The number of primary school leavers struggling with literacy has risen by 30,000 over the past year, taking the total up to over 200,000. In the past 12 months 840 million days of in-person schooling have been lost. The Sunday Times has the story.
More than 200,000 pupils will move from primary school to secondary school this autumn without being able to read properly, according to unpublished Government figures.
The findings, which have sent a jolt through Downing Street, show the impact of lockdown on learning, with the number of children struggling with literacy rising by 30,000 over the past year.
Boris Johnson will use a key speech to launch a “four-year emergency” plan to help disadvantaged children catch up.
Senior Government sources said the problem was the prime minister’s top priority after the coronavirus vaccination programme and would remain a central focus until the next election.
A week ago Johnson met Sir Kevan Collins, who is leading a review of the impact of the coronavirus on schoolchildren. He is said to have “put a rocket up” No 10 about the scale of the crisis. …
At his Downing Street press conference on March 23rd, the prime minister said: “It’s the loss of learning for so many children and young people that’s the thing we’ve got to focus on now as a society.” He expressed concern about those “unable properly to read or write as a result of Covid”.
A recent report by the Children’s Commissioner drew attention to the damage done to education by the lockdown policy.
A report by the Children’s Commissioner, Dame Rachel de Souza, found that about 840 million days of in-person schooling, equal to roughly 19 weeks a pupil, had been lost since the start of the pandemic until March 8th.
De Souza called last night for a “supercharged educational catch-up”. She said: “We asked children to make a huge sacrifice to help control the virus and now we need to give them something back.”
Worth reading in full.
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‘A week ago Johnson met Sir Kevan Collins, who is leading a review of the impact of the coronavirus on schoolchildren. He is said to have “put a rocket up” No 10 about the scale of the crisis. …’
Well done Sir Kevan, a man from a military family so the rocket would have been a good one.
But, unfortunately, directed at the wrong individual.
The man with his hand up the muppet’s backside is the one who needs gripping………
It is the children of the poor who will suffer the most
The political ‘elites’ steal enough to send their children to private schools
Or pay for private tuition.
“More than 200,000 pupils will move from primary school to secondary school this autumn without being able to read properly, according to unpublished Government figures.”
Think about that statement. OK, they were not receiving education for the past year…… But, they are 11 years old! What have they been doing for the previous years? By the time I was six I could read. By the time I was nine my reading comprehension was very good. This is from a working class background! The real question should be is what has gone wrong with Primary School education?
Both of mine were off the ‘official’ scale for reading (I recall it went up to age 15) before they left Primary, and we are very far from wealthy.
Welfarism and the nanny state have made too many parents reliant on others to bring up their children (many kids not toilet trained or can’t use a pencil when they start school), whereas parental involvement is crucial in maximising life chances.
Sadly parents today are expected to work 8+ hours a day, anything less is unacceptable to the state, and then they have to contend with a school system that seems to do everything it can to make life hard for parents. They just don’t have time any more.
Oh, dear…
Where to start with any of that.
Absolutely. For years now the state has been slowly getting hold of our children more and more (after school clubs, breakfast) and it seems to me that many of the parents just handed over their responsibilities willingly. Any parent who can read is at least capable of giving their children a good start with literacy, and help along the way, simply be reading TO them. But many are just too lazy to do so, thinking it’s all the state’s job. Well it isn’t!
“what has gone wrong with Primary School education?”
Idiot know-nothing politicians from Baker, through Blunkett to Gove and err … wassisname?
Having said that, the ‘good old days’ of literacy are a myth of selective memory.
I think this figure compounds the lost literacy from last year too. The government statistics say approximately 19% of primary school leavers didn’t reach the required literacy level in 2016, and the class of 2020 has 644,000 pupils in year 6 (not counting independent schools). You’d be expecting 128,000 pupils to not meet the standards on an average year rather than the 200,000 estimated this year.
Numbers
Attainment
I used to teach in a comp in a prosperous semi-rural area. We had a seven-form entry, about 25 kids to a form, and in every form there were five or six kids who were functionally illiterate. Did they get remedial teaching? No. Did they follow the same curriculum as the others? Yes. Did they make any progress at all? No. Did they ‘go up’ the next year? Yes, Did they leave school illiterate? Yes.
The last school in which I taught was a comp in a large NE city drawing its intake mainly from a local council estate, with many having parents who did not work.
The average reading age of the pupils coming into Year 7 was only NC level 2/3; which made teaching them subjects such as History or French quite difficult!
At 7 years old I was standing in front of my class reading and all my 5 grandchildren can/could do the same.
For the umpteenth time, we are subjected to the explanation that this fiasco, along with all the others perpetrated by the rotten crew now in Government, and its truly appalling “leader” (or SAGE hostage, perhaps) can be ascribed “to Covid” or “The Pandemic”.
It’s not. It is entirely down to the way the Government has handled this entire problem, and education in particular. The teaching unions have been very unhelpful (sic), but Boris and Williamson have, as usual, weakly offered neither carrot nor stick. The latter is plainly out of his depth anyway, as witness the various bamboozlings by “experts” on the ways of assessing progress or substituting for normal examinations.
Whatever one’s feelings may be about the quality of much State education, it is manifest that, far from any “Levelling Up”, Johnson’s actions have served only to drive a deeper wedge between the Haves and Have-nots, which will scar this cohort of pupils and be a source of intergenerational division and rancour for many years to come.
Although the teaching unions often catch the headlines, it’s quite obvious just how quiet the rest of the Trade Union movement has been throughout this crisis.
From the word “Go”, it’s been evident that the government’s been buying the unions’ support through the Furlough Scheme, which is hugely popular in the public services, where future job security comes with a government guarantee.
I sense that one of the main reasons why the teaching unions have been driven to militancy is because they can see all the rest of their “brothers” continuing to milk the system for all it’s worth!
I agree about the idiocy of many unions (and the Labour Party) – but I notice an absence of criticism of the main driver : the Tory Party and their backers in big business and finance. They could have turned this round.
I know that public sector workers en masse are not enjoying this. Another lazy myth for simpletons.
And that milking extends to super super rich overseas owners of stores like Harrods!
Can parents still be fined for taking their children out of school to go on holiday? If I had school aged children I’d take them out just for the irony.
In the dulcet tones of Louis Armstrong…. ‘Oh, Yeahhhhh’
A great video
The UGLY truth about the Covid-19 lockdowns – Nick Hudson – co-founder of PANDA (odysee.com)
if you’ve got an hour.
Yeah and a bit late for the EXTRA millions of children having died of starvation around the world due to lockdown!
For Government speak “Levelling UP’ read ‘Levelling DOWN”. Literacy levels in the UK have been dropping for a while and this is why it is UK is not listed in the worldwide literacy rankings by the UN, Unesco etc. We know as UK politicians love to brag that if we had outstanding rates then they would be published worldwide. The lack of information / numbers is a clear indication that standards are low, continual to fall and nearly a year of stolen class time is doing nothing to improve the situation. The ‘elite’ want a large underclass, as too much education, the ablity to earn a good wage would undermine their status. WEF – You will be happy and own nothing.
Oliver May’s article was excellent and confirms what I have thought since the beginning of this debacle. I just wish one or two of the main media outlets would break cover and finally expose to the general public what’s really happening.
[ Johnson ] expressed concern about those “unable properly to read or write as a result of Covid”.
Not as a result of Covid but as a result of you inane, unintelligent, amateurish reaction to it!