We must stop politicising family life
Toddlers need to be cared for - not indoctrinated
Happy new year! Thank you for reading Cieo in 2024.
I have kicked off the year with an article in The Times exploring Labour’s proposals to increase the number of nursery places:
The Labour Party’s recent pledge to create thousands of new nursery places in primary schools is a credible solution to a serious problem. Bringing nurseries under the control of local councils will make childcare more affordable and guarantee availability too. Some badly needed stability could be injected into a system currently vulnerable to the whims of the market and, with school rolls falling in many parts of the country, making use of existing buildings is cost-effective and efficient. Labour’s plan should be welcomed but it does raise questions. Most fundamental is the matter of purpose. What, exactly, are nurseries for?
Labour’s proposal is for nurseries to be incorporated into schools as part of a “modernised childcare system” available from the end of parental leave to the end of primary school. This all-encompassing approach to the first decade of a child’s life risks blurring the already vague line between education and care. Even when dressed up as “play”, a curriculum for toddlers requires staff to spend time evidencing targets met rather than tending to an infant’s emotional needs. Meanwhile, it is hard to be rigorous in teaching spellings and times tables to older children if tests are considered unduly stressful. The danger is that babies are expected to meet early-learning goals while ten-year-olds are coddled rather than challenged.
Worse is the prospect of politicising nursery provision by using time away from parents to introduce children to values that are not those of the home. If this sounds far-fetched, look north. Scotland’s Care Inspectorate expects nurseries to use gender-neutral language, avoiding reference to “boys” or “girls” and instead using inclusive pronouns such as “they” or “them”. Education Scotland, meanwhile, wants schools to adopt anti-racist policies inspired by critical race theory. Of course, no one wants nurseries to harbour racism or sexism but few parents expect their three-year-old son to come home claiming that he is really a girl and neither do they want their four-year-old checking her privilege before labelling herself inherently racist.
Read the full article here:
This article touches upon some of the key themes I plan to explore in 2024. Raising educational standards requires a focus not just on the mastery of basic skills but on the quality of what children are taught. We need to determine what knowledge is culturally significant - what represents the best of western civilisation - and deserves to be passed on to the next generation.
This means distinguishing between education and indoctrination. There should be no place for sexuality lessons, gender ideology or critical race theory in schools. And we need to challenge the idea that children are too mentally vulnerable to cope with school discipline or academic tests. Part of this involves drawing a clearer line between the roles and responsibilities of parents and teachers. We need greater respect for the family as a private unit not merely a subcontracted state service.
I also plan to keep sharing what I read each month because it motivates me to read more and read better - and my lists have prompted some great recommendations from readers. If you were one of them - thank you!
December was all about fiction and the comfort of favourite authors and genres. Commentary feels like it would defeat the object, so I’m just adding a list of highlights to round off my year in books. This is some of what I read in December:
Muriel Spark, A Far Cry From Kensington
Agatha Christie, Elephants Can Remember
Nancy Mitford, Christmas Pudding
John Buchan, The Thirty-Nine Steps
Daisy May Cooper, Don’t Laugh, It’ll Only Encourage Her
Thank you again for supporting Cieo last year. There is much more to come in 2024!