To not understand why people go on about the impact of Covid lockdown on children

[PrunellaModularis]

It comes up all the time on MN and I don't get it.

They had several months off school, couldn"t see their friends or grandparents or do clubs. Then lockdown ended, back to school, friends, grandparents and clubs.

How come people say "because Covid" to explain young people's behaviour.

Disclaimer: I'm not talking abouy kids in abusive families.

Ignore poll - don't know how to disable it!

So she was 80 in 2020 and died last year in 2025 aged 25 from cancer.

How is that related to cancer, that isolating and immobilty caused it?

No I am not.
I'm pointing out the obvious.
People don't seem to want to hear that.

Older teens were affected enormously. Apart from disruption to teaching, which varied from school to school. GCSEs and A levels cancelled with schools able to give results in a way of their choosing and directly tied to previous cohorts success, which in reality varied A LOT school to school. And young adults having university completely disrupted, it was academically and socially impossible for many.

Even a couple of years later exams were being ‘tweaked’ to try and even out results, which again varied A LOT giving one year of relatively reasonable exams and the next year, back to ‘normal’ but with anecdotally much higher % for grades than teachers had ever seen (for kids who’d had their GCSEs, yr 11 & 12 effected I might add)

So if you think they should all just get on with it and it not effect them as people, their learning, their academic outcome or their future you are in cloud cuckoo land.

Slight hijack of the subject- if you feel that Covid lockdown isolation seriously affected your life. Please consider volunteering with charities who visit elderly people at home.
There are millions of old people who have no social interaction, cannot leave the house, no visitors or phone calls. This is and may have been their life for a long time !
Their situation is nothing to do with Covid but their isolation is permanent. Age concern are a good charity and many excellent small local befriending services exist too.

Do you think the first two years of a child’s life are utterly irrelevant? Children in Reception and Year 1 now were born 2019-2021 so literally their entire first years were disrupted. No baby classes, limited time outside experiencing the world, limited contact to build bonds with grandparents and extended family, fewer eyes on them to notice developmental issues etc.

My son was born in September 2021, so he’ll be in Reception this year. I’d say his birth month peers were the first babies born during Covid where his life and interactions weren’t totally affected by it. And even then, we were still wearing masks to baby classes, and children weren’t vaccinated so people were limiting their social activities.

First quote nails it. I have an only who was in Y6 and went weeks without seeing another child in the flesh. The impact of that was huge. When it was time to return to school she developed acute separation anxiety that still impacts her now.

Why pretend it was a few months ?

It was 2 years before schools functioned normally. Around 30% of secondary education imo.

Which is totally different to the example of the child who has a year off sick then slots back in.

Usually the younger kids copy the older kids (good and bad). That stopped happening. In academics, socially, music, sport, formal exams... the role models/inspiration/expectations had gone. It was like starting again.

Some children were also fearful and anxious. Imo a lot of this has been encouraged/fed.

Its a forum, people post and people respond.
Thats how these things work

The same kids that were forced into online learning for several hours a day or longer. No surprise they are spending more time on screens than previous generations. I'd say it's a direct correlation.

For what it's worth I was in high school during 2000's and we all had phones, everyone went home to MSN chat on their computers and lots of us also spent time gaming.

I know kids with long covid. That has been devastating. Hopefully in a few years people will stop blaming all kids behaviour on covid. It accounts for some of it now but only a few years to go and they’ll be no kids who remember it.

The results were wide ranging and in many cases have only become.more apparent over time. My children had a super time in lockdown but various things have been problematic since that have been heavily influenced by the halting of normal life. One missed key years when he would normally have been socialising and building relationships with peers. The gap meant he missed a safe opportunity to do so, then the next stage was a bit of a trauma because it wasn't gradual enough for him. Two of my children were at an age.when normally they would have been getting into various sports/clubs. They missed a couple of years and so it has been very difficult to get them back into those habits. When they were in school, the pace and rigor were reduced because teachers were accommodating children who had a less happy/productive lockdown. For one of mine, the maths gaps have persisted to his day. We have bridged the gap with a maths tutor, but not everyone is in a position to do that. Some children were able to brush off these things, but one of mine is neurodiverse so it hasn't been as easy for him. I could go on, but I feel.that you are possibly being a little disingenuous to not be able to see aome of these things independently.

That's amazing! Well done to her.

Taking shots at other mums is exactly what you’re doing by questioning why our DC didn’t leap back into their normal routine like yours did. Yours was a teen, those who had younger DC had a different experience.

But way to go, giving other women a good kicking on Mother’s Day. 🙄

We had a year 10 and also younger children

The year 10 could socialise with her friends on her phone throughout the lockdowns

We tried this with younger children but they didn't want to chat to their friends they wanted to play

The year 10 had online school when the others never did.

The year 10 went back to school far sooner than then others.

My older DD was ok but younger was sent home from school in her GCSE year, taught by zoom for months, never took a single exam, got a load of weird predicted grades which ruined all her 6th form options and then had to repeat all that over again with no A level exams. She went from being a child who loved school to a depressed, aimless, socially isolated young adult. It wasn’t a couple of months for her, it ended up being 2 years

Schooling, friendships & even ballet classes were conducted on screens. Plus trying to occupy them while you worked. Without Covid my dd who was 6y at the time would not have had that early introduction to anything other than TV. And now we complain that the kids are addicted to screens & social media.

It’s used by a lot of parents as an excuse for their woeful parenting and their children’s exposure to screens.

There was a negative Covid effect for sure, and it had a far greater impact on those that were already disadvantaged, but instead of trying to remedy it whole swathes of the population have been excused of bad behaviour “because Covid”.

It's a good idea.

The WRVS run a Home Library Service which I volunteered with for a year and they take books and other media to those housebound through disabilities as well as age.

Incidentally one of my elderly clients specified (in the 21st century) "nothing about the world wars - I lived through it and don't want to read about it."

I don’t know if anyone cares but the 2004 born children NEVER SAT A SINGLE EXAM FOR EITHER GCSE OR A LEVEL.

This means they missed a huge fundamental part of their education of 2 ENTIRE YEARS

Months off school or nursery, returning but having to distance from friends, overhearing parents having worried conversations, watching or reading the news and not understanding what it was all about, seeing family and friends through a window or on a screen, attending lessons virtually whist your parents are trying to adjust to working at home and look after you - whilst they are stressed and worried. Family members dying and you not saying goodbye or attending their funeral. It’s had a huge impact on me as a 40 yr old woman. Can you not see that it might have impacted young children at a greater level? The prime time of learning, communicating, socialising etc etc.

I think there was almost an attitude of "we can just do everything over zoom" and it didn't work for everyone. My toddler group tried going on zoom and while it was nice to see familiar faces it was too much stress managing a screen, a lively toddler and a breastfeeding baby with just two hands. It was something that was given up very quickly. We also tried a virtual birthday party for my then 2 year old and I decided never again.

Covid didn't break the model that school attendance matters, it is feckless thick lazy parents that are to blame. If they cannot see the benefits of an education then more the fool them.

Shit. All those millions spent on a Covid enquiry when we should have just asked some blokes from radio 4.

Re traumatic events, prison camp survivors, there's lots of research around this and it takes at least two generations for behaviour to go back to normal. That doesn't mean that there isn't still MH/emotional issues happening. Generational trauma is real. We all stopped our lives (I didn't so much) because we thought that there was a killer virus. We accepted no GP appointments (which never fully returned), no education, no visiting etc. It might have not been as bad as it could have been, but many thought it was and that's going to leave a aftermath.

I agree the school was awful, a lot of the teachers were terrified and didn't handle it well but this was the reality for a lot of kids.

When we talk about 'covid times' we are all talking about our own experiences. OP is deluded to think that it won't have a lasting impact on that generation. A agree with the similar PP has drawn with UK war time children. That trauma lasted a lifetime.

My own DC have bounced back well but many haven't. It isn't fair to dismiss their trauma. They went through something huge. My oldest now has a part time job around college and trains up kids his age, they often won't speak to customers, they're scared to take any initiative and he has to encourage them so much to be achieved even basic levels of customer service. Pretending that covid restrictions didn't damage their generation benefits noone, we might as well acknowledge it and try to support them.