When school feels a bit like the Hokey Kokey

It's been a while since I last wrote a blog post. Mainly because, as a family, we've spent most of our time together. In the house, juggling work, study, playing with a baby and home teaching a 7yo.  Like most families, that juggling act has taken a bit of time to get used to. But we've got there. With a bit of 'ooops' when you've got 3 TEAMS meetings overlapping 🙈

Now though, it seems that we are facing being forced to send our children back to school*. And, here in Wales at least, the threat of an extended school term, taking away our children's relaxation time because someone, somewhere, has decided that they are 'behind'.

Behind what exactly? OK, we, as a society might have to concede that many of our children aren't currently keeping up with the target driven curriculum that has been constructed for them.  And yes, there will be a minority of children who really do need additional intervention that is realistically only possible in a school setting.  On the other hand, most are doing alright.  At home, with parents who love and care for them and want them to thrive in this, most unlikely of circumstances.

We keep hearing about children's need for routine and stability, and how attending a school building for 6.5 hours a day, 5 days a week is how to achieve this.  But how is attending school 'stability' when the kids are all wondering if they'll be in tomorrow?  If their parents are going to get a phonecall telling them that their child needs to self-isolate for 10 days as a close contact of a positive case?  And they get thrown into learning from home once again as a result?  Helping parents to be able to juggle the conflicting demands of their jobs, whilst effectively supporting their child's learning would seem more sensible, and provide greater stability in a pandemic than the alternative.

We've heard countless times about the importance of being in school so that they can socialise with their friends for children's mental health and wellbeing.  But what if their friends aren't in their officially designated 'bubble'?  What of those children whose friendship groups are less interwoven with their own class / yeargroup than others?  Is their mental health and wellbeing less important because they choose to spend their free time in the school day with children they are no longer allowed to socialise with? Not to mention the stupidity of siblings who are forcibly kept apart during the school day 'to preserve the school bubbles'.  

There is no way that an anxious child will learn effectively, and of a child is anxious about physically sitting inside a classroom, then they will not engage or develop to their full potential.  If we try to force our children to learn when they are not 'in the learning zone' then our children will pay the price in later life.

Our society has, for many years, seemed to accept that our education system works well for some and less well for others.  That children from different backgrounds are expected to achieve different outcomes in our schools.  We seem to be a society split by the knowledge (acceptance?) that without school, some children would go without sufficient food, would lack clean clothes and have nowhere warm, safe to spend their day, whilst others bemoan the 'learning loss' that occurs over the 'long' 6 weeks summer holidays and feel pressured into ensuring that their children are tutored in some way through this time to ensure that they don't fall behind (again, behind what exactly?).  

Now we're faced with the threat that our older children will be required to attend school over the summer.  Why?  Because, apparently they've missed out on 'learning' and are 'behind'.  Despite the fact that most of them have been completing the work set for home learning by their teachers.  And at least some of them have been completing additional tasks, set by their parents as we seek to expand and enthuse our children to want to keep learning, when the rest of their lives are on hold.  So, telling them that they are required to complete the work set during the standard school term, at home, whilst subsequently also punishing them for doing so by taking away their holidays, seems counter productive, and downright illogical.  

Why force our children to work during term time, if the work isn't seen as adequate to  maintain the standard of education they require in any case?  Are we really telling our children that they, and their parents, can't be trusted to do any proper learning at home, and that real learning only happens if it's inside a classroom? (Not to mention the fact that our school staff have contracts, and as they're still working through this nightmare, will have used their contracted hours already?)

(*I know you can remove your child from school, and homeschool. But, for many, this isn't an option. Not because you don't want to, but because the other parent doesn't want to. And, it seems, our school system isn't exactly open to a flexible approach to educating children.)