To think that everyone who told those with preschool children in 2020/21 to get a puddlesuit and that lockdown wasn’t that bad needs to read this

[manysummersago]

BBC link

Reading the above has made me feel so angry and sad at what was done to the babies and toddlers of this country, and I can’t believe that we let it happen, quite honestly.

I guess my preschooler is lucky to have older siblings, so I really haven't seen this at all. I'm a bit sceptical about babies and toddlers being "surrounded" by adults wearing masks for most of their lives - no parents wear masks at home, and very few adults in nursery/preschool settings have been wearing masks. Of course children have seen adults in masks, but it's not been most people most of the time.

I think delays in development are more likely to be due to just stagnating indoors during lockdowns, and due to poor parental mental health during the pandemic. I'm not questioning that many children have been badly affected, but I think it's a bit simplistic to just say "it's because people wore masks in public spaces"

@Benjispruce4

I work in primary and some change have thrived in lockdown because of the quality time with parents whereas others who rely on school to bring their child up, found themselves coming unstuck. Harsh but true.

Great so any child who has struggled with the pandemic has done so because their parents expect school to bring their children up?

🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️

It's that simple is it?

@Benjispruce4

I work in primary and some change have thrived in lockdown because of the quality time with parents whereas others who rely on school to bring their child up, found themselves coming unstuck. Harsh but true.

Therefore its inadequate parenting that's to blame?

YABU the lockdowns were necessary before we had vaccinations.

Without the lockdowns we'd have been looking at ICU nurses having to decide who was worthy of ECMO and who not, and mass graves.

Letting it exponentially rip was not an option

What has happened to children is very worrying, but there are shark jumping elements in the BBC piece.

Children surrounded by people in masks their entire lives
Well not at home or on the TV.
And if they were spending time with adults in nursery then they were in nursery.

It's a shame, because I think it's an important report. I also think that some parents understandably struggled to parent in isolation and that the consequences of this shouldn't be underestimated.

I'd like to see more support for parents, as well as better (and more affordable) nursery care.

@peachgreen

The damage done to my now-preschooler, then toddler, by losing her father far exceeds any damage done by lockdown.

Yes, lockdown definitely has been detrimental to her and I can see that - but believe me, there is worse.

This. Absolutely this.

@bookworm14

YANBU. Many of us pointed out at the time that incalculable damage was being done to children, but we were told that ‘kids are resilient’, and that small children don’t need interaction with anyone other than their parents. Anyone who suggested school and nursery closures might not be a great idea was told that we only wanted our kids at school for the childcare and we couldn’t be bothered to take care of them ourselves. Those of us who posted in desperation about the effect of lockdown on our own kids were told it was our fault.

Everything we warned about has turned out to be correct.

Completely agree with this, the narrative on here was disgusting, unforgiveable in fact.

And I hated that parenting behaviours that would have been considered neglectful and damaging for development under other circumstances (enforced social isolation, lack of access to education) were suddenly expected, and if you expressed concern, you were essentially called a murderer. Those things are of course just as damaging whether a result of poor parenting or a result of COVID restrictions. The damage doesn't go away 'cos COVID'.

These are signs of parental neglect. I expect lots of children from certain households did thrive, and some it will have made little difference. ( I’ve had both a non lockdown and lockdown toddler) and there is little difference in their development. What’s disgraceful is this government slashing funding for early years intervention, sure start etc when we know this is the key time to make a difference for children’s outcomes. I can well believe lockdown made it much harder to get families access to help but this can’t be blamed on lockdown alone. I feel the gov have a lot of convenient excuses lined up for problems that were there anyway (lockdown/ cost of living crisis blamed on the war when it was happening anyway). Although this really does highlight how important quality nursery/early years provision is for so many children.

Sorry, I've reread my post about kids "stagnating" during lockdown- I didn't mean at all because of lazy parents or anything like that, I just meant because of the restrictions of being in lockdown, especially in jan/Feb.

@Benjispruce4

I work in primary and some change have thrived in lockdown because of the quality time with parents whereas others who rely on school to bring their child up, found themselves coming unstuck. Harsh but true.

Shame on you for this statement. Disgusting.

You're saying that parents who work are to blame because they 'rely on school to bring their child up'. Offensive, ignorant, ill-informed and untrue.

Without any judgement (as everyone was struggling), many of these problems are also due to a lack of parental involvement and interaction with their children and perhaps an over reliance on nurseries to ‘parent’. Exposing nursery workers to Covid when we knew nothing about the virus and before vaccinations would have been unforgivable. Why should they have been put at risk at a level no one else was facing? We are now seeing the consequences of dealing with a novel virus and there will be many, many negative effects. In this scenario, I prefer to see my nursery colleagues alive and hopefully well whilst accepting this had some impact on young children. The thing that is unforgivable is if we don’t provide catch ups and interventions for children. We also need to accept that this costs money,

@zoemum2006

I bet the government loves us fighting over which individual child thrived or suffered and whether lockdowns were sensible or proportionate.

The reality is many children have suffered because of a lockdown that happened. The question now is what are the government going to solve some of the problems.

Or are we going to put everything on personal responsibility? In which case can we get rid of the government entirely then?

Exactly. It happened, predictable harms occurred to many. What now? The things missed out on were play, exercise, socialisation and cultural learning. Reading too as libraries were shut for much of the time. This isn’t going to be fixed by more hours sitting behind a desk.

Our school has had 2 class trips and forest school sessions this year. I tear up a little thinking how much dd got from those things after so much time alone at home.

It’s disgusting. Don’t even get me started or I won’t stop…

@DingleyDel

These are signs of parental neglect. I expect lots of children from certain households did thrive, and some it will have made little difference. ( I’ve had both a non lockdown and lockdown toddler) and there is little difference in their development. What’s disgraceful is this government slashing funding for early years intervention, sure start etc when we know this is the key time to make a difference for children’s outcomes. I can well believe lockdown made it much harder to get families access to help but this can’t be blamed on lockdown alone. I feel the gov have a lot of convenient excuses lined up for problems that were there anyway (lockdown/ cost of living crisis blamed on the war when it was happening anyway). Although this really does highlight how important quality nursery/early years provision is for so many children.

I agree. The health visiting service for instance was already massively depleted BEFORE entering the pandemic and that situation has only got worse. It's a very convenient excuse to blame covid and lockdowns but there was a survey published in February 2020 that said most health visitors weren't even able to provide the minimum level of support.

History is not going to look kindly at how we dealt with the pandemic. The way we dealt with it (globally not just in the UK), esp after the vaccines were available has been poor. The financial and mental health consequences are going to last for a generation at least.

My pre schooler (now 4- had just turned 2 in March 2020) seems to have coped ok. After the first lockdown she was allowed to attend childcare as normal and see friends outside. We both worked full time from home and just tag teamed childcare in the first lockdown.

Even those with engaged none working parents at home singing rhymes etc will have missed out on normal development opportunities like playing with peers, interacting with people - give the lady in the shop the money for the sweets type interaction of past has been impossible - she’s in a mask behind Perspex and it’s card only. I’m in a ‘nice’ area and Rainbows leader said the girls (4 plus) were wild when we restarted as they had no concept of listening, circle time etc.
So many volunteer run groups eg mum and toddlers have gone by the wayside. It will be a massive issue for future.
Lots of children don’t speak English at home but by school age will have enough to cope picked up at nursery etc that has been affected.
Development. Checks missed or done ineffectually via zoom. Parents unaware child has issues because they don’t see child v their peers.
Lots of parents don’t realise how garbled their children are - they can understand them.
Everyone had a different experience of lockdown. Yes some people had more time. But others were full time wfh no childcare what were they supposed to do with toddler apart from stick iPad on and feed them snacks. In a flat with a single mum who needed to be on calls 9-5 it’s wrong to blame parent for not interacting enough.

I'd rather have my child slightly behind developmentally than dead. But sure, retrospectively let's pretend wearing masks was 'insane'

@Lacedwithgrace

I'd rather have my child slightly behind developmentally than dead. But sure, retrospectively let's pretend wearing masks was 'insane'

Those weren’t really the options because very few children would have died from Covid - many kids have now had it anyway and the number of children who have died from it is tiny.

I spent lockdowns WFH and trying to homeschool my eldest ks1/ KS2. And my youngest was 1 when the first lockdown started, she is now 3. In reality they both spent so much time on screen while we were trying to work at the same time.... But I can't say I've noticed much negative impact on my DC but I don't doubt that there are children who are now struggling. I hope there will be a push for more support for children of all ages.

Whilst on an individual level, we all know some children thrived or are fine, we have to look at things on a population level.

My dc are at various ages and stages and all of them were detrimentally affected. They have missed experiences that can't be recouped (like being part of a production or going on a residential before leaving primary school) or in the car of my youngest, never having experienced an uninterrupted academic year in their life. My dc have been negatively impacted but they will be fine, because they are advantaged in a million ways.

What I have seen, in addition to our personal losses and sadnesses for our DC, is how their peers and classmates appear to have been affected, and how that impacts on their teachers and schools. Behavioural issues seem to dominate in a way they didn't before, trying SEMH needs takes up huge amounts of resources and teacher time, children are not able to separate from parents or come into school ready to learn. Lots of children can't swim or ride a bike at a much older age than before. Lots of learning difficulties are being picked up much later as everything was out down to covid disruption until v recently.

The impacts are massive and there needs to be a plan and a lot of money put behind it.

Everything in that article is just bad, lazy parenting.
Nothing to do with lockdown. Everything to do with bad, lazy parents not doing what they should have.

My children thrived during lockdown. They returned to school way ahead of where they should have been. Because I actually made an effort.

YANBU. The lockdowns of 2021/22 caused immeasurable personal and societal damage.

A baby/toddler was in no possible way as affected by lockdown as a school age child. It is absolutely ridiculous to claim otherwise.

But how would we have coped with more grandparents and parents dying or not being able able to care for their dc's? That leaves a pretty big mess too. I'm a lone parent, my teens only have me.

Before vaccinations were bedded in, and certainly before Sept 2020 we had to be cautious. I never agreed with pubs, restaurants, gyms etc opening up so soon. There should have been priority for outdoor learning for all children. In Jan / Feb 21 school kids should have been able to attend playing fields and playgrounds for outdoor catch ups and PE.