My eldest has school exams this week, and I think it’s fair to say we’ll both be pleased when they’re done.
Setting aside the whole over-testing of children (that’s a whole other issue), the school exams have brought out the absolute worst in the children AND parents. The need for comparing and despairing is running in overdrive at the moment.
You’ve got the kids who are tutored to an inch of their lives, and those who desperately fight against doing any work. They’re getting anxious about how they will perform in the tests. The big hall where they will sit their exams. The questions, the results, the outcomes… Who will come top, who will be bottom, and who will have to change class because of their results?
It’s been the theme of conversation at the school gates and in WhatsApp chats for months now. There are the parents who have been writing out exam notes and coaching their kids every weekend, and those who just don’t have the time or knowledge to help. And then a whole load of us trying to find the elusive middle ground where we’re doing enough without stressing anyone out. I’m not sure any of us have succeeded…
It’s also interesting how much of our own shit this brings up. We all have memories of our own school exams; mind-numbing revision, staring at a blank page and not knowing what to write, the pressure of needing certain grades, and disappointing our parents if we didn’t do as well as predicted. I wonder how much of that we unknowingly project onto our kids’ experience.
We all know the education system is crap but exam grades and academic performance are still the yardstick that society measures success against. Any failure of theirs (to operate in a flawed system) results in judgement from others and feelings of inadequacy as a parent.
So what do we do?
- Untangle our own stuff
- Know what you’re being triggered by and do the work on it
- Widen the narrative
- Have conversations about different types of success and allow grades to be simply one thread
- You do you
- Do what is best for you and your family and detach from other’s opinions. That includes learning strategies, targets, rewards, AND fun and rest.
If you’d like some support for you or your young person during exams season, get in touch and we can arrange a free introductory call.
