School as child care

[Differentforgirls]

From another thread.

A poster said that state schools are there for helping parents to work. Therefore teachers are childminders. Teachers!

I think schools are there to educate our children and, though the staff go above and beyond these days, that is their primary function.

AIBU?

i think their main purpose isn’t to hep parents work, but schools help parents be able to work. It gives you approx 6 hours a day for free that you don’t have to care for your child (at least in term time).

Well yes they are there to educate, but they are also in loco parentis and have a duty of care. So they do carry out some of the duties a childminder would.

The way the government is going they want all children to live in schools 8am to 6pm every day, and spend most of the holidays there too. They'll have them staying overnight next...

I don’t think schools were created to give parents free time. That’s my point. They were created to teach children the basics when they’re small. Reading, writing and arithmetic. The things that they need to know.

YANBU. Parents need to parent their own children and only see school as a place of teaching.

I honestly think your view of education is appalling.

Thank you!

I know you say this negatively, but if school hours replicated nursery hours I could work more, earn more and give us a better life.

Sound. I'm impressed you managed to get a thorough idea of my "view of education" from the two sentences I posted. Top marks to you!

Not probably provided by teachers , but before and after school care and holiday care would be warmly welcomed by working parents

They are teachers and the reason for school is learning. But school is also childcare

Years ago, we were building new schools under the awful PFI initiative. The parents demands were off the scale. It got to the stage we were thinking that the thing we missed were beds.

School is to educate the masses, so it's not just the privileged few who get to learn to read and write, and therefore control the world.

I wonder whether, if universal education hadn't been invented, modern governments would risk it. Keep 'em thick and pliable, or educated and questioning.

Our school looks after ours 7.30-6 on weekdays. They provide an excellent education, extra curricular activities, as well as some childcare provision. It allows us to work full time to pay for the education, so I guess I’d say a bit of both. If school shut then I would need to find alternative childcare provision.

No it isn’t and it should be never be viewed as such imo.

Of course they are childcare, it’s right there in the word, they ‘Care for Children’. They educate and the primary purpose is to ensure a consistent level of education is made available to all children to an agreed curriculum, but during the school hours they care for the children they are entrusted with.

Having this provision and it being expected that the majority use it (homeschooling is considered the exception) means that the government is able to expect that people with school age children to work at least 16 hrs a week which can be achieved during school hours, often with difficulty but it is achievable.

i really can’t understand why the offended reaction at people think a place that’s caring for children can be considered childcare.

But it literally is, kids are at school while parents work - childcare. It’s just factual.

Their main purpose and reason for existing is to educate children. However, they do also enable parents to work.

Children are expected to be at school Monday - Friday for approx 6 hours for 190 days a year. Parents are expected to leave their child in the care of the school and taking a child out of school results in a fine or scrutiny from the LA if your child does not attend a school (even if they are home educated or educated at somewhere other than a school). Therefore most parents try to maximize using those hours for paid work. There are working contracts such as term time only, school hours only that exist purely because of school.

Therefore school is very much built into parent working plans. This has always been the case from when schools first existed. There is evidence of "schools" taking pupils as young as 2 in Victorian times to allow mothers (particularly poor or widowed women) to work.

Can't it be both?

Your children are educated and cared for, enabling you to work at least some hours without buying childcare. Before and afterschool and holiday clubs are run by many schools so childcare is part of the package.

And please don't start with that why have children if others raise them bullshit. It's perfectly possible to raise your children while working to keep a roof over their head and food in their stomach

Yes, that’s exactly what I thought, going back to work had sweet fuck all to do with paying the mortgage or affording food, I just wanted to be able to ditch the kid on someone else.

I agree with you! Parents should parent.

In fact, research shows that a child’s parental background dictates where they end up in life and not the school they went to.

Yup.

I have no problems with people making the argument that it shouldn't function as childcare. But we've very obviously created a system where it does and lots of us need it to.

I don't think this makes a teacher the same as a childminder though, they're different jobs. In the same way that the sports coaches at the childcare holiday scheme my DC went to today aren't teaching assistants.

I was a teacher and educating kids is pretty low on the list. That's why I quit.

To be fair with a lack of family help it is as I can work with the children at school.