Kids in school and change

[CovidStopping]

Ok, so my kids are the lucky ones - they've been in school throughout as DH and I both key workers. We r very lucky and I'm not disputing that at all.

However, I was reflecting today how hard it's been for them.

Their best friends left in March to be home schooled and they were both placed in bubbles with kids from other classes they didn't know so had to make me friends. Then old friends came back and they were separated from new friends in September. Then in January (or whenever - lost track!) old friends went off again and they were both in new bubbles again (but not same kids as last march), so had to make a bunch of new friends. Now next week old friends are coming back and they won't be allowed to mix with the new friends they've made.

I just feel.so sad for them. My kids had already had school changes prior to all this, as well as class shuffles mixing up the kids in the year.

I just feel.like they are learning that whatever friends they make will only be temporary so they better not get too close.

They've been great, but it's pretty hard on primary age kids to have to keep making and losing friends. :(

Just felt sad for them today that's all :(

Oh, and in response to the OP - yes it has been incredibly disruptive. I think it will be something they all remember (if old enough) and will have had an impact on them.

However I am a person who moved schools a LOT and I am really good at meeting people and trying new things so it doesn't have to be all negative for your children - they have time for this to all calm down for them. The main thing is they have had stability and reassurance in you.

The kids where this has been really really bad are where school has been disrupted and home was already disrupted.

Reading this thread has got me worried that there will be divides after all this, friction, and bitterness that filters down to the kids. I hope that's not the case. I hope we all stick together and support each other to support all our children as life starts to return to some kind of normal.

This is a worry of mine too. My friends joke about the 'bitterness' we feel towards other people at the moment - that someone can still see their parents, that someone else has a place on school, that another person has a younger DC at nursery - and we're sort of ok at finding it funny at the moment, that we're aware we are feeling this way.

But it's also not funny, is it? That deep down we're all starting to feel like this and we're comparing the tiniest things and starting to feel so bitter at other people. Even, apparently, what young people have been through

I do feel bad for your kids OP and all kids right now. If you are a shy child especially it must be hard to have to constantly make new friends. It’s like changing school four times in a year.

My reception aged child is another one who hasn’t socialised with other children since schools broke up in December. He has a toddling baby sister but she is... a baby, not a playmate. It’s been hard on all of us as he is bored and frustrated. I do play with him, as much as I can around looking after a wobbly baby, but I’m a tired mum, not a bouncy four year old.

@OverTheRainbow88 you aren't alone, don't feel bad. My DD is a bit older than yours so has been able to play and chat online, but we stuck to the rules and didnt see any friends in person since her bubble closed due to a covid positive in her Class around 15 Dec. Some of the kids at her school have been doing playdates in their homes during bad weather, and meeting outside (two mums, two kids) regardless of this being illegal. But my DD's best friend is the DD of a very law abiding key worker, and her other close friends have very cautious parents.

One friend has had to relocate to another city, as her mum is a single parent with a stressful job and so they've all moved in with the grandparents so there is someone to look after her during the homeschool day. So that friend clearly hasnt seen anyone.

And I agree - our local park has been pretty much deserted on the bad weather. We go almost every day. Sure, we saw some people in the sunnier weather recently and in the past week, my DD has played three times with a girl she knows vaguely who is two years younger. But we live on the edge of the catchment and we don't see her close friends in our park.

I find the whole thing tragic.

I think all children of all ages and all backgrounds whether they've been in school throughout or not have suffered in 1 way or another. Their whole worlds have changed, some may be old enough to understand why some not, they have just accepted it and got on with it and adapted despite maybe be being confused or even frightened.
Our children are the unsung heroes in all this they truly deserve the recognition for their resilience. I hope this summer is filled with some normality for them where they can have care free fun with friends and family again.

Mine have been in school this time because of how badly affected they were last time (one lost most of her speech and was just in such a dreadful mental health state she couldn't function). It's reduced the impact they've had this time around somewhat - but things are still taking their toll by now - it's held off the decline in the younger child's mental health - but now we're at the stage where both are still really visibly struggling.

Depends how the schools are running things - but ours are not some kind of nirvana of packed classes as normal with just a few kids excluded - they have two classes per year group merged together with very very limited numbers in (about 10 or so out of a year group of 60), with one teacher in the year group in-school delivering the planned stuff face to face, and the other year group teacher is working from home supporting the home learners - doing catch up chats, general chit-chat on google classroom over the day, answering the "fuck how do I explain this shit what the hell have they done to Maths" parent email inbox. Occasionally they may put the class kids into the zoom call, camera off, but projected onto the whiteboard so they can see the home kids - but actually they've done that as sensitively as they possibly can for what is an absolutely fucking shitty situation for all the kids.

The change going back into classes is really messing with DD1's head since it's been announced - she doesn't like or cope with change - and some of the lads in her class went pretty much feral first lockdown (they spent it all playing on Fortnite) and have been one of those cartoon mobile brawl clouds on the playground ever since - god knows what they've had going on at home this time around. We're expecting a rough week and weekend until it settles down for her - but she's a child that we know absolutely struggles with change totally.

I think it's very convenient as a side track that this is turning into misery top trumps - keeps people scrapping among themselves so they don't get together and agree that the way ALL these kids have been treated during this is fucking terrible and that as society we have a massive obligation to make sure that we now do our damndest to support repairing the harm that this has done to that generation. Not just in terms of sheer academics, but in terms of the social damage, the damage to language development and the trauma - even in the most stable circumstances who've been cushioned from the worst of this - the idea of going to bed one night assuming you're going to school the next day, and waking up to find you can't go out see your friends, can't go to school, playgrounds are chained up (referring to lockdown 1 and some unscrupulous councils this time around) - it's a huge huge headfuck for grown adults, let alone primary aged kids.

@CovidStopping

you cannot compare children that have missed 23 weeks of face to face teaching and socialisation to those that have had it. I think the original post made a few people speak out because feeling sorry that your child has to play with a different child they already knew is no way comparable to the alternative of children that have had no social interaction for weeks on end. It (to me) almost came across as someone that had their kids in school, that were happy, and didn't really want the rest of the kids to come back and upset that. That's how it came across.

Sorry it came across that way palacegirl. Totally wasn't meant to.

To answer your points -

-as I have stated already in my OP and in a later post.I KNOW I AM LUCKY. I know lots of people.have it harder. I feel deeply deeply sorry for the children (and parents) home schooling.

• my children's school is 4 form entry, and they DID NOT know the kids they were bubbled up with in march or more recently, as from different classes in the large year, so had to make new friends on both lockdown occasions.

-Your assumption I don't want the kids coming back on Monday is completely wrong. I can't wait for the kids at home to come back, they deserve it and it will be so nice to see them and to see the school busy and bustling again. But I am sad (and I think it's ok to be) that my children now have to say goodbye to the friends they've had to make this lockdown and school have said that from Monday they'll no longer be allowed to see their new friends or talk to them at school. That's quite hard to understand or come to terms with when you are little.

Just to reiterate... I know I am lucky. I am also lucky I don't live in a refugee camp or in a war torn country. I'm lucky I'm not homeless. I'm lucky I live in a free country and not North Korea. But just because I don't have it as bad, doesn't mean I can't recognise how hard things are for my own children and others in a similar position and be sad for the experiences they are going through. Kids at home have it very very bad (in lots, but not all, cases), but better than kids going through lockdown in Syria or North Korea, or kids being abused at home. But just because home schooled kids in this country are in a better position than kids in Syria or North Korea or those being abused anywhere in the world, that doesn't mean you can't feel sad for your home schooled kids. Or should we never say we feel sad or are having a hard time, because someone always obviously has it worse?

It's the timing of the post. To say you feel sad because they wobt see their "new friends" because their "old friends" are coming back just smarts a bit. Especially when so many of us that have children at home that are anxious about going back, that feel like school has gone on without them, that will probably have lost friendships as a result of this coupled with 23 weeks of lost learning (even though lots of us have tried out absolute best to keep it going). It just grated a bit but I'm sure you didn't mean it too and of course I agree that my child is still better off than many many children in the world and looking back at this time they will know how hard I worked to keep them safe and sane!

@Thurlow

Reading this thread has got me worried that there will be divides after all this, friction, and bitterness that filters down to the kids. I hope that's not the case. I hope we all stick together and support each other to support all our children as life starts to return to some kind of normal.

This is a worry of mine too. My friends joke about the 'bitterness' we feel towards other people at the moment - that someone can still see their parents, that someone else has a place on school, that another person has a younger DC at nursery - and we're sort of ok at finding it funny at the moment, that we're aware we are feeling this way.

But it's also not funny, is it? That deep down we're all starting to feel like this and we're comparing the tiniest things and starting to feel so bitter at other people. Even, apparently, what young people have been through

The bit about this that's personally really fucked with my brain has been watching the fragmentation, the them and us and the utter venom toward other people throughout this.

Thankfully for the kids we've managed to keep the bulk of it to laughing at the more ridiculous bits and seeing the daft side of some of it - we keep coming up with ideas for a future Horrible Histories episode on all of this and wondering what song would be good for people going batshit crazy over all the bog roll.

My 8 year old is so cross about it all she's planning on how she can start a political party, become prime minster and flush Boris down the toilet as an act of vengeance. I'm frankly both proud, glad she's coping by being pissed off at the people running the show and not turning on other groups within society, and bloody terrified!

@CoffeeWithCheese. Tell your 8 year old I will vote for them if they're flushing Johnson down a toilet!

@MrBullinaChinaShop we e hardly seen anyone either as most friends are avoiding parks and sticking to the rules. Luckily only 6 from her class are in but it’s still upsetting to see them on video calls or pictures of what they’ve been doing. Lots of schools seem to have nearly the whole class in which must be worse.

The only person interacting with others in person at the moment in my household is me because I go to work. Dd barely leaves her bedroom and haven't seen other dc since September (university)

I think it's been really hard for most kids up and down the country. I also think you are not wrong to think about the specific ways it's been hard for yours.

It's been hard for mine too but in different ways. I really hope they can all move on and recover well from this upheaval (and that it really is nearly coming to an end) whatever form it took for them.

Well done kids everywhere, tiny, teenage and preteen, for managing so well this last year. And thanks for sacrificing a lot for all us oldies too.

Why are people shocked that children haven't socialised since they broke up at half term. We broke lockdown rules to allow my son to spend time with his bf once. My daughter has seen no one. It doesn't help that their friends live outside of our area, parents are working full time from home whilst faciliting home learning. Parents won't break the rules if there is someone vulnerable in the family, quite rightly, but children have been isolated. Thank goodness for Fortnight, otherwise my son would have had no interaction.