Children in lockdown

Mine have been fine. At the first lockdown they were aged between 3 and 15. The eldest is at university now. The 8 year olds are full of fun and doing well at school. The two in the middle are fine one has just passed his 11 plus and the other one did better than predicted in GCSEs.

I haven't seen any issues with any of them which I am grateful for.

Was there a reason your GC didn't do their online school work?

We have two lockdown GC, they definitely took longer to get used to people other than immediate family.

Another was in reception year, their online connection through school was basically a teams class get together once a week along with emailed worksheets for parents to go through.

The other five have coped better, apart from our neurodiverse GC who couldn’t cope with senior school after lockdown, fortunately they have settled into college.

It was a terrible thing to do to children. The attendance figures alone are a stark reminder particularly for children from poorer families.

One GD who is also neurodiverse took her GCSEs during lockdown she had very erratic online teaching during that time she did worse than expected and had to retake at college and is still struggling even now.

My son was in his final year at university, and came home just before the first lockdown. He had good online support from them, and definitely got a better grade in his dissertation than he would have done with all the distractions of uni life. He missed out on the social aspects of post finals though, virtual celebrations weren’t the same, and by the time he got together with his friends again life had moved on for all of them. No long term effects that I’ve noticed, although maybe it was easier for him because he understood fully what was happening and why.

DD works at a senior school and her job includes doing the paperwork when a child is suspended - invariably these children are from Year 10 (aged about 15). She says that nationally schools are seeing problems with the behaviour of this age group and it is thought this is due to them having had so much disruption during their final year in primary school and then their first year at secondary.
Worrying my DGS is in year 10!

DGD did her online schoolwork in a relatively short time and got good reports on what she had done. Her DP were also working from home and a younger sibling too.

However, isolation from their peer group did cause a lot of social problems. Friendship groups shifted and some children suffered anxiety as a result when they returned to school.

It did a lot of psychological damage to some children.

On the other hand a friend's GD was about 15 suffering anxiety and school refusal. The pressure of going to school socialising and so on being gone gave her time to heal and she went back to school with no issues. Apparently it was like the anxiety and school refusal never happened. So hard to predict how these things work.

Closing schools for such lengthy periods of time was the thing that annoyed me most about the lockdown rulings.
Fortunately my school age DGC seem to have coped well, but they did have the excitement of leaving London to move to Devon to keep them positive and happy during covid.

Most of mine were OK but a 14yr old GS lost 6 weeks of school in one term during that phase when they were in pods or something and all had to stay at home for a week every time anyone tested positive. Impossible not to fall behind.

I know a few families with children who were born during lockdown, and without exception, they all seem much further behind in their language skills and general social skills than you would expect for their age.

My Grandson who lives nearest me was/is fine. He was just 7 during lockdown. No problems at all.
The other two one older and one younger had no trouble either.

My 3 GDs are all just fine

None of my GC (of widely varied ages) suffered at all. We all rallied round and helped them on zoom and they simply took it all in their stride. We approached it with humour and a sense of fun and they were fine.

Honestly I think children are adaptable and if we didn't make a fuss about it then they were OK.

I am not in the least worried about some children being "behind" - behind what? is the question .... the arbitrary required levels of the national curriculum are a millstone round the necks of imaginative teachers and chidlren catch up in their own time.

watermeadow - I am amazed that your GC had no schoolwork. All my GC had work set from their schools, both state and private, and they were encouraged to do this and we did it alongside them on zoom - and had some fun doing it. They learned a huge amount about computing and even the little ones are now slick and confident in using them.

The lockdowns were necessary - not what anyone would have chosen, but necessary, and everyone rallied round and made the best of it.

It's not about whether individual children we know are OK. It's about the statistics generally. Attendance at school is one indicator.
For vulnerable children it was a terrible thing. I don't think I would ever support the idea of lockdown for children again.

My youngest grandson was born in June 2020. Though my DD got little or no support, he is doing just fine. Having both parents at home with him means that for him his language skills are excellent as he had so much focused time with them. He took a while to get used to us and particularly to people he didn’t know at all.
My granddaughter hated school and relished doing all her work at home. She’s now left school and has a good job.

My grandaughter was due to start school at the beginning of the pandemic, but obviously didn't.

For parts of the day, she had online schooling, where all of the class came together and were given tasks to complete within a specific time frame
The pupils had to log on at 9am each day, to ensure all were engaged and parents of those not engaging were contacted and offered support and equipment if necessary.

Fortunately, or not I was shielding and due to my former career, I was able to work with her each day on phonics and maths activities. She now has an above average reading age. It does not seem to have had a detrimental effect on her, academically nor socially.

I purchased the phonics materials, which she would have been using, which enabled continuity when she did start school.
I appreciate not everyone could afford the time or finances to do that.
Don't tell anyone, I was very familiar with those materials but was sick of of the sight of them, by the time she was able to start school. I thought I had seen the last of them, when I retired!

We broke up the Zoom sessions into sections and DH would take over and read and talk to her, which also maintained our relationship with her.

My DIL was an optomotrist and had to work, my input and that of my DH allowed my son to work from home, uninterrupted.

However, I do know of a number of children, due to start school last year, who were deferred. They had missed out on being at nursery and were just not mature enough to start school.

Luckygirl3

None of my GC (of widely varied ages) suffered at all. We all rallied round and helped them on zoom and they simply took it all in their stride. We approached it with humour and a sense of fun and they were fine.

Honestly I think children are adaptable and if we didn't make a fuss about it then they were OK.

I am not in the least worried about some children being "behind" - behind what? is the question .... the arbitrary required levels of the national curriculum are a millstone round the necks of imaginative teachers and chidlren catch up in their own time.

watermeadow - I am amazed that your GC had no schoolwork. All my GC had work set from their schools, both state and private, and they were encouraged to do this and we did it alongside them on zoom - and had some fun doing it. They learned a huge amount about computing and even the little ones are now slick and confident in using them.

The lockdowns were necessary - not what anyone would have chosen, but necessary, and everyone rallied round and made the best of it.

The schoolwork was fine, older ones able to do their own research and Twinkl was invaluable for younger ones but not all children had laptops, they perhaps had to share or the household did not have one between them.

Children with caring parents probably did find with schoolwork but the amount given was limited in amount and extent.

It was the social aspect which caused such difficulties. It's normal for teenagers to want to spend time with their friends, more so than very young children. Also the habit of getting up, dressed and off to school each day was broken and the result of that is evident in the increase in school absences.

I don’t think any of my GC have suffered long term damage from lockdown. My second GS benefited, really. He is an August baby and the youngest in his year. The time off meant he was able to mature away from the pressures of school and by the time he went back properly, he’d blossomed.

My then-youngest GC was just gone two at the time of lockdown and she craved human contact. By the time lockdown ended she knew the name of everyone in their village, where they lived, their dogs, whether they were grandparents or not and so on. Oddly enough, she doesn’t remember a thing about the pandemic, not even the word Covid, yet she remembers things from before Covid!

The youngest GS was born in 2021 and has no developmental problems at all. His speech is fluent and he’s socially mature with no behavioural issues.

All the parents worked FT, they just had to muddle through as best they could, like everyone else.

PS from my DD’s work with school children, I agree with Galaxy’s observation about vulnerable children. They are the ones who’ve probably paid the highest price. My dd spent a lot of time trying to mitigate the effects on them, even just basics like ensuring those entitled to FSM still received some sort of nutritional support.

Mine DGC were 10 and 13 when COVID struck. The biggest downside was that the younger moved from junior to senior school that year and all the end of junior events - a field trip, a party etc, which his sister enjoyed were cancelled.

For both of them school quickly got going with teaching online. Their parents were working from home, but could work round ensuring the children kept up with their studies.

Once lockdown stopped they returned to their school, friends and usual social life. Now, coming up to their 15th and 18th birthdays, COVID seems to have had little effect on them.

However, with puberty, DGC has been diagnosed with disautonomia, and that is messing his life up far more than COVID ever did.

My granddaughter, who is now 12, coped very well. She is a very competent, extrovert, clever child. It was a very different story for my grandson, her brother, who was just at the stage of transferring from primary to secondary school at the time. He found working from home impossible. He then was supposed to go into the senior section of his (private) school, but really couldn’t cope with the pressurised atmosphere and he moved to a local state school, where he got on better but was still stressed and unhappy. He missed a lot of school. He’s now 16 and in his GCSE year, more confident and stable but still has days when he just cannot go to school. He has a friend (female) who will not go to school at all - not the same school as my grandson - but is happy to do her schoolwork at home.

One way and another, the pandemic really rocked the world of these ultra-sensitive children.

The youngest aged 5 and 2½when covid struck probably found it hardest because they also moved house a long way from their friends. It was a terribly lonely time for them.
DD told me that when they played with their dolls, they would put on an imaginary mask before going out.

One is shy but her DS isn't at all.

They seem to have adjusted well now.

The one who was 10 and now 15 was affected by lack of schooling and missed out on social activities. They got a puppy which helped. Who knows whether things would have been very different. All I know is she's desperate to leave school which she will do this summer. She never reads and is on social media all the time apart from when she's playing football.

It was the social aspect which caused such difficulties. It's normal for teenagers to want to spend time with their friends, more so than very young children. Also the habit of getting up, dressed and off to school each day was broken and the result of that is evident in the increase in school absences.

My teenage GC were socialising endlessly on whatsapp etc., and played games with their friends on their computers, chatted on the phone etc. They were quite happy with that.

They had to log in each morning at school, so that habit of "going to school" was not broken. They might have been in their pjs under the desk - but no different from adults who work from home!

Many parents were home themselves as furloughed and were able to support their children; and laptops were supplied to children who did not have access to them.

School attendance at our village primary picked up very quickly when they were open.

I agree that the most vulnerable children got the rawest deal - sadly this is always so in whatever situation - but I do know that schools have worked very hard to redress this, as indeed they always do.

I suppose I feel that we should not always look on the black side of the scenario in which we all found ourselves. There are many children who were not adversely affected in any way and who learned many new skills during the pandemic.

I regard the school closures as having been inevitable and correct and the local school, where I was chair of governors at the time, worked tirelessly for the pupils in every possible way. Attendance is now at 98%.