Kids are starting school in nappies — but ‘parent bashing’ isn’t the solution

Walking up stairs, eating with a knife and fork, using the toilet unaided.

These are just some of the skills listed on Starting Reception, a newwebsite which adviseson how to prep their children for their first weeks and months at.

Kindred Squared, thewho partnered with the government on the website, found that teachers say 33% of children in theiraren’t school ready.

They cite issues like not being able to hold a pencil, not having basic language skills, and even delayed walking.

The NHS already provides milestone guidance for children at six months, and at one and two years old. But parents are pretty split when it comes to who is responsible for teaching their child key development skills, with 51% of parents aged 18-34 believing it’s up to the school.

But it’s just not a case of ‘blame the parents’. The website has been created, partly because evidence shows children born during the pandemic are falling behind.

have found a 23% decrease in so-called pandemic babies’ scores in cognitive tests, and Kindred Squared say that nine in 10 primary school teachers believe that children’s speech and language issues have worsened since 2020.

‘It’s like putting a plaster over a gaping wound’

Parenting specialist Kirsty Ketley agrees Covid has had an impact on school-readiness, but highlights the loss of support systems that were once in place for parents.

‘SureStart Centres were closing down before 2020, but then many shut over the pandemic and never came back,’ she tellsMetro.

‘Volunteer-led groups, like the ones found in village halls, where parents could meet up and exchange stories and get information, haven’t reopened in the same numbers.

‘Some health visiting teams have also now significantly reduced their opportunities for parents to speak to someone or see in person.’

Kirsty adds the new website ‘feels like parent bashing’. She says: ‘It’s making it a parent problem, when it’s the government that has taken away the support.

‘That village that we talk about that we want to raise kids is becoming smaller and smaller.

’You can’t knock free information, but it does feel like they’re trying to paper over the cracks.’

‘Being a parent is overwhelming’

Mum-of-one Emma* has been a primary school teacher for 16 years, but recently, she’s seen an increase in some pupils without the appropriate skills required for school.

‘We had a case where a child in year two was still in pull-ups,’ Emma tellsMetro. ‘And, when we do home visits, we find that some children are still in nappies. We have to ask parents to toilet train over the summer holidays.’

But Emma believes that parents are struggling now more than ever. ‘Babies born during lockdown and after didn’t really get any socialisation in their first year, and so have become incredibly reliant on the adults around them.

‘Pre-lockdown, children were able to go to wider family or neighbours. They would have had access to baby groups, drop-ins and the like. Lockdown children weren’t able to have this until they were a year to 18 months old.’

Emma says there are other factors at play too.

‘We’re also attached to our phones a lot more,’ Emma adds. ‘I get it, being a parent is overwhelming, so sometimes you just want to sit and scroll and let your children get on with it.

‘But it means interactions and spoken language are not happening as much.’

As a result, Emma say some of her pupils now lack ‘relationship skills around playing games,’ the ability to ‘communicate their feelings,’ and might struggle ‘getting changed for PE.’

‘We also see kids being quite distressed to leave their parents when they first start school,’ she adds. For these families, the guidance can only prove helpful.

Who is responsible for teaching children basic skills?

Kindred Squared asked parents who they thought was responsible for teaching children certain tasks. The results show the percentage parents who believe that parents are responsible for the following skills:

But Emma, who works in an inner-city school in Manchester, where many children speak English as a second language, adds that those parents who are most likely to access the Starting Reception website, aren’t the ones who need it.

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‘The parents who would check it, are the ones whose children are already going to be school-ready,’ she says.

‘Without prompting, or a professional either printing it off or giving the link, some parents at my school would not be able access it,’ she reflects.

But, she points out that extra resources are surely only a good thing. ‘If the research is saying that children are not school-ready, why wouldn’t we do something to help parents in making sure that they are?’

Supernanny Jo Frost accuses parents of ‘neglect’ for missing basic task

Last month, the government confirmed it would be launching a national toothbrushing campaign to ‘revive’ the country’s oral health and ease the burden on NHS dentists.

Taking place in nurseries and schools, the programme aims to encourage children to brush their teeth with fluoride toothpaste and has been given £11,000,000 in funding, targeting three to five-year-olds in the most deprived areas of England.

But Supernanny Jo Frost was less than impressed, writing in a controversial Instagram post: ‘Parents, if you are not supervising your young children or brushing your VERY young children’s teeth that is PARENTAL NEGLECT.’

‘What else will schools do for parents? First potty training now teeth brushing,’ the caption of Jo’s post added.

But as childcare expert Kathryn Lord previously toldMetro, for some parents, working out how to get their children to ‘want to’ brush their teeth can be a source of great difficulty.

In her view, this can also be complicated should they ‘run out of time when they have several children, or children with neurodiversity’ and a ‘stressful school run’ to complete.

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