Is your child suffering with anxiety, read this… it’s
important!
I have received 47 emails from my daughters’ secondary
school since September 22nd nearly 5 a week. I have received at
least 36 text messages from my son’s primary school since the end of October
and he comes home with at least 6 pieces of paper in his school bag a week.
This is some examples of the secondary school communication
Drama rehearsals email, lunchtime revision email, National
citizenship service email, Duke of Edinburgh , carol singers in the village
square email, PTA quiz email, Revision resources, bus pass email, Food
technology contribution email, six form open evening email, six form open
evening feedback email, Sponsored walk email, New headmaster welcome letter
email, Careers talks parent assembly email, parents evening email, parents
evening feedback email, forthcoming fundraising events email, foodbank
collection email, PTA annual Christmas bingo email, community nativity email,
Pre order school meals email, revision guides email (16 of them), STEM fair
email, Email about an email about the newsletter, Email about mock exams and
revision, Working lunch careers event email, school trip email, design and
technology email (she doesn’t take that GCSE)
I received a Christmas card from the secondary school this
week…I’m starting to feel they’ve got attachment issues. It’s a bit like “please be my friend before we pile the
pressure on”.
I find it weird!
My daughter has done 18 two-and-a-half-hour additional drama
GCSE rehearsals since September as well as 4 hours a week in normal class time. She is
now required to go to lunchtime revision sessions. She is getting homework on
the week before she is due to sit her mocks. They now have 2 sets of mocks and
CGSE’s. She leaves on the school bus at 8.00am and returns at 6.15pm (before
GCSE year it used to be 4.15pm).
School talk constantly to her about revision, it is talked
about in registration, in life skills and in assembly.
One of my clients last year had 21 exams to sit.
Meanwhile at primary school… text message about water
bottles, children in need dress up day, Christmas fayre, Swimming lesson
reminder, autumn extreme reading competition, high school admissions, children’s
disco, Reception assembly (my child is in year 6), year 6 assembly, bring in
your plastic bottles, parents evening 2 texts, another text about water
bottles, another text about door entry for parents evening, cross country text,
friends meeting, movie night, reverse advent calendar (8 messages) , swimming
assessments, Library visit, non-uniform day, parent lunch orders (2 texts),
cakes for fayre text, Bike ability (3 messages) Christmas fayre, THOSE ARE THE
ONES I HAVEN’T DELETED.
Newsletter by email and one in the bag EVERY WEEK, reading competition,
letter about parents’ lunch, letter about lateness, elf run, town Christmas light
switch on, letter about pre-school??!!
Sorry, but does it not all just scream desperate from a
system that isn’t doing the things they should be doing when they say they will
do them. Its starting to feel like this pervasive toxic gas
that seeps through my letterbox and chockes the life out of fun times and
family life.
If only a 1/3rd
of the above stuff is communicated to your child in class or assembly, then
overwhelm is inevitable. Too much to remember, to much on the things that raise
money, too much on the SATS. Too much for the part of the brain that needs to
process that stuff which is the pre-frontal cortex, it is the executive functioning
part of the brain that isn’t fully developed until 20-23 years of age.
It feels to me that the schools want to keep that connection,
they try very hard to do that. The moment you are aware and awake that it’s the
steady drip drip of pressure that’s rinsing the fun from your child, then you
may find it hard to agree with a system that has it all wrong compared to let
say the Danish, who don’t receive formal education till 6 years of age and are
voted the happiest children in the world.
There was a news article 8 weeks ago about social media and
mental health, the National Union of Teachers were on to it straight away “yes, yes those lot are the bad guys, those
ones over there, the social media giants. Let’s divert the gaze over there, we can’t
have then pointing the finger at us”. In
fact, they are one of the bad guys, they are one of the heavies that are
contributing to our children’s finger biting and tummy ache complaints and Obsessive-compulsive
behaviours and at the extreme end, self-harm.
Its alright putting counsellors in every school, but school
have got to acknowledge they are also part of the problem.
I understand the education aim is to give every child an
enriching and holistic education, but I would argue that it isn’t happening. Even
the teachers do not agree with what is happening, A survey by the National
Education Union in April this year revealed that 80% of classroom teachers has
seriously considered leaving the profession. The UK have more teachers leaving
the profession than joining.
I have written before about exam pressure, you can read that
blog here. The second link is advice on parenting and helping to take the
pressure off in GCSE year.
What have I done about the GCSE pressure? I have held off
from buying the revision guides, I have spoken to my daughter and decided we
will think about a timetable in the second week of January. I will do what the
above blog suggests about GCSE pressure. I also communicate this to school. I’m
not buying into the pressure.
I feel like I bang on about this all the time, I have worked
with children and adolescents for six years and I have noticed the pressure
getting worse and the effects of that pressure having far worse consequences
than before.
Einstein said “Stupidity
is doing the same thing and expecting different results”, who knew that one
whole system could be so stupid?
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