I've just read something disturbing. Something that has actually made me wonder whats happening with the UK's Educational System. I've just seen an article posted up on my Facebook feed about the government wanting to increase the number of hours that children attend school, to 45 hours a week! To break that down, that would mean your child will be in the classroom and at school for 9 hours a day!
Here is the link to the article: Article Link
9 hours a day! How in the world do you expect children to sit in a classroom and work solidly for nine hours a day? Some children can hardly manage six. This of course will cause many problems on all sides. So, I'm going to explore them like I usually do.
Teachers/Practitioners
A Teacing role is not just a 9-3 job like most people think it is. In fact it is a lot more. Lessons have to be planned to achieve certain academic outcomes and to hit the children's developmental targets. Lessons also have to stick to the National Curriculum and be interesting enough so that the children don't fall asleep. This of course takes up a considerable amount of time. This is going to put strain on the teachers and practitioners, if they have to teach for nine hours a day then by the end of the day they are going to be exhausted, worn out and most likely wanting to end up strangling some of the children in the class. Therefore the lesson quality will drop considerably and teachers are going to find it hard to keep children motivated for such a long time. Yes children will have breaks and times to eat, however should we really have an education system that runs for such long times?
Children
The children in schools have only a limited amount of stamina. Some more than others. Younger children are going to find it harder to stay focused and work for nine hours a day. Some children can't sit still for five minutes when they are younger, are you really going to sit them down behind a desk for nine hours? Also when it comes to younger children they will be getting tired by the end of the day and keeping them in school until 6pm is going to end up with quite a few of them sleeping on the desks. The days will be dragged out for them and they will not enjoy being cooped up for so long. Can you see a six year old child being in lessons for nine hours a day and then being bright and cheerful at the end?
Parents
Well this should be a good one to argue. Yes some parents will welcome it as it allows them to pick up their children after work, however others will argue that it doesn't give them anough quality time with their children. Seriously, if you drop your child off at 9am into school, pick them up at 6pm, its literally going to be get home, bath child, feed child and put them to bed. There will be hardly any time left in the evening to talk to your child, play with your child or simply help them with their homework. We'll be turning the children into mindless drones who allt he ever do is sit in classrooms all their childhood.
Summer Holidays
So they want to slash the summer holidays too, to just seven weeks in the summer and have longer terms too. Seriously, what the hell are they planning to do. Keep children in school forever? This means that children are just not going to get the quality time they need with anyone if they are always in school. Children won't be able to go on holiday, go to new places or even visit their own family elsewhere in the courty or world. If they extend the term times then its going to have a knock on effect on everyone, there's going to be more and more children who all they know is school. There are going to be children who don't know what a tree is because they've never had the time to climb one.
So why does the government want to do this? Well its all to save money isn't it. They want to reduce the cost of childcare yet they want children to be in schools longer and terms to be extended? How in the world does that make any sense. Most full time jobs are roughly 37.5 hours a week, so how in the world do we expect our children to do 45 hours weeks when adults can't even do that?
They claim that its going to boost Education Standards. But as a childcare practitioner, I'm telling you it really isn't. Its going to do the opposite. Teachers are going to be so overwhelmed and overworked and underpaid that most will probably end up quitting from stress or will just go insane. Seriously, how does the government expect us to cope with the care of thirty children for nine hours of the day, only to go home and do an extra three hours work unpaid on planning and marking then start again the next day?
I seriously think that having children in schools for 45 hours a week is going to seriously damage the UK's education system. Yes it would save a few million pounds here and there, but is the education and welfare of our children really worth that? Can we honestly put a price tag above out children's heads now and use them as capital? Once again this is the way of the government to save a few million pounds; they predict it will all be good and make it sound fine but they are not living in the real world at all. Unfortunately most politicians (And no offense to any politicians reading this) have never worked in a school environment and don't understand how stressfull and tiring the job can sometimes be, and yes its rewarding but asking for nine hour school days is just too much to ask for.
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