"My parents dont let me watch the news": reflections on 11+ interviews I have carried out

[hannaretch]

Over the past few weeks I have been carrying out 11+ interviews with new applicants to our school -independent day school, outside of London, thought of as the most academic school in our town.

I generally talk to the children for 20 minutes about their studies, hobbies etc and ask them to talk about themselves. The aim is to get an idea of who they are and whether they will fit in with the school ethos. We tend to interview almost all applicants as we feel that a good interview will allow us to get a better view of the individual even those with marginal entrance exam results. They get information on the type of questions they are likely to get before the day to allow them to prepare. We also ask them to bring in an item which they then talk about.

One of the standard questions I and others ask is along the lines of do you follow the news? Talk about a current news story/ what do think about Ukraine/ climate change? type thing. Nothing too major but it allows us to get an idea of their awareness of the world. Most are able to answer with basic knowledge and some understanding of the issues and it often leads to good discussions.

I was shocked that two or three of the ones I have interviewed this year stated that they werent allowed to watch the news and had no opinions/ ideas about the issues. Surely watching the news at 6 etc or online or even Newsround is basic preparation for life? (or school interview at least?)

I have a colleague who is mid 40's who actively avoids the news. Apparently it's depressing 🤷‍♀️ She has an 11 year old who would presumably be in OP's category.
Don't understand it myself I mean I rarely watch TV news but read the papers, listen to radio & glean news from a variety of sources.

nope i see no reason for children to be aware of the negativity that is called the news.
childhood is too short for that stuff, i can only see it causing anxiety and undue stress.

I don't know OP, had the 8:0clock news on last night and had to scramble to change channel when they started talking about porn on people's phones as 7 year old dc still en route to bed.

I’d like to know if you rejected those applicants, or disregarded that part of the interview on the grounds that it wasn’t their fault?

By the way I did get both my kids the week junior which is excellent.

Have any of these children not had any Ukrainians join their school? Surely school talk about some current affairs. I know our local Primaries will have age appropriate assemblies if there has been something major in the news as school will want to ensure that children are getting the right information rather than the gossip in the playground

but childrens newsround is available on iplayer?

Many adults are not well informed on current affairs. I am not surprised their dcs aren't as well.

I have two children who are about to turn 11.
News round is great and yes I would be happy for them to watch that.
Other news hell no.
I personally turned all tv and online main stream news off during covid.
So much of it is scaremongering propaganda. Slanted to put the fear of gold into you and this has really ramped up since covid.
No way would I want my child exposed to that at 10/11. They are just not old enough to process and get to grips with bad / horrific news stories are most likely not going to directly impact them. It causes anxiety for me let alone them. older kids yes fine but not age 10 for my two anyway.

I am that person. It’s all completely turned off. Only get snippets via what is on mumsnet.

Good, the news is depressing.

I used to have terrible anxiety from watching rolling news but thought that I would miss important information if I didnt watch it .

Until, I started working and would ask colleagues about such and such I have read or seen and they wouldn't have a clue.

They are living their best life and don't seem ignorant of major event but just not all consumed by doom news.

I have a read of Google news but no longer watch the news or buy papers.

My mental health can be a bit variable. One of the things I do if I am slipping downwards, is to tune out of the news and current affairs. It really does help! Sometimes people are not robust enough to handle all the depressing stuff.

I think your assumptions and expectations are misplaced.

We're living in the age of streaming services and intensive tutoring and extra curricular classes that are piled on. Families often don't have the time or the inclination to sit down and watch the news together - and when 'screen time' comes around, everyone has their own screen anyway, and parents stream music they like in the car.

Family life is pressured, family time is precious; parents don't want to spend it staring at misery on a screen. Media is fragmented; everyone has choices now.

Many parents don't want to turn on the TV in the evening and find themselves and their children faced with news of school shootings and massacres and horrific images of police beating black men to death, or apartment buildings blown to bits in Ukraine.

I think parents have become aware of the difficulties children have in processing all of this, with no contextual information and little capacity to address it from an emotional pov. Parents have become more aware of ratings for media content and understand that news also contains images and conflicts that can be too much for children.

This. I have come across many adults with very little knowledge of current including teachers in schools. This hardly leads to active discussions in class. I think it depends on families. My dps were avid readers of newspapers and this has passed down through me to my dc but some people were brought up in homes where current affairs were never discussed so its not part of their life.
At times l take a break from watching the news as l find it overwhelming and would relish some programmes with good news too.

I agree with this.

Also many parents are anxious themselves about the state of the world and don't want their children feeling the same way. It's hard to expose them to some news stories and not others that are very dark for a 10/11 yo.

That's crazy. When I was in yr 6, we saw pictures of Ethiopian famine daily, Chernobyl and had lived through and debated the miner's strikes. We watched newsround but the six o clock news would be on after neighbours, 10yos aren't babys they need to know what is going in in the world.

Watch the news- no DS10 doesn’t.
He has a subscription to a weekly kid’s newspaper though. He also watches Newsround at school.

Behave yourself.

Mine get their news from The Week magazine.

For the serious answers:

The news matters.
Knowing what is happening matters.
There is so much age appropriate news information out there, but tbf, even TV news is so watered down generally compared to the past.

At secondary school, going forward, these children who have been protected from reality are not going to have any critical thinking skills, (which start to be taught BEFORE secondary school, albeit not described as such)

I don't watch the news. I read a paper I subscribe to (the times) however the news quality is so poor and biased imo I refuse to watch it anymore. Plus with covid and the war, half the time It's things best left for adults only to see.
I hand select what I think my dd should know and talk through it with her.

Her school discuss current news topics and if boarding they watch the children's news.
I personally think at 11+ they have plenty of time to learn about so many depressing things that are going on. If I was in your shoes I'd look for a more appropriate question at this age even though I know historically it would have been a common question.

I think it’s complex OP.

I’m a journalist by profession and was a complete news junkie from childhood. My school got the Mail (I know) and the Express (which leaned centre-left in those days, pre-purchase by Desmond). The news was a lot of Charles and Di’s marriage, stuff about HIV / AIDS, and Thatcher v Kinnock.

But despite the early HIV coverage being scary, there was generally more light and shade. These days things are either a bit shit or deeply worrying. I encourage my kids to watch Newsround and get The Week Junior, which does an excellent job of creating some light, usually with conservation stories.

Sadly a lot of people don’t share news as a family as they get it on their device, so it’s not in the environment. As an industry we were so excited at tailoring my news content that we never really thought about the strengths of the traditional model in challenging preconceptions and aiding general knowledge.

In my dc's class there was a large group of kids who were not allowed to watch the news but were allowed to watch love Island.......... There is a thread on AIBU now asking 'Could you be married to someone stupid' or similar. I guess there will be more candidates for that type of thread in 10 years time.

Plus with covid and the war, half the time It's things best left for adults only to see.

What about those 10y in Ukraine or those in Western Europe between 1939-45 ? For a sensitive infant school child (age 4-6) I'd agree, but most 8,9 and 10 year olds are capable of understanding these things. Of mice and men is a yr7 text, plenty of misery in that. We read the hand maids tale at the same age. This is such cotton wool parenting..

I buy the Week Junior to solve this problem. Both the regular version and the Science and Nature one that comes out every three months are excellent.