'What do they even do there all day long?'
/I’m honestly so done with hearing this sentence.
Yesterday night, as we do every Friday night, I took my son out for dinner. It is something we do each week and we love to have that quality time together after a full working week.
We were sat down talking and the table across from us had three sets of parents and about 7 children. The children were at a separate table to the adults.
Two of the adults walked over to the group of children and picked up a piece of paper that the little girl had been writing on. The mother (I presume) proceeded to shout out this sentence…
'What do they even do at school all day long?'
I’ve probably heard this sentence tens of thousands of times in my lifetime by this point. I’ve even said this sentence to my own son (then I caught myself and stopped!).
It is a real frustration of many parents. Many of you pay a lot of money to send your kids to school. You expect more, more, more. And quite frankly, I’m bored of it.
I find this sentence rude and disrespectful.
Sure, your child goes to school all day long but you do realise that they only have one teacher right? Two if you’re very, very lucky.
Sure, your child goes to school all day long but you do realise that they have other children in the classroom with them right? 12/15/16/18/24/30 etc.
Sure, your child goes to school all day long but you do realise that the expectations on your child’s class teacher are insane? I doubt you do!
So yes, of course your child is learning everyday at school but don’t expect that to be enough. It never will be.
If you don’t put in the work at home, the gaps will widen and widen until those gaps will become so much harder to fill and it will become simply impossible to make accelerated progress.
It’s as simple as that.
You choose to send your children to school. That is your choice. Own it.
If you are of the impression that it is not enough - do stop moaning about it. And instead waste your precious energy on actually supporting your children at home alongside what they do at school.
Do you know how many times I’ve had a parent moan at me about their child’s progress but when I’ve turned around and asked they what they are doing every day with their kids their answer has been - ‘Nothing, I work!’ or ‘Nothing, I’m busy!’ or ‘Nothing, isn’t that what I’m paying you for!’
We need some more education I think. Some of us need to think deeply about we talk to teachers. To the people who look after our precious children every single day.
Not only do they need to think about their education.
They also need to think about:
Their wellbeing
Their health
Differentiation
Lesson planning
Assessment
Marking
Record keeping
Safeguarding
Behaviour management
Parent engagement
Working well with other staff members
Extracurricular duties
Playground duties
Lunchtime duties
I could go on and on and on and on.
So stop saying this sentence. And if you’re not satisfied with the level of your child’s learning and curriculum acceleration then do something about it - YOURSELF.
