And what about those kids? Part 1

In her comment on my last post, Lisa expressed some concern about how kids are dealing with the trauma of this virus. She said she'd probably want to homeschool if she had kids at home right now.

And since I'm a huge advocate of homeschooling (which I really prefer to call lifeschooling) I agree just on general principles. If a person can homeschool and wants to homeschool, I enthusiastically recommend doing so for a million different reasons, none of which are due to the virus.

I also think (due to the virus) there will be many people who realize having their kids living and growing outside the institution can be a wonderful way to spend more time together and that it contributes to bonding, both between parent and child(ren) and between siblings.

I think there will be a significant number of families who find the homeschooling lifestyle to be a good fit for them. While beginning to homeschool was a necessity because of the virus, that recognition of the benefits of life learning instead of schooling will probably have an effect on school choice for many years into the future.

I was reading some commentary on a parenting forum a few weeks ago and was interested but not surprised that several of the parents posting there commented were marveling that little Zoey/Chucky/Ferd no longer had a tummy ache/headache every morning.

If you didn't know this, many children complain of a tummy ache when they are anxious. The school office is often swamped in the first hour or so each morning when kids (often the same ones day after day after day) have gone to their teacher complaining they 'don't feel good'.

Protocol is to send the child to the office where the school nurse will take their temperature. Most of the time, their temperature is fine, they're sent back to class (you're fine, no fever, hope you have a wonderful day)  and that's it. No one calls the parent to say the child isn't feeling well. No one works to find out why the child is anxious, instead dismissing it as the child 'trying to get out of schoolwork'.

So did you get that? Kids are going to the office every day saying they don't feel good, they're given a temperature check and dismissed back to class if they don't have a fever.

This goes on for years and years, although generally speaking, the older they are the more they are resigned to the day-to-day of institutional life which translates into bigger kids have fewer morning tummy aches.

They aren't faking it, although it's not usually their stomach that's the issue. They just don't have the words or the life experience to understand what's really going on with them. 

In their little brains, their generalized emotional anxiety from getting up early, being separated from the people they love and having to march in a line and be 'good' all day long translates to a tummy ache, which is a concrete thing to complain about.
Parents have no idea.

No clue.

It's a really awful thing, but it's just more routine abridgement of a child's rights. A child's rights end the moment they walk in the door of the building.

It's one of the reasons I find the idea of schools teaching kids about oppression to be sort of silly, since the actual definition of oppression is prolonged cruel or unjust treatment or control/the state of being subject to unjust treatment or control, subjugation, subjection, repression, suppression, ruthlessness, heartlessness... I'm sure you can add a word or two.

The fact that most people in the system think they're doing these things for the good of children doesn't change the effects of the oppression. It's traumatizing and the usual sentence is 13 years.
And if you're honest, you see that the public school environment places the wishes and needs of kids far down the list of priorities.

And if *I* had to be honest, I'd say the needs of children aren't even on the list.​

I've struggled with it over the years because the nature of my work means my own contribution to the routine abridgement of human rights. You may find that overly dramatic, and I can understand why you'd think that way, but I see it as factual. No, I'm not standing over them yelling and working to make them feel insignificant or worthless, but they're in a position of having to ask my permission for basic human needs.

Permission to pee, to eat, to play.

I love my kids, I want them to have a pleasant experience while in my care.

I try to say yes instead of no as often as I can, to things like craft projects or using toys in different ways (making Rube Goldberg machines from Hot Wheels tracks and marble runs and dominoes, for example) and to extra snacks, reading books outdoors, messy art... whatever.
But I do have an expectation of a certain amount of conformity.
I have had internal conflict about what I do for a living (or did for a living until the plague sidelined me) but I realized a long time ago that kids will be in day care anyway and they may as well have someone who actually cares spend that time with them.

That applies to school staff/teachers quite often, too. They do care about the kids and believe they're doing things that are good for them. There are amazing people in every school I've worked in.

For every example of a crap person who shouldn't be working with or around children, I can show you 10 who love the kids and would do anything in the world for them.

I am amazed by some of the things I know teachers and other school staff do for the kids, from buying groceries with their own funds to making sure a child has a new dress or pair of shoes for the concert.

People have to work. They have to buy regular shoes for those children they made. Obtain dental care for them. Keep them sheltered and fed.

My commentary about the school system is general commentary. 
I don't hate the people in that system and I do not judge people who send their children to school.

But my basic reservations about how those kids' emotional needs are being met, particularly the little guys, are valid.

We're willing to see and overlook what goes on partly because we were all there as kids. I don't know about you, but I do have lasting hard feelings, sadness, angst, anger and that ol' helpless feeling when I think of the time I spent in public school.

My high school graduation was like what I'd imagine being released from jail is like. I was just so grateful to not have to go to school anymore.

And I don't think most people know what it's really like now, 20, 30, 40 years post our own graduation(s).

Schools, in some form, are necessary until we figure out something better and I really don't see that happening.