What is going on with (some) kids?!

[Purpleturtle45]

I have been a primary school teacher for 20 years and I just cannot believe the decline in behaviour and attainment In that time!

Yesterday I witnessed a 6 year old kick, spit at, punch and threaten to kill the DHT and ultimately trash the room and the staff are powerless to stop it as they aren't allowed to touch a child. This is a daily occurrence.

So many children are disrespectful and will argue back to your face now and a lot of the parents are just accepting of this! I honestly fear for the world if this is what the kids are like!

Every teacher I know is looking to leave, they are being driven to breaking point every day! It's all so worrying.

People in general seem worse. Rough, no regard for others, happy to raise feral kids.

Huge decline in the behaviour of children and their parents at DCs primary over the time they were there.

Shit parenting.

Social media convinces thick people that they know better than anyone else (including education experts), and gives them a persecution complex.

As a mum of an autism child verbal high IQ doing quite well after a change of school I can assure you not all children are doing this on purpuse.
Do you know how much you have to fight to get any help? Even if your child has a diagnosis. Which you also have to fight for or pay for.

That said I have quitted my job for NHS. The abuse of staff is extraordinarily high since Covid. No thank. I won't do it.

It’s just crazy isn’t it? We are pushing against a tide of terrible parenting and children just being given screens all of the time. And we can’t say anything to anyone because they might have additional needs rather than just no boundaries at home.

Even just the potty training issue, where parents are just not bothering now because we will do it at school apparently, can’t be tackled properly because it just gets thrown around that they might not be able to potty trained because of SEN. But it’s not that at all. We all know there will be a few children in nappies at school but not over half.

It's a worrying development and not all can be down to additional needs.

I think The Screen, social media and poor parenting are to blame. I think many children miss out on important early socialising where they learn how yo behave and read social cues. Add to that time poor parents, always giving in to children with whatever they want and you get this type of behaviour.

30 years of working with children and young people plus families and i agree :

Excessive unmonitored screen use. Seeing things they shouldn’t at very young ages, far too long zoning out, playing games they shouldn’t or watching videos too old for them.

Never actually played with or shown how to play, social skills, sharing, communication. Lack of good communication skills can go a long way to destructive behaviour as child is frustrated.

Diet: not enough nutrients, lots of junk.

Sedentary life styles. Not enough physical activities from a very young age. To burn off energy etc.

Nothing interests them because of said screen use, quick scrolling and dopamine hits. Can’t use imagination on their own or to play on their own or with others so they quickly become destructive

Parenting styles, limited boundaries, rules. Some parents let their kids do what they want.

Some children are getting labelled with ADHD when it’s obvious behavioural and now they are at an age they can’t control them. There must be something else.

(I absolutely recognise SEN children, unrecognised SEN, masking, social difficulties and meltdowns etc and this is not about those).

Also a teacher 👋 and I agree. I think there is also a massive misunderstanding of gentle parenting as well - people get it confused with permissive parenting. I've led workshops to support parents with behaviour but the problem is that the ones who need to attend often don't.

I am really concerned that staff aren't allowed to touch the child though, OP. "No touch" policies largely left schools in the 90's. I think your SLT need a bit of guidance with current legislation and behaviour management programmes available to empower staff!

I’m very pro SEN children being recognised and getting help and support. I have a sibling that is a 1:1 support in school and they struggle so much and in my line of work i’ve met young people who have masked for years and years until they hit crisis.

However I do not believe every single child with terrible behaviour has an undiagnosed Neuro diversity.

I do think the behaviour and development of non SEN children is really worrying and this is echoed by professionals like teachers, doctors and so on. Just like you have seen with adults in the NHS ( and other public facing roles). Since covid and social media everyone knows better than everyone else and they have an echo chamber over on facebook which spurs them on more.

I'm always really surprised when I read about young children spitting. Where do they learn to do that? Do they see their parents doing it during arguments?

I'm 49 and have never seen anyone spit in anger. It's grim.

I have family members who seem to be good parents but give lots of IPad time. Class it as 'downtime' for the kid.
Now said kid is at school and 'doesn't have a great attention span'. I wonder why 🤔
And that's when parents are good...

The years after Covid were especially bad in early years for behavioural issues and regressed behaviour compared to previous cohorts. There was also a marked increase in SEN and autism.

Our current younger cohorts seem more typical to the ones I saw at the beginning of my career so hopefully parents are becoming more aware of the affects of screen time too young as one of the causes of some behaviour.

Children need face to face interaction and plenty of outdoor and free play away from screens to regulate.

I think it’s lack of connection and so they don’t care. Babies stuck in car seats being pushed around whilst parent scrolls their phone. Toddlers shoved in pushchairs or in front of a screen while parent scrolls their phone. Kids sent to daycare for more hours than they spend with family. No social interaction. Then a society with fewer boundaries and consequences plus the impact of social media. Not to mention the extremes of the manosphere and the toxic “beauty” culture for girls creating rife bullying and harassment opportunities.
People in general are more self centred. “Me time” is like the holy grail, looking after number one, looks focussed adults on weight loss injections and Botox or gym obsessed. So kids are seeing selfishness right from the start and then remaining in their “I want” phase pretty much forever.

Paediatrician here and yesterday I observed a 4 year old on a phone just flicking through extremely short videos, probably TikTok im not sure. I thought to myself what's that kid going to be like by time they are at school? I honestly rarely see a child with a book at work, the ones who are admitted to hospital for various reasons and might spend several days or weeks with us. Of course if you're sick watch some movies and have some screen time but many could read a book and parents just dont bring any in. Thats the area which i work in anyway!

Lazy, shit parents that use send as an excuse not to discipline their children.

I'm going to get flamed for this but in my opinion I've a few reasons I think

Babies being put into creches at a young age because both parents have to work. I think the best place for babies/children is at home with A parent.

No extended family.:Again parents have to work long hours so the 2 days they have off each week they play "catch up with the house/ each other and just don't have time to connect with family. Families live too far away or just don't get on so don't see each other.

Food: is crap, quick fixes no fruit, veg. Takeaways, crisps, sweets.

Screens: how many small babies/toddlers do you see in prams with a phone in their hand. Stuck in front of you tube no parent interaction, no looking around taking everything in. Whiteboards in school with projectors beamed into them. TVs in bedrooms, iPads to help them fall asleep.

Entitlement : everyone thinks there child is special and they are the exception to the rules. Normal social behaviors don't mean anything to them they can do want they want. They want people to drop everything to watch their child twirl and twirl. The child has to be the center of attention at everything. They give their child Prince/princess complex

Then you have the just "bad parenting" parents just give in to whatever their kids want so they don't have to deal with them.

Has attainment declined? I thought the overall trend had increased

Children are exposed to violent or age inappropriate games from a very young age.

Games and short form videos provide constant instant gratification.

Less free independent play, parents intervening in everything, dc not able to solve problems for themselves with their friends.

Parents shield their children from any minor inconvenience, disappointment or unfairness, rather than allowing them to experience and work through it.

Society has changed from being adult centred to child centred. While well intentioned, children now have fewer opportunities to develop self discipline, resilience and the ability to cope with normal disappointment and difficulties in life. Normal sadness or struggle is instantly labelled a mental-health problem.

A small example of how things have changed, years ago, if a child on a bike or scooter was approaching an elderly person, the child would be expected to slow down, wait or give way. Now, it's the other way around. Parents look at their children as the absolute adored centre the universe and have gone from teaching children how to fit into society to expecting society to revolve around children.

Just how these kids will adult one day is anyone's guess. Perhaps they’ll end up having relationships with AI instead of real people, so they never have to deal with rejection, disagreement or the inconvenience of having a flawed, fallible real life partner.

I’ve seen many kids under two doing this, it’s very common and they are usually watching you tube shorts either on kids you tube or the adult version. Hence the poor development we are seeing in some young children.

Behaviour wise it’s complex & imo part of a society shift. We are more individualistic now & people forget that it’s schools who tell children to have a voice, speak up, etc. The days of being seen & not heard are long gone.

‘You have to fight to get any help’
‘I won’t work with people who abuse me as it’s too unpleasant’

These statements somewhat undermine each other.

the videos they watch on YouTube shorts and TT also desensitise them and by and large many younger tweens and teens are now quite hard nosed.

There are always so many of these types of threads on mumsnet and there is always almost unanimous agreement that kids are getting worse: lazier, disrespectful, fatter, insolent and indolent, screen addicted, badly behaved, addicted to junk food, lacking in attention...

We're mainly parents here I should think, are these our own kids we're talking about? Or other people's?

I have two kids with an unusually large age gap. My eldest is 24 and my youngest is 10. I don't see a massive decline, personally

I agree but I was aware that around 5 children in my child's class was written of as bad attitude children. It was undiagnosed SEN. And utter chaos for pupils and teachers/TAs. For years.

My child has been bonkers at school but always polite/well behaved and thanks to high IQ doing not doing extraordinary but acceptable. So no one cared that she was struggling. At all. The other 5 children threw chairs, hit staff and so on. Nobody seemed to care a lot about them either.
After getting a duagnosis and changing her school her grades are better and she is behaving much less bonkers.

Tbh I believe that much of the behaviour within the NHS stems from frustrations. What patients (and staff) encounter is insane. It has really been a fast road downhill fir NHS.

We have chosen to relocate to our native EU country 6 months ago where the school system is different and better suited for our child with AuADHD.

She has reached secondary school age and deserves better than waiting and waiting for an assessment in UK.
It took 3 months here to get it done from arrival.

We both worked for the NHS for 20 years in senior roles but staying in the job or our daughter in the school system couldn't no longer be justified for us.
Fortunately we are easily able to find work in most countries. Not all parents can do that and yes, we were sorry to leave but has settled well.

We have been a no screen family. Only 20 hours in nursery due to shifts. Startedcst 2 yo. I have seen a lot of parents doing this. It's not always sh*t parenting but teachers/TA so often said to us "cut down on screens and she will be fine. Right". It's the new excuse to blame some parents.

it’s also a natural consequence of smaller family size, parents can focus in more.

So many parents are not willing to put their children first. They would rather be doing anything else (on their phone) instead of parenting. They don’t even want to talk to them.