Parental responsibility has clearly gone missing when it comes to education - Ismail Mulla

I hate to sound like a grumpy old man but whatever happened to parental responsibility? Back when I was whipper snapper, just the thought of bunking off school would result in a glare from the parents. Any protestations would be met with a clip around the ear.

Things are different these days. If anything, parents are at times proactively taking their child out of school.

What a sad state of affairs that we no longer seem to value education for children. Spare me the nonsense of parents knowing best. We all know that the Friday off isn’t being used for algebra revision or understanding and identifying adverbial phrases.

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It’s so that lazy parents, usually working from home, can get an early start to the weekend.

Pupils in a school classroom. PIC: Danny Lawson/PA WirePupils in a school classroom. PIC: Danny Lawson/PA Wire
Pupils in a school classroom. PIC: Danny Lawson/PA Wire

The pandemic has changed the way we live and work. I’m all for technology making communication easier.

But the one thing that cannot be underestimated is in classroom learning.

There was a time and a place for online learning. When the pandemic struck the government was too slow off the mark to ensure every child had access to a computer to enable them to continue learning.

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It doesn’t matter how fancy a laptop a parent invests in, it is no substitute for in classroom learning.

I occasionally do some part-time lecturing at Leeds Beckett University. It is equally rewarding and challenging. During the Covid lockdown of 2020, I had to deliver lessons online.

Although these were young adults, I still encountered issues with getting them to comprehend certain parts of the module. Imagine getting a child with a multitude of distractions around them to concentrate on the important matter of education.

Society has a thirst for reinventing the wheel. How can we do things faster, smoother and make it shinier? But sometimes the old ways are the best and there is simply no substitute for children being in the class amongst their peers and in front of their teacher.

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The rise in “unorthodox” education since the pandemic, with part-time timetables and flexi-schooling on the rise, should concern anyone who cares about a healthy society.

The Education Secretary needs to get a grip on a system that has become “fractured and fragmented for too many children”, not my words but the words of Ofsted chief inspector Sir Martyn Oliver.

I wouldn’t class myself as Ofsted’s biggest fan, it is a flawed department driven by bureaucracy, but its job isn’t made easier with the way that school absences are recorded.

Schools can currently record flexi-schooling, where parents home-educate their children for part of the week, as an authorised absence which makes it difficult for the watchdog to track how many children are being partially educated at home.

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Far too frequently, the work of teachers is undervalued these days. In fact, the pandemic gave us a glimpse into the thinking of some parents when it comes to schooling. Schools were a glorified creche for them to thumb their kids off to for the day.

A teacher can change a child’s life for the better. I still look back at all the teachers that played such an important role in helping me get to where I am today.

For example the late Mr Robinson, an art teacher whose form group I was in, daubed ‘Do not procrastinate’ in big letters on his old chalkboard (he refused to let it go despite the switch to smartboard). It’s a piece of advice that has stuck with me.

It’s not just access to teachers that children are being deprived of. Children don’t get the time and space they need to develop into the confident, competent adults that they need to become ready for the world of work.

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Everyone remembers the bumps and scrapes we had in the school playground. Whether it was playing football or just running around during a game of tig. Friendships made, unmade. It was all part of growing up.

At a time when young people find it increasingly difficult to even answer the phone owing to a lack of social skills, surely keeping them away from social interactions is counter productive.

A wider reset is needed when it comes to education. The curriculum needs to better reflect the needs of industry. For example children don’t necessarily need to know the component parts of a printer but learning how to code would be hugely beneficial.

However, it all starts with parents taking responsibility for their child’s education.

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