The University of Cambridge statistician Professor Sir David Spiegelhalter was recently asked, out of all the masses of data he has waded through during the Covid pandemic, what were the figures that surprised him the most. He said the biggest surprise was that the pandemic had actually been “a net lifesaver for younger people”.
In 2020 there were 300 fewer deaths among people aged between 15 and 30, and therefore “300 fewer families mourning the death of a young person”, Spiegelhalter explained when he took part in BBC Radio 4‘s Desert Island Discs on Sunday.
That was because young people were “essentially locked up”, he said - and they couldn’t go out driving fast, they couldn’t get drunk or get into fights.
But, of course, the flip side of that - as Spiegelhalter was quick to point out - has been that because young people have been deprived of that ability to socialise and interact with their peers, there have been consequences for their mental health. And that means the light shone on mental health - via Children’s Mental Health Week, which is taking place this week - is arguably more important than ever.
Teachers have been doing their best to make it clear that there is a mountain to climb in getting young people the support they need.
How shorter break times affect mental health
They have said that vulnerable pupils have become even more vulnerable, and that there has been a rise in violent incidents “most notably among P1 and P2 children [equivalent to Reception and Year 1 in England]” after their experiences of the pandemic, and that returning to school has been “problematic” for some pupils - in both primary and secondary - who are suffering from “heightened anxiety about coming back”.
The message from the Scottish government has been that pupils’ wellbeing should be the priority, but there have been accusations that this is just paying lip service to mental health when the reality is that schools remain under “intense pressure” to raise attainment.
Meanwhile, attempts to broaden out what we measure in schools - and therefore what we value - with the introduction of a pupil wellbeing census have floundered in the wake of concerns about pupils’ privacy and also about the appropriateness of some of the questions.
As a result, some councils have said they will be pausing the survey until the issues are resolved and others have said they will not be running it. So the wait continues for wellbeing data that the auditor general told us last year was needed to “shift” the focus away from exams and academic attainment.
We already know, however, that every day schools are equipping children with all sorts of tools that they need to keep in good mental health. They keep them active through PE and introduce them to what could turn out to be lifelong passions through the likes of art, languages, music and drama.
Some schools also teach their pupils about practices such as mindfulness that could help them cope with life’s challenges, and increasingly schools are making a real attempt to nurture their pupils and help them recognise their emotions, and manage them.
This is all important. But it is also hugely beneficial to give people - including children - time and space to quite simply do what makes them happy.
This point was made recently in relation to teacher workload - the headteacher of a London school that has introduced a half-day Friday, Thahmina Begum, featured in a recent Tes article about schools that have implemented a 4.5-day week.
Begum was pretty scathing about the idea of wellbeing twilights for teachers or directed-time yoga, when schools could do something “on a structural level...that is actually meaningful” to improve teachers’ work-life balance, namely finishing early on a Friday.
For children, the key to improving wellbeing could also lie with structural change. School is a safe place where children come together and where there is room to run around and play, but research shows break times are being eroded.
The research looks at English schools. but the message from Scottish teaching unions and children’s organisations is that the same thing is happening north of the border. The research shows that, on average, in 2017 children in England aged 5-7 had 45 minutes less break time per week than children of the same age in 1995, and pupils aged 11 to 16 had 65 minutes less.
The result is that lunchtime in some schools has been cut to the point where it is no longer possible to run activities, and there is only time to wolf down some food and get back to class.
So, while we preach healthy eating, in practice all too often we encourage pupils to shovel down their food.
Of course, break times are not universally loved. These periods when there is typically less supervision can be difficult for children who are being bullied or who have yet to find their tribe.
Surely, though, cutting breaks is not the way to solve these kinds of problems? And the English research also shows that “the vast majority of students viewed break times very positively and valued the social opportunities they allow, as well as the opportunities for eating and drinking”.
Now that the Scottish government is investing millions in the expansion of free school meals - and now that schools are supposed to be prioritising wellbeing (if we take government rhetoric at face value) - would it not be a good time to make more time in the school day for play? Not to mention some of that liberating time with friends that children have lost so much of during the pandemic.
Emma Seith is a reporter at Tes Scotland. She tweets @Emma_Seith
