Why do schools still operate like it’s 1950?

Most kids don’t have stay-at-home parents in 2021 - and our expectations of parents need to change with the times

Last Sunday – at 8:30 pm – my daughter alerted me that she needed to take a sock puppet to school – the next day. 

And it needed to be a pirate sock puppet. 

We hadn’t received an official instruction from the teacher or school, but a question about a sock puppet had been mentioned in passing on the Whatsapp group for her class (which – for some reason – includes every mother, but only two fathers from the class). 

I had forgotten about the puppet in a sea of other messages about which days the kids needed to wear their PE kits, and making sure she had something red to wear for Red Nose Day. Now we had 12 hours before she went to school – and no option of going to a shop or ordering supplies from Amazon.

I actually like doing crafts – but for fun. This was a task. 

I messaged another mom who kindly sent me a picture of her creation. Then my husband, daughter, and I worked together with our minimal craft supplies to create something that would pass as a pirate puppet.

I won’t be opening an Etsy shop anytime soon…

I lamented that it wasn’t that long ago that we were tasked with sending her to school dressed for The Great Fire of London. Because who doesn’t have clothing appropriate for 1666 hanging in her child’s closet? I wondered if I could send her to school in a Frozen costume and suggest Elsa was going to turn the great fire into ice?

Maybe not.

Then this week, we’ve been tasked with coming up with an ‘Eggceptional art project’ involving eggs, art, and puns. I may be stuck in the house this weekend (for the 82nd day in a row) but I really don’t want to spend it doing a craft project that’s been forced on me. Yes, it’s her project, but she just turned 7, and most 7-year-olds aren’t very well-versed in puns. My immediate thought was the theme of ‘Bill and Ted’s Egg-cellent Adventure’ – but I don’t think most kids today would get it…

And besides, whose project is this anyway?

Some parents will see this as an opportunity to show off their crafty talents. I see it as an opportunity to add to Jeff Bezos’s fortune.  But it turns out the Easter craft supplies on Amazon Prime are limited. We’re still in lockdown and there are no mega craft stores nearby.

My options are the supermarket and Poundland. And guess what – their modest selection of supplies has already been picked over by the hundreds of parents with the same ‘get crafty’ tasks (probably by parents of older children who knew this was coming!).

And it’s not just her class. Last month (when schools were closed and the kids were doing learning at home) my five-year-old boy had an activity to ‘make dinosaur fossils.’ It involved mixing ingredients and baking ‘fossils.’ As I perused the list of ingredients, I noticed it called for 60 grams of sand.  

Sand. 

Now, when I was growing up, I had a sandbox in my backyard. I don’t know any child who has a sandbox in SW London. I used to have two garden centres within walking distance, but they are now closed.

So I went to Amazon – but surprisingly, they don’t sell sand in a snack pack. Instead I can get a 12 kg or 15 kg bag. I wondered if any of my neighbors would have 60 extra grams of sand lying around... 

We didn’t end up making fossils that day, and if my son doesn’t dream of becoming a paleontologist, you can trace it back to my failure to make fossils in 2021. I’ll show him Jurassic Park when he’s older to try to make it up to him.

Why do schools do this?

Here’s the thing – schools are still operating like it’s 1950, and everyone has a stay-at-home parent – one who spends their days baking cookies and sewing clothes. Most parents have jobs now – and even the parents who stay-at-home now are unlikely to spend their day crafting.

I actually love the idea of art and crafting and exploring, I really do. But the reality is that these assignments are additional tasks for parents, adding to an already overflowing plate. This is just one more thing we have to organize (and for the younger kids, one more thing we have to do).

And time is but one consideration.

For some families, the constant requests for activities and costumes that cost money might be prohibitive. If 1.4 million children qualify for free school lunch in the UK (that’s more than 17% of children in state schools), they probably don’t have £15 to buy that costume from Amazon. I’d rather the school provide standard supplies (which I would happily contribute to purchasing) so that all children had access to the same materials and felt included.

But since that hasn’t happened, I’ll be getting out my glue gun this weekend.

And brainstorming egg puns…