have plenty of tie with your child @SunriseSunsetFullMoon - any gaps you feel are essential life skills for your child that their school doesn’t cover is for you and the other parent to teach. It’s called parenting.

And if you do it you know it’s been done correctly to your standards and you can give your child bespoke individual tuition.

So get on with it and stop expecting school to teach your child everything you think they should.

Our children (now teens) have learnt “essential life skills” up to their age by experience in school and advice, guidance, love and oh my lord much patience from us.

Did you get taught how to deal with anti-social behaviour when you were 14? I didn’t

What helps at that age in school is having a group of solid, got your back friends, you can tell bullies and arsehole kids to fuck right off then.

Schools cover quite a lot actually but you need to parent as well the shock the horror!

Can teachers make schools the perfect environment for your child? God no
Can schools make kids like other kids? God no

And sometimes yes, for some situations, for your child at school you are on your own. So you step up as a parent because what other choice do you have?

The kids bring to school learned behaviour - which is really tough on the teachers. I would assume the kids start to get confused when they are told one thing at school and get a different / conflicting one from home. Thank you for sharing what you deal with and I hope you have the energy to keep educating the kids a more positive enlightening way of seeing and behaving.

Hear hear.

I taught my three children all that.

It's very difficult to teach these skills to children when their parents run into school at the least little negative comment or disappointment their child experiences. I could look through this site and provide you with 100 examples.

On a 5 period day, I see 150 children, plus 2 x form times, another 30 children, managing behaviour in the corridors in between classes or as I’m walking to briefings/the canteen/the photocopy room. Obviously I model behaviour I expect from the children, but I absolutely think parents are at the forefront of teaching resilience, good behaviour, implementing sanctions if something goes wrong with their child’s behaviour.

Do you have any thoughts on why the children are coming to school without those initial "fundamental" abilities?

Should school's insist that they won't take on a child if the parent hasn't completed their foundational input into a child's upbringing?

I only ask, because I had to do that before I entered school. If the entry to school is set - then does that not put the onus back onto the parent to do just that parent? and then you have a class that is now at a similar ability for teaching further.

No this is a parents job.
What's really frustrating (as a teacher) is we see a lot of parents now that can see their children have no resilience, and complain to us.
Whenever a change happens in my classroom (think a substitute teacher for the day or an assembly on a different day ect) I have parents that will pull me and say "but you know XX won't cope with change"
Sometimes they use the word can't instead of won't.

Really frustrating that these parents are speaking that over their children. So I gently correct. "XX isn't coping well with change yet". We then discuss how we can support that child to take small steps to building some resilience.
It doesn't matter how small the steps are. A parent who works to build resilience in steps is completely different to a parent who tells everybody the child just won't cope, and then (usually) later blames the school when they don't have the correct skills.

Parents (me included, this is huge in my home) need to be building these skills from the get go.

Off on a slight tangent but these skills are often stolen from children from an early age by plugging them straight into screens at the wrong times or places.

Im not a perfect parent by any means, but my children understand that by not having screens in the car/at the dinner table/waiting rooms ect helps them to build resilience and social skills for other times they are going to be bored and waiting.

I think parents should think about the culture we build within our home and how that makes life easier for our children as they grow.
I'd rather my children found life less challenging because they had a foundation of solid skills, than they had no resilience or general life skills and found everything overwhelming. We need to be supporting children to build these skills from the early years.

Should school's insist that they won't take on a child if the parent hasn't completed their foundational input into a child's upbringing

Schools can insist on very little these days. I think smart phones and instant gratification have a lot to answer for. You only have to look at the number of toddlers plonked in a high chair or buggy with a screen, and I regularly hear parents using highly inappropriate language and insults to discipline their children in public. Personally I think a parent shouting "stop being a little shit" to one sibling hitting another sibling has done very little to rectify that child's behaviour, they've just taught that child that they are a little shit, so they might as well act like one and that it's ok to call people names. For every great parent out there trying to so a good job is another one doing a really shit job, and they exist in an echo chamber of tik tok posts telling them it's fine to let their kids game all night and that kids need to learn to deal with the Internet so why filter it etc. I'm ranting now but honestly, as a teacher the things I see and hear about kids homelives are astonishing.

Parents need to start parenting.

I think this kind of stuff comes through life experience rather than being taught. Some people learn early, others never seem to.

Is this because parents are too involved in screens, and don't have interaction time with their kids to teach them and model this behaviour?

Interesting idea but that will NEVER happen. In my experience, most decent UK Primary Schools are doing an amazing job, desperately trying to be all things to all children, with no budget, limited resources, too few people, no time & minimal parental support - all against the backdrop of an ever changing, demanding, unrealistic educational system.

I often wonder if in Sex Education at School if there is a section that covers the consequences - obviously (to most at least) that the possible result of having a child would need to be cared for in ALL aspects of life and that is is a HUGE financial obligation, life commitment and parenting responsibility, that when you become the parent, you become that child's fundamental teacher - but no-one really has a one-size fits all Parenting Manual that covers every aspect of life's skills that's best for the success of a harmonious community.

That is what parents are for, i would say schools are there to educate

Anything else teachers need to do? Ridiculous.

They should have learned these at home.

Critical thinking is not just about academics - forgive me if I have misunderstood you - the dimensions of critical thinking - knowledge - the elements of reasoning - the critical thinking standards - the critical thinking traits of mind and the barriers that undermine our thinking - thoughts, desires, emotions and actions are crucial to our resulting behaviours and those our children learn from us, as well as advancing greater mental health.

The reality is that parents and home life will always have massively more impact on a child than the school. If parents don’t engage, the child will struggle, no matter how great the school. If parents do a decent job, the child will be fine in almost any school.

It’s not just screens affecting children, it’s also the diet of UPF.

I think it’s mostly a parents job.

Do you know that they’re NOT doing it in schools though? A lot of the PHSE in my school now is around building resilience, emotional intelligence and the power of yet.

Life is confusing - in the food industry we are told butter is really good for us, then the next moment its margarine that is good for us - then in pharma - they have their stories - it all depends who has the money to promote it.

in anything new - it gets put out and tested, and its only in the testing do we see the results. Testing takes time - Tech has now had time to see the effects - and the effect is that society is changing in so many ways! The question is whether it can be controlled better and whether the effect can be reversed.

I am seeing lots of examples where smart phones are being removed from scenarios for periods of time and the positive effect it is having on people.

Like anything its about control, choices and responsibility.