We need to rise up about the lack of education for our children

[Speeding201700]

Please do this. Please join the Twitter movement #usforthem
Please write to your MPs
Please talk about this.

Our children are missing out on their fundamental human right of an education.

The children of regular families are suffering (all 5 of mine are suffering desperately), but those in vulnerable families are suffering even further. The gap between these children will be HUGE

I am a teacher and a mother. I am ready to go back to work full time and with the 'old normal'. I am also type 1 diabetic.

Please help us rise up to get our children educated. Our children have been totally forgotten about. Throughout my career I've had it rammed down my throat about how school is a safe place for so many children. They don't care about these children now.

I am amazed so many people have just accepted this. It has gone on for too long now.

Lets just say hospital capacity is 10000. And say we only got to 9000 last time.

You do realise that if we let the virus double one more time, we would then have been at 18,000. It was doubling every two days.

No we weren't overwhelmed.

We were less that one week from being overwhelmed.

Totally agree OP. Does anyone have a template/or guidelines for what to include in a letter to local MP? Thank you.

"And now, not a sound on the effects of this on their education."

Are you serious? Parents, schools, local government and the DoE are all talking about nothing else.

But the truth is - whatever the impact is, it's tough luck because there's currently no alternative.

And the reason you haven't heard how schools are going to catch them up is because we don't bloody know. We've never been in this position before!

Most schools are fully focused on how we can continue to teach remotely now we're back in school, what we might be asked to do next, reaching out to vulnerable families, planning for more year groups returning, assessing Y11 & Y13 and all sorts of other things - we haven't gotten around to how we're going to get your kids back up to speed yet, sorry.

"they should be doing everything they can to get them back at school,"

They are. They are doing this. The government are desperate to get them back - so that parents are less pissed off and so that people can get back to work.

I don't understand why people think 'they' aren't already doing everything they can to get kids back to school.

Just gradually.

@garfieldisacat please can you help? Not being difficult or goady at all, I genuinely don't understand and would like to.

How has the curriculum been suspended? Very simplistic but when a football match is suspended, because somebody is injured or something then the clock stops, and they restart exactly from where they were. How will this happen with the curriculum/school? When DS goes back for example, he'll likely go straight to year 5. Will be just start from the March of year 4, if so, how will they fit in the whole of year 5?

With the best will in the world, surely they can't have expected parents to have completeld year 4 at home and the DC are significantly further on than when they left? Or are they?

garfieldisacat, I think everyone understands that perfectly well. What is less clear is why is it desirable to do it or to carry on for so long.

"But nobody has suggested ditching social distancing all together have they? "

Yes, several pp did advocate that earlier on.

If schools and education were so vital why is it OK not to have them?

I found this post very interesting - especially people who have high school children who are saying they are not getting an education. I know some of this is sometimes down to a lot of families not having the electronic resources - but what surprises me is the difference in education that schools are giving.

DD, Y10, has all the resources she needs, her own laptop, a quiet place to study, good broadband etc she has on average 1- 2 hours work a day, some days nothing, she attends an excellent, high achieving school. She's been offered a few Google Meets with teachers before the summer holidays. When I get home from work I sit with her and go through revision guides or online resources to try to help her but I'm no teacher. I've watched her sink lower and lower and she desperately wants to be back at school and have some idea of what will happen next year and I can't give her those answers. These year groups have been left hanging, I fully accept the current focus is on Y11&13, but these kids need to know a plan and soon.

I like Weeping Willows points.

"So all kids will be on an even footing when they return? Pull the other one."

All kids are never on an even footing, sadly.

But I take your point. Unfortunately, there is no alternative right now and I expect there will be much relearning and revisiting next year.

@rawlikesushi

"And now, not a sound on the effects of this on their education."

Are you serious? Parents, schools, local government and the DoE are all talking about nothing else.

But the truth is - whatever the impact is, it's tough luck because there's currently no alternative.

And the reason you haven't heard how schools are going to catch them up is because we don't bloody know. We've never been in this position before!

Most schools are fully focused on how we can continue to teach remotely now we're back in school, what we might be asked to do next, reaching out to vulnerable families, planning for more year groups returning, assessing Y11 & Y13 and all sorts of other things - we haven't gotten around to how we're going to get your kids back up to speed yet, sorry.

Omg don’t turn this into a now they are bashing teachers again thread. Those are so bloody tedious. This needs to be debated. And people do have a right And bloody well should to ask how kids who have basically had no education vs those who have been in the privileged position via set up at home to continue having an education - how will that hap be closed. Because we all know that it won’t. No one is saying that is a teachers fault so for gods sake don’t derail the thread.

"What really worries me is that we did all of this to not overwhelm the NHS well it didn’t get overwhelmed and here we still are. We are all sitting here and watching it all happen to our children, to the economy. I am with you OP - we should all be protesting very loudly, not sitting watching it all happen to us."

For the love of god, read up on exponential growth and educate yourself so that you don't look silly.

All kids are never on an even footing, sadly

I know. This is going to make the gap even bigger.

But I take your point. Unfortunately, there is no alternative right now and I expect there will be much relearning and revisiting next year

I hope so. Lots of kids will need to catch up.

May I draw your attention to this.
www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/birthsdeathsandmarriages/deaths/bulletins/excesswintermortalityinenglandandwales/2017to2018provisionaland2016to2017final

2017, the year the flu vaccination didn't work too well and in excess of 50,000 people in the UK died. I didn't even know about this until recently. Schools did not shut down.

NO ONE knows if lockdown has saved lives. It may have inadvertently caused alot more than it saved. People are dying of cancer, missed appointments , heart attacks, strokes. But no one gives 2 fucks about this as it's not Coronavirus

Same with pubs!

Because drunk people will be great at social distancing?

Gosh the old normal certainly had its pitfalls but this is far more damaging, and will get worse and worse as time drags on. But hey, we can go to the park, so all is hunky dory.

But your argument isn’t that all kids should go back, it’s that services for kids with SEN should be prioritised and opening sooner. We all know they won’t do that and the uproar from other parents would be loud if they thought our kids were being put first for a change.

DD is losing out because all her services have been cut except for one physio session over Skype once a week. Having schools back sooner en masse means they are less likely to open services because they will still be deemed a risk.

"If schools and education were so vital why is it OK not to have them?"

It's ok not to have them temporarily to avoid hundreds of thousands of unnecessary deaths.

Anyway I have gone off topic. This post is for people who want to protect their children's education and some advice on what we can do about it.

The curriculum is not suspended.DS is in year 10 and is still receiving a full five days online teaching. Live interactive lessons. Assessed course work, language auras and oral tests. They have been full on since Easter. He is at a private school and although we have had a discount on this terms fees it is what I would expect.
I feel incredibly sorry for yr10s and 12s in the state sector. Work is being set by email for my friends DD with no teaching. They have been left to study on their own which some will be quite competent to do but many have yet to develop independent study techniques.
Yet again there are going to be widening gaps between state and independent schools.

"No one is saying that is a teachers fault so for gods sake don’t derail the thread."

I'm not detailing. A pp said that parents needed to know how kids would be supported to catch up. I'm answering her : nobody can tell you that yet because we don't know.

It will be very interesting to see when schools return how they will deal with attendance. I predict many parents will feel very jaded after this and be very unconvinced about the importance of attendance.

"2017, the year the flu vaccination didn't work too well and in excess of 50,000 people in the UK died. I didn't even know about this until recently. Schools did not shut down. "

We have 50,000 deaths after two months of full lockdown.

It doesn't compare with 50,000 deaths over a full year of normal life.

I have two autistic sons. It would have been nice to have the support of other parents when my DC (and me - had to give up PhD to become carer) were being thrown under the bus.

I'm afraid that abstract notions of caring about the well being and mental health of children or women fall rather flat because there is no evidence that parents or teachers or local authorities or the government actually did care. Despite all the 'every child matters' rhetoric no one gave a shiny shit apart from SEN support charities like IPSEA and SOS!SEN. DS1 had 5 terms education in five years. You'd think this was a scandal, but no, we had to start JR proceedings to even get home tutors (obviously following tribunal court hearing).

The education system is not even flexible enough to provide decent education and support for DC with SEN because they don't fit the norm. The structure is rigid. Fit in or piss off.

The rigidity of that structure is not flexible enough to provide education and support that is different from the artificially constructed norm (that tbh was fine with you when your DC weren't the ones to suffer - remember if you don't like how it is you should HE). Covid means deviating from the norm.

Maybe the same advice fits, if you don't like part time timetables to fit around the best interests of everyone else, to keep other pupils and the staff safe, you should give up work and embrace FT HE.

Denial will not help you. I couldn't wish away my sons SEN any more than you can wish away the pandemic. I had to accept reality and deal with it, why don't you? This does not mean that you don't campaign but you have to weigh up an 'abstract' campaign with your child's needs in the here and now. Is campaigning the best way to support your child now?

Do you have integrity or are you just being selfish? Will you widen your campaign or continue to campaign when it doesn't affect you directly?

"I predict many parents will feel very jaded after this and be very unconvinced about the importance of attendance."

Well that would be very silly of them because the class will be learning while their child is not.

Also, anyone with an ounce of brains will know that the only reason schools are closed right now is due to no viable alternative in the midst of a worldwide emergency.

I am a Year 3 teacher at a one form entry village primary in the South East.

I am happy to accept this risk at the current R rate (below 1) and teach under ‘normal’ conditions so long as my childcare is ‘allowed’ to run as normal (grandparents + nursery).

Equally, I’d be delighted to teach a bubble of 15 children in the longer term (imagine the individual attention you could give the children if you only had a class of 15 of the same year group!), if the government could provide resources for this.

Please all take note that, as state schools, it is the DFE who make decisions like school closures. They also make decisions that lead to bubble sizes and thus restrict the amount of education that schools can offer. Messages to MPs, GW etc will have much more of an impact than constant complaining about individual schools!