Preparing our children for adult life post Brexit

[catdoctor]

My DCs are 6 and 3. I'm trying to think how I can help them to thrive in the UK and abroad post Brexit. What do they need to have in the way of qualifications and other skills to enable them to make the best of things whatever the outcome?

Look on the bright side OP - if they are not gifted academically there will be plenty of work on the farms (all year round with seasonal fruit and veg) - they'll get fresh air and will never be fat, and accommodation is provided too!

At 6 and 3 you can probably just focus on resilience and confidence. Make sure they know they are loved, reward their effort, support their choices, nurture their curiousity.

The sensible answer on this thread.

Nursing or Medicine. Seriously. Not in the UK but abroad- Australia, Canada or USA.

Well as the voice of experience I really recommend you do not encourage your daughter to be inspired by Science and the world around her, to nurture her talents in that direction and to offer her role models in the shape of women from Mary Anning on who have made a very real though often unrecognised contribution to our understanding of the world and to advances in the fields of medicine, agriculture, future fuel sources etc etc, to believe that she can follow in their footsteps, to support her through five years of the hard slog and intellectual challenge of studying Science to Masters level, with a careful eye on choosing the modules that would equip her to achieve her dreams in her chosen specialism and on getting the necessary high grades. Who knew Brexit would come along and trash her prospects in this country....

Thankfully we also decided to live in another culture when they were Primary age, and encouraged them to read and experience culture widely and with an open mind. I have encouraged their emotional intelligence, empathy and critical thinking, above all for them to think for themselves. As a result she and her sister who followed her interests in art and the humanities needed no encouragement to learn two European languages and Mandarin. As things stand I honestly the latter are the most important contribution I made to their future happiness........

I totally agree that resilience and confidence matter above all. I just wish I had realised how important it was going to be for them to develop resilience. I really had no idea that this country and the environment they face could change so fundamentally in such a short space of time.

Maybe get them into a good Grammar school?

Anon The years of intensive tutoring in tutoring factories 10 to a kitchen table, probably of dubious educational value, and certainly damaging to enthusiasm for learning, confidence and resilience, that goes on around here, purportedly because it is essential to get into the grammar schools (and then often to keep up once in) results in neurotic anxious young men and women. Don't do it, really, don't do it. May has no idea,and I went to a Grammar School and understand how it used to work before the tutoring industry and admissions arrangements conspired to undo all that

Tbh at 6 and 3 they have a long time until adulthood, a lot of water will have flowed under the bridge by then.

If you are anxious to give them a brexit escape route, then you might consider - while they're still young and you still have the right to do so - taking a year or two out and going to live somewhere in the EU. Put them in local schools and they'll learn a language. And from the noises being made by the EU there seems to be a decent chance that all those who have availed themselves of FOM before March 2019 will keep their residence rights permanently. If your circumstances permit I might just consider it.

My first brexit-related act was to get my kids' dual nationality sorted out. If you have any way of getting a second passport then I would do that.

Yep
Irish passport applications sent for!

No grammar schools in Scotland - and absolutely no plans to re-introduce them after 40 years. #justsaying

Maybe that's why we voted to Remain

Put it another way - how can I make them employable?

Because no-one in the UK had a job ever until the EU came along and invented 100% employment rates, is that what you are saying?

A word to the wise: your DC will do what your DC will do, despite your best laid plans.

Maybe get them into a good Grammar school?

How very egalitarian of you, anon. I thought it was remainers who were meant to be elitist.

Politics A level so they (as a nation) can get us back in the EU.

How to apply for a visa