Do parents have low expectations?

[mrz]

www.telegraph.co.uk/education/educationnews/12206787/Parents-low-expectations-condemning-toddlers-them-to-a-life-of-underachievement.html

The kids I see in full time school still spend far more time with their parents than they do with me, even allowing for a long school day.

Given weekends and holidays they do. It's also not just about waking hours, it's about a more nebulous overall influence.

It's seen in stark contrast when the kids speak a completely different language in school - you can clearly see there what the main influence is, and it isn't the school language.

I'm happy to agree to disagree. I see my situation every day in my work

I don't need to do the maths. My job is all about trying to overcome the parental language influence during school hours. It's not easy.

Added to that, the kids don't spend 8:30 to 4:30 talking endlessly to an adult. A lot of the chat is between the children and is not good quality. I lot of it is listening and not speaking.

Add up the amount of time per day a single child actually converses with a teacher. I bet it's next to nothing.

As I said, I have a bilingual child myself who is being taught in a second language. His struggle is that he's picking up the language 90% from kids aged 3 to 6 so he's not picking up very clear pronunciation, complex vocabulary etc. The fact is whilst he's in nursery his actual one to one interaction with adults is very low compared to child to child interaction and interaction with me in his first language.

I'm saying that the time a child spends with parents is far more influential than the time a child spends in school.

I'm saying that the time a child spends in school isn't always time spent having high quality language experiences.

I'm saying that asking education staff to make up for the poor quality language experiences that some children have at home is a tall order.

Who are the kids in nursery though? Yes that's right - the kids whose parents have full time jobs. So NOT the neglected kids from generations of non working non apirational non educated non book reading parents

Not where I live and work.
The majority of Nursery places are funded places - all, in some areas.
Sadly, time and time again dc start Nursery without any verbal language - a few sounds or maybe the odd single word. Their time in Nursery is invaluable.

I am not sure if some areas still have priority access to nursery based on prior attainment and need. When I worked in this field, a long time ago, the HVs and Educational Psychologists would identify children who needed to start nursery at 2 or 3 instead of the usual 4. They were prioritised over other children for places. Occasionally 2 year olds would have statements naming the nursery.

However, we also had people earning decent money (Police Officer Mum doing shift work and commuting springs to mind) whose children were prioritised because of lack of attainment and our state nurseries had teachers (oh how fortunate we were) and the private ones did not. The private ones often refused the very delayed child. It is always a dilemma as to whether supporting the child is the priority (it was on my committee) or whether, if people earned decent money in a family, they should use a private nursery and the state places be kept for those who could not pay. It seems now that the lottery of a priority place is even greater. There is a great bank of knowledge regarding which children need help. The help needs to be targeted to those who are more in need. That would be the best starting point.

Some of the children who have the hardest time relating to their peers at the school I work at are mostly from middle class families whose parents both work long hours and the child is in school from 8-5.30 and then sent to lots of activities too, both weekdays and weekends

Their behaviour suffers and they don't have enough time at home to do their reading/phonics etc
The other end of the scale are the kids whose parents (usually lone parents) have a very chaotic lifestyle with multiple children by multiple partners and with the older kids looking after the younger ones.
No homework done in these homes either by for a very different reason
I truly believe both these types of parents love their kids, but their parenting - for whatever reason - is inadequate

To answer your question mrz...imho lots of parents (with the current stresses of long hours and worry about money) see school as free childcare
Education doesn't really come into it
We also get a lot of kids sent in who really shouldn't be for the same reason...before we broke up for Easter we were sending 3/4 home a day!

Of course we bother Washed. My whole job is "bothering"!

My point is simply that if you want to target language development in these kids, imo the money is better spent supporting parents, not throwing money away on things which i don't think will make much difference.

bojo ime it can be really hard to get a child a place, even when there is priority need. You can have all the paperwork you need but you can't have a place that doesn't exist.

I also think that in some cases dc are referred when they don't really need it, but because there's nothing else in place to support the parents with their actual problem, and so a nursery place is taken because it's the only way to assist. So eg without being specific the carer or disabled/ ill parent actually needs support, respite care etc, or the parent with mh issues needs treatment. But because those things are all more expensive and harder to source, prioritising a nursery place for their toddler is one of the few practical ways to attempt to lighten their burden. Even though they wouldn't need it if they got adequate support with their actual difficulties.

I don't think it will make a difference over and above what is already provided

Children's centres and preschool aren't the answer for the most deprived. The funding isn't there for supporting the actual causes. If you've got pnd, parenting classes at the local sure start aren't going to fix it

I couldn't agree with this less, and other comments about how sure start and children's centres were not effective in the areas they needed to be.
When I had a baby, I was alone, had been homeless (couch surfing at 6 months), had no friends with kids, and was very isolated. My midwife appointments were at the local childrens centre. They also had ante natal classes, baby clinic, playgroups, a cafe, a playground. So, when my HV told me to take my baby there to get weighed, I did, and the place turned out to be a lifeline.
I had pnd (didn't realise at the time) and it scares me to think what kind of state I was getting in.
The childrens centre meant that twice a week I could go to the clinic, sit in the cafe and have a cheap cup of tea, and inevitably end up speaking to someone, other women with new babies etc. It was a place I knew there were kind people, and I could walk in any time.
Now, I am a reasonably educated working class woman, and am now quite confident but as a new mum I knew nothing, and was actually very scared and defensive about it. I desperately needed that uthreatening, accessible place.
This cc was in an inner city area, and all kinds of people accessed it, but mainly those from the surrounding estates.
Ok, there would be people who would be less likely to turn up to a baby group or whatever, but the place helped and supported a very wide range of parents, not least those who were isolated by their own limited English.
Children's centres and sure start may not be able to 100% alter poor attainment for toddlers, but my God, they are so much more useful and effective, just in terms of building stronger parents, than extra nursery hours, or more testing of kids.

I agree IfNotNow

I used to go to speech and language therapy course at sure start when my ds was little.
First week, it was full of children. Every week, children started not to turn up. I don't know why. In the end, Only myself and another parents was a regular, so they had to stop this course. I know it was a pain to come to an hour course every week, and it was free, so people didn't take it seriously. But I was really gutted when they told me they can't continue. And I've seen lots of children started this course at same time with my ds have come to school, and are really behind in speech and language skills. It's a shame people don't take advantage of something that they are offered to help children.

I'm always surprised when I hear of reception children only starting to learn the very beginnings of phonics. Or learning the values of numbers up to 10.

I started to teach my children their letter sounds from when they were babies. We counted the stairs together as soon as they could walk. And from there they both learnt at their own speed. It was never pushed, it was just there. In our every day lives amongst all the other things I taught them in order to help them grow in to well-rounded adults.

I could have not bothered mentioning to my 18 month old DD that the letter 'm' is 'mmmm' for 'mummy', for fear of her not being 'ready'. But she wouldn't now be enjoying the enormous pleasure that reading Enid Blynton to herself, aged 5, brings her.

I could have not bothered mentioning to my 2 year old DS that 'c' is 'kkkkkkkk' for 'car'. But then he wouldn't now be enjoying playing i-spy with his sister on the way to nursery.

We teach our children to walk, to feed themselves, to use the toilet, to talk, to build towers, to ride a bike. Why on earth shouldn't we teach them their colours, their numbers, to read and write. And why shouldn't this continue within nursery and preschool settings?

Young children (babies even!) are so much more capable of learning more than most people give them credit for. They are total sponges.