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Covid-19 Megathread


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1 hour ago, Nexus said:

Any lost learning can be caught up with, though. The school system in the UK needs a change anyway. 

I mean I'm not an expert in children growing up, but lost learning can be caught up with doesn't entirely seem true, at least to me. Yes, I can learn my times tables later, but I will almost certainly lose out on the basic skills that children need, i.e. handling a knife and fork, interaction with people etc. Those things cannot be taught, possibly caught up on but then it's just going to create a whole other world of problems including some children being held back or worse pushed on when they're not ready. Again personal opinion wouldn't this just show a bigger divide between children from wealthy and poor backgrounds?

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10 minutes ago, stewdogg said:

almost certainly lose out on the basic skills that children need, i.e. handling a knife and fork, interaction with people etc. 

It's a shame they'll never be able to learn these things at some future point in their lives. I hadn't realised we were dooming our children to lives eating food with their hands only.

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14 minutes ago, Chris B said:

It's a shame they'll never be able to learn these things at some future point in their lives. I hadn't realised we were dooming our children to lives eating food with their hands only.

We're impacting a couple years of their most formative years for social and brain development. The way their brains work at a young age is so different from how it is when they get even a few years older. We can't know exactly what the impact is of course but to shrug it off completely is ridiculous and shows a real lack of understanding.

Edit: and also completely ignores stew's point about how once again poorer kids will feel the impact much more. 

Edited by Chest Rockwell
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6 minutes ago, Chest Rockwell said:

We're impacting a couple years of their most formative years for social and brain development. The way their brains work at a young age is so different from how it is when they get even a few years older. We can't know exactly what the impact is of course but to shrug it off completely is ridiculous and shows a real lack of understanding.

Edit: and also completely ignores stew's point about how once again poorer kids will feel the impact much more. 

Exactly, they are in the golden years of learning both educational and socially. The cost of that is quite significant and shouldn't be easily underestimated. 

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I agree with Stewdogg, science studies suggests (or did last time I read about it) windows where learning certain skills are best adopted in development and foundations of a personal phycological profile are set, particularly social skills. That's not to say these can't happen later or change over time but the prime window has passed. Much like growing a plant, it's not that it can't be planted in September rather than April and still grow but it requires more work and effort. 

However it has raised a question, am I odd in that I used a knife and fork before I started school and was taught to do this by my parents? 

I don't remember it being considered odd or special, and the lad spooning stuff into his gob with his hands was considered the exception, and probably called dirty John like the lad who still shit himself. 

Off Topic but someone once went on about how important schools teaching things like home economics is, as how else will children lean to cook. The fact I learnt how to cook from family, friends, tv and books and home ecc taught me only how to make a shit loaf of bread again made me question how different my education was to others. 

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26 minutes ago, Chris B said:

It's a shame they'll never be able to learn these things at some future point in their lives. I hadn't realised we were dooming our children to lives eating food with their hands only.

Maybe they can work out how to use a can opener. 

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59 minutes ago, Chris B said:

It's a shame they'll never be able to learn these things at some future point in their lives. I hadn't realised we were dooming our children to lives eating food with their hands only.

 

31 minutes ago, Keith Houchen said:

Maybe they can work out how to use a can opener. 

I remember when I was off school for a week with Chickenpox and got promptly bullied when I returned to school and grazed my lumpy mash and beans like a malnourished horse.

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Judge I worked with on 30th & 31st has tested positive, so I'm back hiding away for two weeks. Health system is so fucked and swamped here that they're not even bothering to test confirmed close contacts anymore. I've a bit of a sore throat, today but no proper covid symptoms thankfully.  Not a great start to the year anyway.

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39 minutes ago, Chest Rockwell said:

We're impacting a couple years of their most formative years for social and brain development. The way their brains work at a young age is so different from how it is when they get even a few years older. We can't know exactly what the impact is of course but to shrug it off completely is ridiculous and shows a real lack of understanding.

Edit: and also completely ignores stew's point about how once again poorer kids will feel the impact much more. 

I take the idea of that seriously. But suggesting these things can't be caught up on either doesn't make sense, and when the examples are things like 'using knives and forks' and basic human interactions - they're still around people and still having meals. They're not cut off from human interaction. I get the points about development, but acting like they're gone doesn't make sense.

I don't downplay how much time away from other children and structured learning is a problem and has to be dealt with afterwards. But by the same token, I think losing grandparents at a similar time is likely to be an issue as well. If Covid runs rampant through the teaching profession, that's going to end up causing longer-term issues as well.  When I see a lot of this, I worry about my friends that are teachers being thrown under the bus - I'm also the child of two former teachers as well, so this isn't an academic point to me. Saying 'oh, but if the schools are temporarily closed, my child won't learn to eat with a knife and fork and won't know how to interact with people' feels like ignoring the amount of damage kids being in school right now can cause. 

I'm in favour of closing the schools when necessary - the key point being 'when necessary'.  If it isn't necessary now, when is it? I'm also in favour of doing whatever needs to be done with taxes (especially for the wealthy) in order to finance keeping people safe, and ensuring better child care and education.

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24 minutes ago, Chris B said:

I'm in favour of closing the schools when necessary - the key point being 'when necessary'.  If it isn't necessary now, when is it? I'm also in favour of doing whatever needs to be done with taxes (especially for the wealthy) in order to finance keeping people safe, and ensuring better child care and education.

Agree that it should only be when necessary and hope it comes hand in hand with a strong vaccination roll out plan that includes the teachers etc. to get things back up and running ASAP. However, I fear it wont 

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