Primary education for the modern world

[ThinkingForward]

Discussion on how to reform the primary school offering to make it suitable for modern britain

> benefits of having more directed hours of experiences and learning
> more diverse educational offering
> societal benefits: broader opportunities for parents, families an the economy

I am a father of a 6 yr old dc, and both my wife and i work full time, she works for the NHS and i run my own business(es). We have elderly parents, who also require our input and limited family support (our son gets picked up by my mum 1 day a week and she has him for 2-3 hrs).

The need to better provisioning of early years childcare is often highlighted, however there is little public discussion about the effects of a Victorian timetable on modern society, especially at primary school level.

This touches nearly every aspect of society,
a) educational regression of pupils after long summer holidays
b) lack of holiday provision for students and family's that receive pupil premium (from school meals to welfare checks)
c) discriminatory effects on women's earning, career progression and pension provision. Furthermore the effect on families/ relationship stability as a consequential outcome.
i. on breakdown of relationships this can lead to loss of homes and employment, in some case lead to problems of homelessness and addiction for the parent without the children
ii compounds disadvantage, for children especially if extended family support isnt available.
d) environmental impact of a 5 day vs 4 day week for example (additional heating, travel etc), if the current level of funding was capped then a shorter week with longer days may provide additional opportunities for parents to gain good quality employment
i. economic impact of the mismatch between typical holiday allowance (4-6 weeks for full time adult) and 13 weeks school holiday.
f) impact from unauthorized absence due to rigid holiday patterns and consequential high prices of travel

Forster introduced the education act in 1870, even at this stage the need for continuous evolution was recognized in the introductory speech. The timetable is probably one of the only recognisable elements of the schools system from 150 years ago. So much of our society has changed and the persistence with this timetable reinforces discrimination and could be seen as a root of many negative outcomes especially for women. Impacting short and long term earnings as well as pensions in retirement, but this also changes the dynamics of the economy, family life and even the environment. The academic literature indicates that long holidays are not to the children's benefit, with the loss of skills over these longer breaks. The travel industry becries the seasonality of holiday, and justifies its crazy pricing as a result of this.. So who actually benefits from a 150 year old timetable?

Almost every section of society would benefit from reviewing the school timetable, it would be ideal if there was more funding for more provision, but there seems to be almost no loosers from having a more fit for purpose timetable. Different funding options for the short, medium and long term could be considered. For example use of the tax free childcare allowance. As schools provides good quality educational options and childcare at a lower cost than the private provision (typical outside funding rates are around £4.20/pupil per hour with most priviate provision being 25-50% more for "just childcare"). Furthermore the marginal cost for increasing this provision would be modest as there would be mainly variable (additional direct staff and minimal additional overhead).

Working patterns have been brought into sharp focus following C19 and the working from home revolution. There are plenty of opportunities to look at different school and working patterns, for example a 4 day school week with longer days. This might allow those that work around school drop off and pick up to improve their employment opportunities, cut there travel costs and the school to only heat the school 4 days a week . Similarly a 45-46 week schedule then most 2 parent families could manage childcare with their normal holiday although this would be a challenge, but would not create such dependence on family friends, private provision etc to be able to manage the holidays.

So what problems do people see with changing the current victorian timetable to one which fits with modern life.?

yeah this is similar in France. If you dont have grandparents around then its a mess.

There is no benefit to society in embedding disadvantage from almost birth. This is really what im keen to try to resolve. Hopefully MN can get its collective wisdom together to surgest workable (both practical and economically sound) ideas together.

When it comes to staffing its clear that this wouldnt work with the current pool of staff and more staffing might be needed.

There’s your first problem. We can’t fill teaching positions already.

The work pattens might look different to how they are now, for example 4 day week with longer hours per shift. (nursing staff often work 3x14 hr shifts, with 3 days on and 3 days off)

Are you suggesting parents book their kids into school for ‘shifts’ and schools provide a bespoke timetable for each child?

Weirdly, post got truncated. I’ll try again.

DS’s state primary already has the option for children to be on site between 8am and 6pm. It is called afterschool care, and the time between 3:30 and 6pm is spent on sports and clubs.

So what you are suggesting is that my DS should stop his football, gymnastics, art club and second language, and I should have to either go part time or find some sort of childcare provision for Fridays, just so you don’t have to lower yourself to using ASC like every other working parent in the country does? No thank you.

If your child’s school has crappy ASC provision, campaign on that instead of trying to take it away from everyone else to fit in with your personal working patterns.

Also, can you imagine how expensive holidays would be if every family in the UK was trying to book the same two weeks? How crowded every attraction would be? It is bad enough with everyone trying to book the same six weeks off, condensing it into a fortnight would be hellish.

This really has to be the most self-centred post I have ever read on here. You want the entire country’s education system to fit around your own personal working patterns. Just breath-taking.

I tried supportive, in the first year of school and i was fobbed off.

Deceit is not cool, in my book. If a HT and chair of governors dont know what there statutory position is on provision for education is, how can we have any confidence in other aspects like child protection.

If youre saying that parents have no business "interfering" then this is a very interesting position.

Why not send your child to boarding school OP? Then the little bastards won’t be under your feet when you are trying to wfh, which is clearly what is driving this, and I understand public school headmasters are adept at ameliorating blowhard dads with a bad case of engineer’s disease.

And nope, I’m not a teacher and don’t work anywhere near education. Reacting solely to your comments on this threads.

Recruitment is an issue in teaching, but i think the reasons behind this is a whole other thread.

No im not suggesting the children do shifts, im saying that you might have staff just as they do now working different times of the day and these might not all be the same.

So for example you might have a music teacher which only works 4 days a week but 10 hours a day. The class teacher might have a 5 day 8 hr/day, there might be two PE teachers one which starts at 0700 and finishes at 1500 and another which starts at 1000 and finishes at 1800. This would then allow for all these other activities such as staff meetings and planning to happen.

It’s a partnership: parents, children, school and community. Individual parents are not usually listened to! A big group of parents might be. As in many instances, you can have responsive leadership or leadership that digs itself into a trench and stays there. Quite often schools hand over their premises to child care providers. Some schools do have teachers running activities. Others do not not. Teachers all work beyond classroom hours but some put more in than others. As in most aspects of life.

We do know one size doesn’t fit all in education. What we lack is the money to do anything better and quite often a will to look at anything different which might be better. We are not an inventive country in many ways. We react negatively. However at a time of great issues in society, more people working is a good thing. Filling teacher and NHS vacancies would be a good thing. The big question we have is why people don’t want the jobs and do not want to work. All the ideas in the world won’t take off if people prefer to retire very early and others prefer benefits.

I honestly don't know what to say.

It takes some absolute brass neck to go into a school as a parent and ask for the Head to completely overhaul the way they run their school.

Suggest, yes. Provide the information, by all means.

But this sounds like massive over-reach.

If you are being told it isn't possible because of x, y and z, even if you believe these things are untrue, it is because they don't want to do it and no, as a parent, you only get to vote with your feet. You absolutely don't get to 'interfere' any more than I could go into my GP surgery and insist they change their working patterns, introduce new clinics or change their IT systems.

You seem utterly clueless about the state of schools and the pressures school staff are under. It would be great if we could have big-picture conversations about improving outcomes and changing up the way we educate children, but that's a luxury at the moment. You are thinking idealistically and - in a way - there is nothing wrong with that - it is pie in the sky, though.

But, in reality, it sounds as though you have harangued a head teacher (and the governors too?) about a big idea when they are likely stressed about the budget and Ofsted and staffing levels and SEN and behaviour and getting through the next week without the building collapsing.

You know how Maslow's hierarchy of need works, right? Schools are struggling with the absolute basics and you are talking to them about higher level luxury ideas. Education is in flat-out survival mode.

So yes, we need change, but that needs to come from way above a single school. It needs to be a total change in school funding, debates in parliament, involvement of all major stakeholders. Introduction of new resources, buildings, staffing, pensions, terms and conditions, training... the reach is so huge.

Plus, you'd have to get the travel and tourism industries on board with less school holiday. They would take a huge hit.

You can, as I said, set up a free school from scratch and introduce wherever you like, but going into an existing school and suggesting this is like going into a refugee camp and suggesting they bring in super fast wifi and spa facilities. Nice idea - absolutely not appropriate in this situation.

Im saying that the things which are currently in some ASC would be better incorporated into the core curriculum. The 4 day week way just one idea, im happy with a 5 day week but i thought we would end up with a funding bunfight.

The benefits of a 4 day week could be environmental, economic, as well as family life. A 9 day fortnight for parents would seem to be workable. It seems that this isnt seen as popular, which is good to know.

I have campaigned on the ASC and we are getting low quality crowd control, as the schools answer often to low levels of attendence is to cut cost rather than improve the offering and charge a little more for it.

The holiday thing i pointed out that there would be 6 weeks of fixed holiday plus 2 weeks of personal time, ie you take it whenever you want / it gets used up in sickness medical appointments etc, this would remove the issues of the summer holiday crazy pricing, or atleast dilute it.

go out side the school...

In Norway (even with the rather challenging winter weather) then there is teaching outside. The approach is combine physical activity with academic activity. This might be taking a walk to a neighboring school or a local park, in the forest etc.

An additional issue is that teachers are not play workers. I agree that funding is needed for wrap around care and statutory provision for high quality, fully funded after school clubs would be brilliant, but it’s nothing to do with teachers.

The government are highly unlikely to pay teachers to provide play work, nor are they going to provide more teacher hours, either by the existing teachers working longer hours or additional teachers working shifts.

You’d be better off campaigning for better funded, high quality wrap around care (as a pp has already pointed out)

The holiday thing i pointed out that there would be 6 weeks of fixed holiday plus 2 weeks of personal time, ie you take it whenever you want / it gets used up in sickness medical appointments etc, this would remove the issues of the summer holiday crazy pricing, or atleast dilute it.

I know you are going to take this as not wanting to change things and being wedded to the status quo - and this is not that. Believe me, I share some of your feelings about education and change.

However, this would be a nightmare.

You start a scheme of work on...let's say weights and measures
You do this in any creative and hands-on way you like. You might use cooking or D&T and create a lovely, progressive experiential scheme of work.

But Billy was off for the first week of that, Gemma is going to miss the second week. The part where you introduce it or bring it all together in the end is missed by 25% of your class.

When are you going to catch up that learning? How can you assess a child who has had 2 full weeks on one topic against one who missed half - or all - of it?

How would planning that curriculum work?

Open to the idea, but I can't wrap my head around it.

So again, you're just proving the problem isn't education, it's childcare. Schools are not meant to be childcare. Schools are meant to be education. Your issue should be aimed at a government that doesn't value families and doesn't provide affordable and good quality wrap around care.
Yes Poland does have different start times in some places, but they also have excellent and very cheap wrap around care which carries on into their summers and includes food and activities. Norway literally takes away any say you have as a parent and can take your children off you for the strangest things.
Frankly you are just moaning and your arguments lack any innovation.

Surely the answer is just abolish schools altogether and them into resource hubs.

Teachers are an increasingly scarce and valuable resource, they could provide lessons in the hub. Other activities could be provided as well. Most free but some could carry a small fee.

Forest school, cooking, music lessons, sports etc could all be available as could online lessons and specialised SEN groups.

To avoid falling under EHE there would be minimum attendance including proscribed attendance at core subjects or parents could choose to flexischool and EHE with supplementary lessons from the hub.

Teachers would have genuine flexibility and would be teaching mostly interested kids. Kids who need SEN provision would get it. All kids would get a wider range of activities. It works round family life. As long as you have minimum attendance over the year then you can go on a six week trip or take a holiday in June. Teachers also can take holiday as and when as their lessons will only be timetabled when they are present.

Good hubs could incorporate family support services including Early help, benefit support, food banks, so while your kids do a lesson and Forest school you can visit with your DV worker and your baby is in the crèche.

Teachers do their jobs again, ie teach and the wider social work, childcare support is available from specialists in those areas.

There you go, an alternate plan for primary education.

The HT shut down the parents discussion in the parents council and PTA as a form of control. They delted the threats where parents could discuss this and poisoned whatsapp groups they dont like (some of the teachers are parents in the same school).

The money is easier to find when you have a model which generates money. This is really the point of looking at the whole picture. A lot of the teachers seem to think that the money just turns up, we need tax revenue to fund this. Borrowing money leads to inflation which drives up interest rates....

There are lots of reasons that they dont want the jobs, I believe scheduling is a big factor, as many people have pointed out childcare (certainly pre-school) often wipes out one salary.

Other ideas might be for the parents to pay the same as the pupil premium £1455/ the school from there tax free childcare or even the whole £2000 of the allowance, but this often is seen as unreasonable or discriminatory, it would however boost funding. The school is more effective in hours provided per £ spent than many of the childcare options.

based on approx £4.20 @£2k this would allow for an extra 476 hours. vs the ASC which is £6/hr. Furthermore it would be likley that these extra hours could be offered slightly cheaper as the school is already heated, cleaned, admin overhead covered etc.

Well aren't you the bees knees...

... I guess you don't have a load of kids who need you to deal with parents/social services etc whilst you are polishing your own halo.

The HT shut down the parents discussion in the parents council and PTA as a form of control. They delted the threats where parents could discuss this and poisoned whatsapp groups they dont like (some of the teachers are parents in the same school).

So whatever you think the Head's motivation is, they don't want to do this. You are banging your head against a brick wall. Why would you want to try and force a reluctant Head to take this on?

Find a Head Teacher and Governing body who want to trial this. Or set up a free school. This isn't happening and you are probably causing untold stress.

Hahahaha sorry.

I might die laughing. You have to either me on a wind up or the most blinkered parent I've ever heard.

Do you wonder why you were phoned off? Could it be your attitude?

Asking teachers to work shift patterns rather than the set hours they currently do? That's a fast track to losing anyone left who is decent and completely killing recruitment.

Do crack on with your fantasy land ideas and set up your own magic school if you feel this strongly. I'm sure your head would be delighted!

What he is is a man. On Mumsnet. Every single one of his posts just reek of entitlement. Oh me, the important man who has travelled the world over and seen all that education has on offer. I probably don't have any qualifications nor have I spent time actually working in schools. Me, the important man that will complain and complain about lack of innovation whilst myself not actually giving any solutions that are practical or reasonable. Yawn. OP just home school your kid.

That's nice dear.

Our school tries to do things outside the school premises where they can.

However they simply do not have the staff to facilitate this. Especially on days when more than one class is off the premises.

They ask parents to volunteer to assist with this. Otherwise they can't meet the health and safety requirements for adult to child ratios.

So they are forced to keep them to a relative minimum.

In my son's class of 30 there is only ONE parent who can volunteer on a regular basis. Why? Because all the others have jobs with most being professionals and having pretty full on jobs. They need a minimum of TWO to run an activity off premises but given the class ideally need three.

So how do you actually propose to do this? Where are you going to magic adults from?

The school can't afford the funding for an extra TA for my son's class even they have been massively struggling with a few of the kids (one clearly SEN but delays with diagnosis and parents foot dragging on it have meant they dont get anything currently). The disruption to the class on site is enormous. There is also another child who has massive meltdowns. Seeing first hand either have one and how much it affects the class and how the staff are so stretched is a reality check. They don't have the staff they need ON SITE never mind the means to provide more off site education.

You live in lala land.

I wonder how many times he's spent a day volunteering to help IN class or on a school trip?

I am guessing his ever so busy schedule and important jobs means he can't and that's a task for lesser mortals as it's beneath him.

Nothing said suggests he's ever spent time with a full class of little people. He doesn't even seem to like the prospect of looking after his own darlings and thinks that should be the responsibility of someone else.

Funny that.

Lala land is right.

Please, OP. Meet with your MP if you want to. Lobby the Education Secretary (and good luck with that. She doesn't give a flying monkey about education), but for the love of all that is sacred, leave your son's school ALONE.

I appreciate that i could have done a better job of explaining this but this was my first post on here. Its disappointing that so many people take such a confrontational view of change

Sweetheart, if the headteacher and school governors think you are a dick, and everyone on here (parents with no axe to grind) thinks you are a dick, maybe… it’s because you are coming across as a massive dick, and not because none of us are intelligent enough to recognise your genius?

But but but it's my first time 😭😭😭 you're all mean!!!

His task is innovation. Why would such an important man spend a minute longer than necessary in a school that's less useful than a, (insert little mermaid voice) whadya call them ''wet paperbag".