'Tough love' advice for parents of university graduates
Is it actually impossible for people to understand that children, being humans and all, are individuals and therefore no one single solution to the supposed problems of education or parenting - regardless of who is proposing it - is going to work for everyone?
Apparently so.
Advice on using "tough love" to motivate children to find a job and leave home after university is being issued to parents by the government.
The guide from the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills admits graduates could find things difficult in the current financial climate.
It warns against nagging but also against being "too supportive".
Perhaps Lord Mandelson should take heed of his own advice and stop nagging us, then, not to mention easing off on the "support" Nulabour is so keen to force onto people. Oh, wait, here's a bit more:
The guide also advises against allowing a few weeks back home to turn into a few months. Its solution is to show some "tough love" by not doing their washing and ironing.
Where my children live and what our domestic arrangements are are none of the government's business, quite frankly, whether they are 2 or 20. How have we ended up paying for some hapless graduate - no doubt recently flown from the warm and feathery nest of tough loving parents straight into the warm and feathery nest of the civil service - to produce this rubbish?
But onwards:
Boys aged three 'must work more'
Boys aged three and four must be made to write more to stop them falling behind girls before they even reach school, the Government will order nurseries and childminders.
So the "problem" is that boys, in general, develop certain skills more slowly and/or differently than girls? Is it a problem? Or is it just a fact that requires no meddling and tinkering with, just basic acceptance and accommodation?
Nope, a problem, it seems, for a government that demands equality and diversity without the diversity part, thank you.
New boy-friendly guidance is to be sent to all nurseries and childminders advising them to get the youngest boys to take more interest in writing, scribbling and drawing – basically just putting pencil to paper.
Oh for goodness' sake. How long before it comes through the letterbox of all parents - hey, mums and dads, here's some expert advice from the DCSF: why not encourage your three year old boy to put pencil to paper?
After a year of school, more than one in six boys cannot write his own name or simple words such as "mum", "dad" or "cat" – double the number of girls – official figures show.
Well, either, boys are really stupid and lazy - in which case how do so many of them end up running the fucking country - or... perhaps they might be starting in the gulags schools a tad too early?
Early-years experts condemned the move, arguing that having more targets to get children writing by the age of five would be "developmentally inappropriate" and potentially damaging, particularly for boys.
Quite. If it weren't for the otherwise impossibility of delivering what might pass as an education to the masses through institutions, no-one would consider the exact age at which children learn to read or write to be at all important, apart from idiots who believe that statistical averages are targets for children, rather than a derivation of vast human difference.
But that doesn't stop Dawn Steamroller:
Dawn Primarolo, the Children's minister, said in an interview with The Independent that after 12 years of Labour government, the gender gap remained a "stubborn" and "worrying" problem.
Only because you say so, you absolute moron! Either, the system is broken, or 50% of children are. I'll let you guess where I am placing my bet.
"It is about readiness to learn. It is part of the development process. There is a gap, and it is a worrying gap," Ms Primarolo said. "What we can see is that boys, particularly on emotional development, lag behind girls. That emotional development is very important in language development through play before they start school and reading and writing.
Dawn, on the other hand, would prefer to blame the broken children - the lazy, stupid and emotionally stunted boys who have been failed by their parents and can only be fixed if NuLabour's guidance on how they must play in a life-relevant way is followed to the letter:
The guidance, which will be sent to nurseries from January, will include advice to set up role-play activities tailored to boys' interests, such as builders taking phone messages and writing up orders, post office employees writing on forms, and waiters taking orders from customers.
Sorry, is the same government that is so passionate about child-led learning? Bwahahaha.
Boys will also be encouraged to write using unusual materials such as chocolate powder and coloured sand to make marks on the floor and walls outside.
And this is a prime example of how they just. Don't. Get. It.
Scenario A: Child spills chocolate powder on the kitchen floor and starts tracing patterns in it with his fingers. Parent observes, and if appropriate lies down and joins in. Parent and child discuss images, shapes, letters or numbers - or possibly the chocolate powder itself - and perhaps develop a story or narrative through play. Parent and child enjoy emotional bonding as well as fruitful learning experience and tidy up together afterwards, demonstrating further understanding of co-operation and domestic work.
Scenario B: Teacher with too little time and too many children checks her DCSF To Do and How To lists for the lesson, complete with targets to be achieved and qualitative outcomes to be recorded in media of her choice. Teacher eyes box of chocolate powder doubtfully and sprinkles on desks of boys only. Girls deem this to be unfair and attempt to dab freshly licked fingers into Tyler's picture of a cement mixer. Tyler snaps. Fight ensues. All children, desks and equipment covered in slightly gritty chocolate paste. Teacher cries.
Ms Primarolo said the new guidance aims to get all nurseries and childminders to learn from those who have successfully narrowed the gender gap.
Or those who say they have (in a matter of years) successfully undone the work of hundreds of generations of human development and adaptation that continues to differentiate men and women to this day.
But there are sensible people out there:
Child-development specialists have opposed the writing targets for five-year-olds since they were first proposed, arguing that many children, particularly boys, do not develop the fine motor skills needed for writing until they are six or seven.
Sue Palmer, a former headteacher and author of the book 21st Century Boys, described the decision as "state-sponsored child abuse", arguing that boys were developmentally behind at birth and needed time to "run, jump and play, in order to acquire the physical control and capacity to focus that they will need later on".
She said: "The Government's belief that they can accelerate human development is just nonsense. This is massive control freakery which will be disastrous for the children. These very young children have become hostages to political fortunes because ministers believe that their political futures depend on getting a certain number of children to reach these targets by the age of five. That is just wrong."
Dr Richard House, a senior lecturer at Roehampton University and a founder of the Open Eye campaign against the early-years curriculum, warned that many of the targets for five-year-olds were inappropriate for the age group. He added: "Many of the much-criticised 'teaching to test', assessment-driven characteristics of the primary school are now invading our nursery settings."
Not that Dawn - or Toby "traditional approach" Young for that matter - will be listening to them.
I don't want anybody else telling me that what they think is best is the way it should be for all children, thank you very much. I think I'll continue to just say no.
Update: Jax covers Toby's article in detail here.
