How much do you think the pandemic hurt your child academically?

[Anonymous]

Academically? Not at all. Socially? Still working on it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I've heard from both my kids' teachers that they're still seeing big issues with handwriting and social skills.

At the beginning of the year, a 4th grade teachers shared than about half of her students were still writing certain numbers backwards. This is likely due to reliance on tablets for math instruction during virtual and in the following year. The 4th grade teachers have reported lots of social issues too, particularly among the boys (who have been described as "wild" or "feral").

A first grade teacher shared that she was still teaching pencil grip and letter formation to her students this spring and that many were still very far behind in fine motor skills. She thought it was likely from missing years of preschool/daycare. She said she's still seeing social issues too.

My DD is in 4th grade and the handwriting is what her teacher commented on to us as well. My DD's handwriting was really bad at the beginning of the year and has improved considerably. I think what has helped has been the teacher's insistence on not using electronics for writing assignments. My DD has weekly essays and reports which are all handwritten. It was rough at the beginning but now it's fine- she started out complaining about writing a paragraph but she can now do a 2-3 page essay on different topics she's researching. My DD also disliked this teacher at the beginning because she was so strict with behavior but now really loves it when she compares to other 4th grade classes.

As for the OP's question, my DD was in 1st grade. School has been a struggle b/c she didn't learn through zoom. Getting her up to speed academically and also being able to handle a full day of school with behavioral and academic expectations was hard. I'm happy we had the transition period in a year where it didn't matter grade wise.

Even before covid, most schools stopped teaching handwriting and its one thing you need to work on at home. Then, come middle school, most things are on the computer.

There's a big difference between not teaching handwriting explicitly and having 1.5 years were kids did almost no writing and worked 100% on a tablet, followed by another year with still a lot of tablet and only some writing.

At one point a little ways into the pandemic I tried to have my 1st grader do an extra math worksheet and she burst into tears because she couldn't remember how to form a 8. It had been too long. That's when I started supplementing, but it still wasn't the same as school had been pre-pandemic where kids did nearly all work by pencil or crayon. She was still online for full school days with zero handwriting.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My sister in law is a public school ELA teacher and brought a stack of essays with her to my house as she’s staying over because her water heater flooded her apartment. I perused though some of them out of curiosity. She teaches the 8th grade. Some of these kids write like they are in elementary school. Serious and consistent spelling mistakes (read is raed, you are is ur, mention is mensin etc), failure to write more than 2 sentences for a 500 word essay, run on sentences, poor punctuation etc. She told me most of the kids are very behind and a good number should not proceed to high school. She said that in the last 3 years the overall quality of the work the kids are producing is down. How much do you think the pandemic hurt your child academically?

Kids seemed unaffected by it. They showed up and paid attention though.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Our teen fell back a year and spent time in residential treatment for suicide. The pandemic wasn't the primary issue but it sure didn't help.

I'm so sorry and I hope your teen is on a good road to recovery.