To wonder what’s so bad about school?

[graygoose]

This is from a Mollie Mae post that popped up on my feed (not a follower but she pops up) saying they were viewing schools for her daughter and she was concerned about how strict it seemed and she didn’t want school to crush her spirit. And that she’s considering home schooling. Almost all the comments agreed that they are worried school will crush their child’s spirit and are anxious about their kids starting school and advocating in favour of home schooling.

Now, we all know the algorithm creates somewhat of an echo chamber but I was surprised at the sheer number of parents who are so anti-school (not education but anti-bricks and mortar schools if that makes sense). I’m genuinely curious if this is an increasingly prevailing view? If you feel this way, could you elaborate?

My DD is a toddler so obviously not in school yet!

Unfortunatley, schools are more about "bums on seats" and attendance stats than about the child. So much focus is placed on performance and rules, and there isn't enough care for a child's mental health and well-being. Plus, way too much pressure is put upon our children from such a young age, and it’s so sad.
Oh, how excited I was to see my eldest child start school, followed by the others one by one. But my goodness, I didn’t realise the years and years of struggles we would encounter in the process especially once we got to secondary school.
After everything we’ve been through, I can completely understand why so many parents are now looking at other options for their child’s education.

Lots of schools these days are like prison camps and conformity is king rather than individuality. This is especially true of the awful Harris Academy schools but lots of others are very similar.

Some people love them because they erroneously equate ‘strict’ with ‘good’ but in general they are looking to create drones.

I'm a primary school supply teacher. I don't have children. If I did though I would not send them to any of the schools I work in - and I work in a wide variety of schools, rural and urban, inner city and leafy village, inadequate and outstanding, well resourced and struggling.

Teachers are stressed, other staff are stressed, the curriculum isn't fit for modern life. The high achievers aren't stretched, SEN children struggle. Behaviour is almost universally a problem. Not enough creativity, sport, art, drama. Too much testing and one size that doesn't fill all.

The kids are the ones who end up paying the price.

Secondary teacher here. The transition is rough. The children have to sit down, stay in one place, have multiple teachers a day, listen and write a lot, not shout out whatever comes into their heads, go to the toilet at set times, do homework, etc.

I think for the majority (not everyone) whose parents have a disciplined work ethic and environment, it's fine. For others, in busy households or whose homes aren't hugely routine / predictable, it's a real struggle.

At Y7 parents evening I can guess which parent belongs to which child based on that child's behaviour or struggles to integrate at school.

I loved motherhood up until my child started school. I have been worrying ever since. My child learned important values and behaviours at home, only to see other children who act in ways that are the complete opposite - lying, hurting others, and damaging things. He has been blamed by both teachers and other children for the tiniest things, who often don’t give him a chance to explain himself.

He dislikes the school toilets, which are always messy, and he doesn’t drink much water while he’s there. He began school meals with enthusiasm, but he hated them. Became quite a fussy eater suddenly. He has changed so much! Learning used to be a fun activity we did together, but now it’s seen as ‘uncool’ and something for ‘nerds’. He has been called ugly by other children and has a genuine, constant fear of some of the boys he meets everyday.

I don’t want to homeschool, but it feels like schools are far from being the best place for a child. They don’t prepare for the real world but they do shape it. The bullies go on to be bullies in the woke place, the bullied carry the scars all their lives.

@ProudCat hmmmm so DD comes from a stable home, bought up as you say… academically v strong averaging 70-80’s across the board. Zero detentions, zero demerits, is NT, 1 episode of sickness. She is year 8. In my DD secondary the kids like my DD who want to do well absolutely hate it. It’s the ones who have all the detentions, talk back are not doing so well academically all think the school is great… go figure. Pls don’t blame the parents for the kids in secondaries who are miserable. Most parents I know as well as most secondary teachers think the system is massively failing kids, especially at secondaries.

I disagree I think she’s really switched on and more business savvy than most her age.

I do hear her posting about their child’s behaviour often so maybe she’s worried she wouldn’t cope with the school rules and would be told off too much

My kids are teenagers now, and while I didn't home school and don't think I'd have been any good at it, I was very concerned at how conformist at lot of schools, especially secondary schools, seem to have become in the UK. We ended up moving to find a school we thought wasn't so draconian and narrow but still had decent academic results.

This is really sad, can he change schools?

Ask teachers why they hate school so much?
Huge recruitment crisis and loads quit within a few years of qualifying.

The vast majority of children go to school and do fine!
I've had the opportunity of working with dozens of home-educated children snd in nearly all case the parents are the root of their child's 'problem' with school.

I think a good primary school can do a lot to ease the transition to secondary. In years 5 and 6 my children have mostly been expected to stay in their seat and raise hands to ask or answer questions, asked to wait until break time to use the loo if they can, and swap teachers (between the year group's two class teachers) for different subjects.

It worked for our elder child, who made the jump to secondary well and now likes it there. I'm hoping it will work for the younger one too.

My kids don’t go to school, we home educate. I looked into sending them but pretty quickly decided I just didn’t want to. Massive class sizes, weird rules, narrow curriculum, loads of unmet needs, huge recruitment crisis and most teachers i know seem to hate it. If you are in the fortunate position to home educate I can see why most people would at least consider it.

I found looking at primary schools absolutely harrowing. Ultimately, you are entrusting your most precious person to these institutions. Not that I’d ever home school - strictly for loons.

The amount of stupid i see on social media has to be humans, AI bots would be smarter sadly.

I saw a whole 2min AI video of my town posted the other day with fake litter, flaking signs etc and over 400 "people" commenting about the state of the country and what Labour has done and immigration etc. It's bloody depressing how gullible some people are.