I am so worried about everyone's kids at the moment, and fed up with talk of "catchup" and "tutoring", "when will schools reopen" and "how to make them safe".
We've had over a year of everyone trying to jump to adjust to different conditions in lockdown/schools opening/home schooling. What's supposed to be happening changes all the time, and changes are last minute. I get it that schools need to be safe. I don't want my lot going into school if they aren't really safe. But people have different resources, some people (teachers included) are trying to home school children whilst teaching full time from home, not everyone has a suitable computer, not all teachers are IT savvy, not all kids have a safe, calm place to work, and kids working alone is not the same anyway.
I think it's time we took more control of this situation. Made a long term plan given things are not going to change in the near future.
Catch up tutoring isn't going to work. It will just put our poor stressed and confused children through more stress. I want kids to have the option of an extra school year. Yes, it'll cost, yes, it'll require organisation. But the alternative is that all the children currently in schools will risk starting next year a year behind... and that could follow them through the whole of their education.
An extra year would also allow parents do more of the good stuff now, and less trying to be teachers. They can look after kids' mental health and development, do some interest-based learning and being together. What's important at the moment is mental health and some learning - when they can get back to school for good, in safe conditions, they'd have time to work on the academic stuff.
I don't want the kids and young people now in schools to live with the consequences of covid for the rest of their lives.