Parents of 5th graders - let’s talk

[Anonymous]

Socially/behaviorally, I think the issues are a result of the screen generation of parenting. Some kids are totally and completely screen addicted at shockingly young ages. Parents can't run into Target for 15 minutes without handing the kid a phone. The amount of kids using their computers at inappropriate school times is high. Defiance/ignoring of teachers is also high.

I work in an ES across multiple grades.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Socially/behaviorally, I think the issues are a result of the screen generation of parenting. Some kids are totally and completely screen addicted at shockingly young ages. Parents can't run into Target for 15 minutes without handing the kid a phone. The amount of kids using their computers at inappropriate school times is high. Defiance/ignoring of teachers is also high.

I work in an ES across multiple grades.

Agree

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Socially/behaviorally, I think the issues are a result of the screen generation of parenting. Some kids are totally and completely screen addicted at shockingly young ages. Parents can't run into Target for 15 minutes without handing the kid a phone. The amount of kids using their computers at inappropriate school times is high. Defiance/ignoring of teachers is also high.

I work in an ES across multiple grades.

Yep. My kids (8th graders) call these ipad kids (generally 4th and below).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I see fewer effects in my 5th grader’s class than in my 8th grader’s class.

Same. I think the younger ones are more mature than the older ones where at the same age.

[Anonymous]

Learning disabilities are not generally flagged by schools till 2-3. If you knew your child was struggling you need to get them help. We taught at home long before Covid.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I teach that age-group and yes; the changes are profound. Not in every kid, but in a very significant cohort.

My child didn’t get the multiplication table memorized. It was started and just got lost in the whole mess. What can you suggest to strengthen this?

NP. I am not a teacher but I taught my kids multiplication anyway. Just buy some flash cards and some math multiplication card games (sold on Amazon). Quiz your kid in the car on the way to soccer. Has to be fun and consistent - and it can take a concerted effort for some kids.

I am a sub. I am always surprised when I sub for 5th and 6th grade classes and they still don’t have their basic math facts down cold (including addition, subtraction, multiplication and division). It makes math so slow. I agree, flash cards and they also have online math facts games. If they just spent 10-15 minutes a day….

Schools don’t teach spelling, grammar, math facts. Parents have to do it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I feel like every parent who has kids with issues attributes them to the lockdown; whatever the age. I don’t see how staying at home for a year can alter every generation of kids so much. And if it was lockdown, why is it your kid and not all the kids in your kid’s grade?

I think that when we are seeing immaturity and learning difficulties across age groups it has as much to do with parenting, copious screens at home, and copious screens in school. Many parents think they’re “on” their children’s behaviors, but they aren’t. They let many many MANY things go and favor their children instead of the good of the group. If we went back to the school days before smart boards in the classroom and chromebooks in every hand, we would see better behavior. If kids weren’t handed iPhones at the store and iPads at restaurants to keep them quiet they would be better off. I don’t think it was the lockdown, I think it was the shift in parenting that came with it and that hasn’t gone back.

The bolded is an argument in favor of Covid having a significant impact, in my opinion. It was a major stressor event for some (but not all) parents, similar to a job loss or divorce, so heavily impacted how some people parented. And it causes many kids to be in screens much more often during the duration of school closures/hybrid schedules than they would have been otherwise -- some kids were using screens for school, entertainment, and socializing for the duration of social distancing, which for some places lasted a full year. If that happened during a key developmental time, I could see it having a long-term impact. Especially if combined with parents having their own mental health crises (these spiked during Covid).

I think my own kid weathered this ok but can understand why many kids might be struggling.

I agree that covid necessitated more screens at the time. But kids have been back in school for 2 years now, longer than the covid shutdown. And kids are screen obsessed. And they are on them a lot. At home and school. I am a teacher and I’m anti-screen. I do as much as I can on paper. But when 5th graders have their own phones and have tik tok and YouTube and constant access to social media—it’s destroying their mental health and their ability to sustain their attention…yet parents are afraid to take the phones away. There’s also a victim mentality culture right now (amongst adults), which feels exacerbated by social media. We complain about work being too much, we complain about the weather, we complain how the past changed everything. Teachers (and like I said, I am one) are complaining more than ever. Is it hard? Yes! But I feel like the complaining is making it worse. And we need solutions, not more complaining. Same with people who feel Covid messed up their kid. Sure there are some who were more profoundly affected than others. But please don’t discount the screens and lax parenting and shift from unstructured play to structured activities and sports teams being the focal point of many kids lives. And…nobody knows it their child would have had these same problems had Covid not happened. Depression, anxiety, learning disabilities, etc all existed before Covid.

It’s time to move on and stop blaming and start thinking of solutions. What can we do to get kids back on track? How can we hold boundaries so they feel safe? How can we have high expectations of them, while also letting them play and be children. My first suggestion is to take away their phones. And stop the chromebooks in school except for special occasions.

You are very wise. I agree with you 100%.

We still have relaxed expectations in my public school district due to Covid. Why?

I am a parent sitting on district committees and nobody can quickly summarize the degree to which we are still impacted by the pandemic learning loss.

The chromebooks are 100% now but the kids aren't learning more/better and the teachers are very inconsistent with the learning management/grade portal. And there is epidemic use of phones in class for non-schoolwork purposes.

As a parent, I've allowed too much screen usage. But not sure what to do about it. My kids are doing reasonably well in school. I just wished their free time was better spent.

[Anonymous]

My DS is in 5th and for him I think his handwriting is the only thing that has suffered. He wouldn’t have otherwise been using a laptop to do work in 2nd grade when that skill was really developing. We supplemented from the summer after 1st through the middle of 3rd with small group tutoring, I think that made a huge difference and has paid off in his math and reading.

I think a lot of the issues, regardless of grade, is that parents and adults were greatly affected more than we realize and it’s trickled down to kids.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Learning disabilities are not generally flagged by schools till 2-3. If you knew your child was struggling you need to get them help. We taught at home long before Covid.

It was really hard for current 5th graders to get testing in 2nd or 3rd because of Covid. Schools weren't doing testing or IEPs. Totally not legal, but that's what happened where I was. Private testing was hard to get too and tutoring was virtual or with masks. A lot of parents didn't have the skills to help their kid. It was a mess.

[Anonymous]

My 5th grader and her friends seem largely unaffected. It hard to know for sure of course, but they’ve been amazingly resilient.

My 1st grader (turned 3 in Feb 2020) who missed 18 months of preschool has behavioral challenges and the teacher says there’s a lot of it in their classroom. Again, hard to know for sure, but the shutdown seems to have a bigger effect there. It was also hard to know if delays (potty training, speech, focus) were typical absent peers so we didn’t really flag some of her problems until later.

[Anonymous]

DS and his friends seem mostly unaffected. The only thing I've noticed is that some still seem younger than I thought kids would be who are about to enter MS. Not necessarily immaturity, I'm not sure how to describe it. I was shocked by how many of DS' friends still believe in Santa and the like.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I teach that age-group and yes; the changes are profound. Not in every kid, but in a very significant cohort.

My child didn’t get the multiplication table memorized. It was started and just got lost in the whole mess. What can you suggest to strengthen this?

NP. I am not a teacher but I taught my kids multiplication anyway. Just buy some flash cards and some math multiplication card games (sold on Amazon). Quiz your kid in the car on the way to soccer. Has to be fun and consistent - and it can take a concerted effort for some kids.

You’re right, I guess there’s no short cut. It was much easier playing math games with first and Second graders.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Socially/behaviorally, I think the issues are a result of the screen generation of parenting. Some kids are totally and completely screen addicted at shockingly young ages. Parents can't run into Target for 15 minutes without handing the kid a phone. The amount of kids using their computers at inappropriate school times is high. Defiance/ignoring of teachers is also high.

I work in an ES across multiple grades.

It’s sad to see babies or toddlers in a stroller out and about and they are watching a TV program. This has become so common. Then you see the ones with no screen and they are engaged with their surroundings, smiling at people, looking around. I just don’t get it.

[Anonymous]

I have a third grader, and I think it affected their age group the most. He was in Preschool and then kindergarten during the lockdowns. I think the most long-term damage is kids who are currently 9 and 10 years old.

[Anonymous]

Our public school got rid of timed math quizzes for addition/subtraction/multiplication/division facts because it was "too stressful" and "made kids feel bad" when they didn't know their math facts. I kid you not.

And here we are, with a whole generation of middle schoolers who don't know what 45 divided by 9 is.