If you follow us on social media, you may be aware we have been having some issues with school and our lovely boy struggling with school refusal, being utterly exhausted, and not coping that well.
It’s starting to come to a head, and we are reaching a point where change needs to happen, for his good, and for all of us.
That’s another blog post, possibly more than one, and we shall return later to what we plan to do.
However, I want to ask, and I want to know why, when I tell people my son, who is only 8, who is absolutely exhausted, on his knees, not coping that we are struggling and that he’s finding life hard, that the reply I get is usually something along the lines of…
“ah, it’s that time of year, they are all exhausted, so many kids are struggling, it’s normal, they are all transitioning” or “they have a lot to deal with, it’s normal for kids to feel this way”. I swear I have heard this so many times. I have seen parents sharing how tired and unhappy their kids are, how hard it is right now, as we trudge towards the end of term, on social media and in real life.
These are primary school kids we are talking about. Children under the age of 11 mostly. CHILDREN!! Why do we shrug off that our kids, or a large number of them, are not coping, and are beside themselves with tiredness and stress as we come to the end of the summer term here in the UK.
Why is this OK? Why are we ok with our young children being shattered and staggering into the summer holidays? We is this accepted as normal?
Why are we allowing the school system and it’s ridiculously over extended and pressurized curriculum where our children are being forced to work harder and learn far more than is appropriate for their ages, in order to meet targets set by a government that doesn’t care about our kids, but the results churned out by schools…? School should not feel like a horrible place that children have to cope with.
Why?
Because school is free, and it’s basically childcare on many levels and we are indoctrinated into thinking that this is how it should be and because the school says it’s ok for our kids to be this way, then it must be. Because we hand our kids over to school every day and we accept that they get to have a say in our kids lives even when deep down we may not think that school is always right.
Our system is hurting our kids and we are rolling with it.
It’s wrong. It is not ok for small children who should be happy, relaxed, not stressed to be under so much pressure.
I have reached the point where I don’t want that for my children any more. Particularly for my small son who already struggles to cope with certain things.
It is not ok, and if you think it is, I would seriously challenge you to tell me why it is?
I agree with you. We need to be more aware of what is just tiredness, and what is exhaustion and not coping.