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Comment by wonderwonder | Hacker News Reader

"I think this digital child managing system sounds moderately dystopian to be honest" I disagree, I have 2 kids in elementary school and it is very useful to be able to look up what the kids have scheduled for the day to determine what to dress them in, see what's for lunch and if I need to pack them something if they won't like the available option. Most importantly though its very helpful to look up what homework / tests are due as the kids tend to not manage this so well themselves. It also allows me to check their grades. Its not so much a "child managing system" as a way for the parents to be empowered to ensure their kids are doing well and what is going on in their school lives. As a parent, my kids are my responsibility, any tool I can use to be better at that is a good thing.

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As I said, as a kid I would have hated this. I don't think kids benefit from this kind of overbearing parenting in the long run. Better than being neglected, I guess. Perhaps this is useful for very young children, but knowing myself I would have broken out of there as quickly as possible.

I can understand personal preference of a child but study after study show that children whose parents are actively involved with their education and schooling get better results.

I guess this comes down to the definition of actively involved versus overbearing.

There is a fine, fine, fine line to walk between the two. Knowing how your kid is doing, asking questions, and being interested in their schooling is okay. Using it to force action without learning consequence is not.

It is, sometimes, okay for a kid to miss an assignment because they're not great at time management. That's how they learn consequences for their actions.

Anyway, you two have a fundamental disagreement, I believe, about the level of interaction and control required to be involved.

Kids primarily benefit from parents education and their engagement in their children. But more by providing stimuli, not by surveillance.

This isn't a black and white issue and as I said, it depends on their age. As I understand it we are talking about more or less preteens here.

Correlation does not equal causation. Parents more involved in school are more likely to be involved at home more generally.

Active involvement = parent teaches child various skills and ideas, reads books aloud, suggests interesting problems to solve, works together with them on extra-curricular projects, obtains materials and resources related to the child’s personal interests, ...

Micromanaging the completion of their school-assigned busywork is something different.

I don't know if you have kids, I am guessing not, if I am wrong, my apologies. Knowing what your kids have due for school is not micromanaging its a core part of being a good parent. I know if my kid has a math test so it lets me sit down with him and review for his test, it allows me to ensure he knows the basis for whatever comes next in his curriculum. Terribly overbearing parents are not good but I think people are for some reason assuming the worst from this app and more so the parents that use it and it seems very odd to me. I ensure my kids study for their weekly spelling tests for 10 minutes a day, and review with them before tests and that is seen as micromanaging and negative? Strange times.

Active involvement would be talking to your children and asking them what they have for school.

Looking up their schedule on a website is passive involvement.

I'm relieved these systems didn't exist when I was a child.

(Reading about people) breaking Blackboard et al was some of the best fun in school days....

Of course these systems existed, they just used paper or other mediums. Did you not receive calendars, directory books or yearbooks, permission slip for upcoming museum trip, etc? Save the date slip or important school numbers magnet for the fridge?

If there's one thing I remember from my own childhood, and know from my various nieces and nephews - children can't be expected to tell the whole truth, or sometimes even remember the whole truth.

One bad test, one missed homework, turns into a spiral of shame that makes children hide the truth out of a fear for their parent's and other trusted adults' disappointment (real or imagined). If my parents knew the truth - when I know the truth - we can fix it before it spirals into an unfixable situation, and not after.

Not all children are perfect, nor perfectly able to remember every event and assignment they have.

My oldest kid is 5, but I hope when he is older I can leave him to handle his own schoolwork (offering help if he wants it).

> study for their weekly spelling tests for 10 minutes a day

Aside: Spending 1.5+ hours per week between home and school studying spelling per se in the way students typically study spelling is an outrageous waste of time.

Arguably studying spelling per se is a waste of time in any quantity (as compared to spending that time on intrinsically motivated reading and writing, and learning how to spell as a side effect), but anyone who cares enough about this to devote hundreds of hours to it should set up some kind of spaced repetition system.

> I can leave him to handle his own schoolwork

It turns out that kids are not adults. Part of raising them is teaching them life skills such as time management is something that takes a of time and management. You may be lucky and have a child that manages time well, or you may have a contrarian that does what they want. Part of being that manager, is knowing exactly what you are managing and having readily available data is part of that.

I am contrary. Around 12, I rejected homework, learned to manipulate and lie instead. It took many detentions and frustrated parents to get me reoriented. I can completely understand kids who don't like being told to be a rote learning little worker bee who does what's told without question. Why do this at all? Why do it this way? No one else cares, they just want it over with as fast as possible, but the same crap comes up over and over again as if to make kids comfortable being bored, and doing what they're told. It's such magnificent bullcrap.

Rejoice if your kid is difficult. They see a problem. Adults need to help them understand it.

If your kid is a critical thinker and has problems with the school system, but is still learning, that's fine. If your kid is two years behind his age group in mathematics- that's less fine.

Part of being a good parent in this scenario is being able to tell the difference. Data can probably help- is my kid getting a D because he doesn't turn things in, or because he can't do long division?

Hacker: Education in this country is a disaster. We're supposed to be preparing children for a working life. Three quarters of the time they're bored stiff!

Sir Humphrey: Well I should have thought that being bored stiff for three quarters of the time was an excellent preparation for working life.

- Yes Minister (Season 2, Episode 7 : National Education System)

sure, studying spelling is probably a waste of time with today's technology but that doesn't change the fact that he has a spelling test every Friday and he is going to feel better about himself if he passes vs fails. Its not a bad thing to set your kids up to succeed within the given system. Its fine to be a rebel but you must also understand that going to school involves testing and as a parent you don't always get to choose the subjects. I very much think that the self esteem my kid gains from getting good grades and actually learning to study is well worth the horror of having to spend a few minutes a day with his dad hanging out, practicing spelling, learning math and chatting about their day.

If you want to set your kid to succeed at spelling tests per se (and he doesn’t have enough past reading/writing experience to know the words already), you could get a list of likely words a few months in advance and put them into some kind of spaced repetition system (whether electronic or based on paper flash cards).

You’ll pay back your initial time investment within a month or two, and you’ll end up with a dramatic improvement to efficiency and long-term retention, as well as teaching a useful tool/skill that can be put to good effect if the kid ever needs to memorize trivia for med school or bar quizzes.

Trying to cram-learn a new list of miscellaneous things every week is a fool’s game. The key to human memory is connections, context, and repeated exposure, not brute-force effort.

Personally I always just read science fiction books hidden in my lap during spelling time in school, and my teachers gave up on trying to get me to study lists of words I already knew how to spell. My older brother’s strategy was to just do poorly on spelling tests because he thought it was a waste of time: never seemed to hurt him, and decades later he can spell as well as anyone. YMMV.

I think it’s good to be involved but an app that passes information to the parent, essentially bypassing the child, is disempowering to the child. The child should know and be able to tell you she has a math test. If she is not good at managing that sort of thing, then she needs to get better. Using an app to circumvent the child’s own management of that stuff is at least similar to micromanaging.

And quite the opposite, it reinforces the idea that they don't need to remember it so they never will.

Are you able to tell us, without looking at your calendar, every meeting you have for the next week, every assigned task without consulting your task manager, all without fail and with perfect recall of the details?

Expecting more from a child's brain than you do of yourself is folly.

Should a child know what calendars are for? It seems like that could be a useful tool for them to have in their toolkit.

At least for my nieces and nephews, they have as much access to their scholastic portal as their parents. So yes, such calendars are absolutely useful tools. A good thing for parents and children to look at together.

And much like their calendars, we do not ourselves set every event that appears on our calendars.

Well I specifically can tell you every meeting and assigned task, but that's because the meetings are at standard hours and I work on larger open ended projects.

I was also absolutely terrible at remembering what's for homework and when the school exams are... so I learned to write it all down in a notebook so I didn't miss anything. No fancy parent control required. That was basically standard practice ingrained from first grade onwards.

> If she is not good at managing that sort of thing, then she needs to get better.

...And how do you think that happens?

"Sarah, I can't help but notice that you have emotional regulation issues. Go get better at it."

I would ask her why she didn’t do well on her math test and encourage her to think about strategies she could use to do better on the next one. I believe in providing scaffolding and empowering young minds. I realize there are different parenting styles but at some point the child won’t have anyone else to manage her and will need to solve problems in her own. It’s great if she has a lot of practice and experience with self management by the time she has to fly solo. I suppose if there’s enough wealth in the family she may never need to manage her own affairs, but I feel like she would be missing out on important aspects of life; the pride and comfort that comes with self sufficiency and personal accomplishment.

"I would ask her why she didn’t do well on her math test and encourage her to think about strategies she could use to do better on the next one." How has that worked with your own kids? If my kid comes home with an F on a test, they don't want me to sit down and think about strategies. They are going to probably be upset (if they think academics are important) or not care at all (not a great alternative). First thing your kids wants is just to be told its fine and that they will do better on the next one. But them doing better on the next one will not result from giving them strategies, they are kids, you have to sit down with them, go over the subject matter and discuss it with them to ensure they understand.

"I feel like she would be missing out on important aspects of life; the pride and comfort that comes with self sufficiency and personal accomplishment." letting kids fail a ton of stuff in school so that they can learn better strategies sounds good in practice but in reality it will probably end up in the kid feeling terrible about themselves, and mentally resigning themselves to academic failure. Kids don't need strategy they need to know their family cares about them and are actively there to support and work with them.

I kind of think you two are talking past each other here. By 'encourage her to think about strategies', I think the OP does mean to show that they love and support the child. That'd fall under the category of encouragement, and they probably think it's obvious that you'd take care of their emotional and mental health while problem solving.

On the other hand, you seem to be anti-strategy but you say that you need to 'sit down with them, go over the subject matter and discuss it with them to ensure they understand'. Isn't going over the material a strategy to do better next time?

It may be that the word 'strategy' is just ill defined here. I mean, this isn't the military, so isn't a valid strategy the application of any plan whether it be as simple as "hey kid, study before the test" or "let me teach you English-comprehension personally"?

You expect that from 6 years old? They can't even read and write.

School age kids don't start at 14 when you can discuss strategies. It starts at 6 when the kid starts mostly confused and excited.

> ask her why she didn’t do well on her math test

That sounds like a reasonable approach for some parent-kid combinations. But as far as this discussion goes...

It was about an app that provided information like grades and that a test was coming up with the parent. It sounds like it would be a perfectly fine complement to your approach, no?

I don't see how it is some sort of replacement that is going to make everyone into helicopter parents. (And the problem with helicopter parents is not caused by some app.) In fact, I have trouble seeing how it intrudes more than the entirely nondigital approach to school-parent communication used when I was a kid - bring back this piece of paper with a parent's signature.

That's absolutely micromanaging and negative.

The goal of school isn't just to pass the tests. If a kid fails to revise for a test, but it doesn't matter because their parent will just look up the schedule and force them to revise, then they learn nothing beyond what's in the test.

If they fail to revise and as a result do badly at the test, then next time they might actually take the initiative and revise through their own motivation, and that's a far more valuable skill than anything that might actually be in the test.

Thanks for the feedback on my parenting style Diggsey, I will be on the lookout for a visit from child services for the terrible crime of paying attention to my kids results at school, making sure they do their homework and sitting down and studying with them for their tests. I only hope they can forgive me when they are older.

I’ve learned that once you have dogs or children, everyone else seems to have a very important opinion on what you should do with your own, all related services, etc.

>That's absolutely micromanaging and negative

Not really. Schooling is largely targeted towards the great masses in the middle of the Bell curve. These kids will need help, prodding, and other forms of encouragement in order to keep their basic schoolwork up.

There are a smaller number of kids on the left and right tails that will, for the former, never make any effort; and for the latter, will require nothing other than support. That's just the way things are, I didn't make it that way, and there is nearly nothing that can be done to change it, and recognizing that fact will do more for most children than trying to pretend it doesn't exist.

The mass of kids who need the aid of their parents are helped when the parents can follow along. I have to use a system similar to the broken Swedish one for my kids. It's a mishmash of various systems, and sometimes teachers just give up and use something else, or use a less appropriate method (like a shared Google doc or similar). Keeping up with simple things like "when is the next math test" is a real chore.

While it would be great to be able to instill "initiative" into the souls of kids, it's unlikely to work. Unless you happen to know of a magick elixir that can do so, in which case there are a crapload of adults who could use a dose of this wizardry.

It helps to not romanticize children. Kids are dumb. Even the smart ones. They have little life experience, and their brains are still wired in such a way that they struggle to see consequences. Most of schooling is just a grind to slowly teach them enough basics that they can operate relatively efficiently. Left to their own devices, they will play games, eat candy, and believe that they will make a living as a Twitch streamer or something equally ridiculous.

Interesting strategy. How have your kids performed under it?

Not him, but generally to large extend I have that strategy and kids do well. Both have good grades and are motivated. Obvious caveat is that if their grades were not good, I would get involved more. When their grades fallen a bit, I was there telling them that they need to learn, analyzing test with them and so on and blah blah. When homework was not done, I got involved for a while until the kid got into habit of doing it. Other obvious caveat is that when they ask for help, I always come in to help.

The thing is, hands off approach really works and motivates kids - but it still requires attention and correction. And it does not work with all kids at all ages.

Most people remember 15 years old self and assume kids all ages are as mature as they remember themselves. Meanwhile, most 6 years old are much less developed.

How did you know the homework wasn’t done?

When homework is not done, teacher sends the email. Or gave the kid black point and then the kid was unhappy about it and told me. If it did not, that teacher would also send mail, but after like 2-3 points within short period (don't know the exact rules).

The other option is to ask in the evening "have you done homework". One of my kids would never lie and other only rarely, so it worked.

To add to it, old system was not freedom. One feature of old "parents know only what kids tell them" system was that many parents learned about issues only when inevitable end of semester report/grades came. At that point, issues grew large. Even worst, parents were surprised and shocked, tended to react badly, punish the kid , yell, beat them etc. I remember reading about flux of kids running away each time reports come.

Okay, with this email business we’re back with the “micromanaging”.

In which alternative universe is teacher telling parent that homework 7 years old was not done micromanaging? Even among adults, analyst telling project manager you are not doing tasks right is not micromanaging. Or your peer developer telling pm your quality of work is bad. It is completely absurd.

The whole point of child raising is to raise the child. Not to go "kiddy, if you are not born organized and attentive, tough luck, we gonna do nothing and then blame you for being bad in school when you grow".

Actually, I agree with that position, which is why I started this sub thread curious about how this comment played out https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29108069

My point is that by the standards of that comment, you are micromanaging. I think those standards are ridiculous, though.

Plainly, parents of successful kids are all very involved. This sort of “you sink or swim on your own merits” nonsense is moronic bullshit.

If they fail to revise and as a result do badly at the test, then next time they might actually take the initiative and revise

Hahaha no. Have you met an 8 year old? Homo economicus they are not.

You're saying that the negative results of failing a test should come from the school and not the parent. I don't see why this is true.

A school will grade a student down, but often kids will simply just not care about that unless there's impetus to do so from their peer group or people they rely on as a role models (e.g. parents).

Also, when talking about kids... I think it's useful to clarify what age group you think a particular standard applies to. Kindergarteners need more parent care and management than secondary schoolers. It's more okay for a 6 year old to fail a test, than a 17 year old prepping for university. The stakes are different, and the mental abilities of the child are different. What is reasonable for one is not necessarily reasonable for another.

FYI in English "revise" means something like "edit". You probably meant "review". I know in Spanish "revisar" can mean to review, so that caught my eye, and thought you might be tricked by a false cognate.

British English "revise" = American English "study".

Oh, TIL, thanks!

Perhaps British English?

(US review) to study again something you have already learned, in preparation for an exam: We're revising (algebra) for the test tomorrow.

https://dictionary.cambridge.org/ja/dictionary/english/revis...

I see you and GP as arguing slightly different points.

I don't want an itinerary app. I don't want to know the schedule/homework directly.

But I will absolutely ask my kid if they know, and make the point that they should know, and work with them to remediate that if required.

And as they learn I will get to step back a bit at a time and let them go for it.

I don't really know why you have to have kids to have an opinion. All of us have been kids, and "I hated things like this for reasons I couldn't express at the time and certainly wasn't allowed to express at the time, in retrospect it was not effective for me, and in retrospect it soured my relationship with my parents as an adult" is a valid argument.

The parents using this system have also been kids. Not having kids means that you have not had to deal with the frustration of trying to figure out what is going on with your kids at school. Knowledge is a very important part of making decisions for your kids and the more knowledge you have as a parent the better. No one is suggesting that the parent have intimate details of everything going on with their kids but the reaction to a simple app that allows the parent to know what homework is due and if there is a test is a little dramatic. Everyone is entitled to an opinion on anything, no one is saying they aren't but to ignore that parents and non parents may have different insight on something like this is disingenuous.

I know you have kids, so you're too close to the situation to have an unbiased view, but realize that the math is only a small part of what your child is learning here. They also need to know how to judge for themselves whether they are prepared, they need to know how to seek out help from you or a tutor when they don't. Similarly, they need to learn what happens when they don't do these things and just assume someone else will do it for them.

You are doing your child a disservice by ensuring they are always prepared for every challenge they face.

"You are doing your child a disservice by ensuring they are always prepared for every challenge they face." I think you are very much reading too far into the situation. I am making sure my 7 and 10 year old do their homework. They know there are consequences for not doing it because I explain to them that there are. Kids don't have to get hit by a car to know to look both ways, they just need the parent to tell them. I understand you don't have kids and so are coming at this from a theoretical position, but theory and a live breathing, emotional child are very different things. You could argue that this is the way you were raised and you turned out great, but everyone was raised differently and most of the people on this site probably turned out pretty well when compared to the majority of society at least from a financial and capability perspective.

"so you're too close to the situation to have an unbiased view, but realize that the math is only a small part of what your child is learning here" I appreciate the perspective, on the other hand you don't have kids so have not experienced the situation at all. The idea that a parent is doing a young child a disservice by sitting with them, reviewing their homework and discussing their day is pretty strange. I wish you well when you have children of your own. Now if you will excuse me I have to go and tell Brady how to improve the snap in his throws.

Edit: "I know you have kids, so you're too close to the situation to have an unbiased view, but realize that the math is only a small part of what your child is learning here". Your argument boils down to people without kids are the best people to know what is best for kids as people with kids are too close to the situation. That makes no sense and I disagree.

if parents want to do this, they should know they kids have exam... just one semester failue on exam, kids will start escape and "forgot" homework and more test, if parent work too hard they even have no chance find it...

That assumes an environment that your parents will be actively involved and understand how to use the non functional swedish site.

I don't know anyone personally whose parents were involved with them during their school years and they achieved moderate or high grades.

I was a bit happy for sometimes getting help with reviewing homework and someone to practice English words with (that is, one of my parents). And who reminded me of things I'd forgotten, be it homework or the sports bag.

Some people here (not you) seem to think that one shoe fits all -- that because they didn't want the parents to be involved, that's what best for everyone.

When in fact kids (and grown up people too) can be very different from each other

All kids are sent home with a folder that lists the homework they have due, tests they have taken etc. This just puts it online? Are you saying that putting it online is the issue or that parents should have no insight on what their kids are doing unless the kid decides to tell the parent?

> parents should have no insight on what their kids are doing unless the kid decides to tell the parent

As a kid this is exactly what I believed. Parents believe otherwise, of course.

Do you have children? Honest question.

Not yet.

Also don't have kids. I'm in my 30s. Totally agree with the other commenter. As a kid in school, I had to learn to be responsible for things, it was my responsibility to decide what I could handle on my own and what I told my parents about, and I paid the price when I dropped the ball. Yeah, there are always a few kids who need more help learning these skills than others, and I could see the app in the hands of good parents being useful. But I don't want to live in a world full of people whose parents never trusted them.

I feel like one of those old people complaining that "kids these days aren't allowed to go play on their own, climb a tree, scrape their knees, etc". But this seems really troubling on a whole new psychological level. IMO kids need autonomy to mature, which can't happen if their parent can "magically" know anything.

Your parents already had access to the app, just in the form of a folder you were sent home with that had everything printed out. This is just a digitized version, its not the 2nd coming of the Gestapo. Also you need to think about this from the perspective of the parents, having kids in school mean you have to do things, you can either be informed ahead of time and do them in a leisurely manner or you can find out last minute, rush everything and get stressed. The app helps people avoid that stress. You are young, I am surprised you are anti the digitization of something that has been inefficient for so long; and trust me if you have kids in school you would know just how frustrating it is to keep track of everything that is going on or due.

It sounds like you may have had a very unorthodox childhood and may not realize it. No, my parents didn't have access to, or knowledge about my things. As soon as you entrust a child with a document, it is up to that child whether that document survives more than a few steps out of the classroom, let alone whether a parent ever knows about it. That is a very strong form of autonomy, important to a child's development, that the app completely eliminates.

The stress you are talking about seems to me like the hallmark of an overbearing parent. Let your child fail sometimes. That's ok, they need to experience that, that's how you learn. You can't let them think that someone else will always take care of the things they don't. You're not doing them any favors by ensuring they always succeed.

I think maybe we are thinking of distinctly different age groups. My kids are in elementary school, they are sent home with a folder everyday that lists what is due. Teacher told us at the beginning of the year that this would happen. If my kid suddenly did not bring his folder home I would know something was wrong.

"The stress you are talking about seems to me like the hallmark of an overbearing parent" Maybe but I have kids, and most of the parents I know are the same way, so I guess there are a ton of us that are wrong. Your opinion may change once you have kids.

"Let your child fail sometimes. That's ok, they need to experience that, that's how you learn." Appreciate the advice and I accept it as its advice I would have given when I did not have kids, thought I had it all figured out and believed raising kids was easy.

We should leave them out on the hills to fend for themselves, feeding them will only make them weak! /s

You overdramatise the point, but yes!

You feed the toddler.

You pack and give food to the 5-10 year old. They feed themselves.

You supervise the 10-teenageish to gather/pack their own food.

After "teenageish" you do in fact leave them out on the hills to fend for themselves...

... and part of fending for yourself, is to know when to ask for help. But the terms of help is hopefully between two capable humans at that point.

In the school system, I would expect that teachers are not asking 5-10 year olds to do complicated tasks. But to do simple tasks outside of school hours (homework) and know how to dress on any given day is totally appropriate. Parents can assist their kid to be so organised as and how they can. But the kid themselves are responsible to the school if they aren't.

> know how to dress on any given day is totally appropriate

No, 5year-olds can't [all] track the three different "special" outfit days in a week and know whether to take in the clothes or dress in them in the morning. Many five-year-olds don't know which day comes after which, and most don't have literary skills to write themselves a reminder or to log on to a computer calendar and check. They need parental help. I can tell you that some of us parents find it difficult to track these things and keep everything straight, too.

Teachers absolutely do ask children to do tasks they can't achieve on their own (eg. I guess maybe rich families might have all the stuff to do an impromptu craft project but if you need pipe-cleaners and black card to make a spider for Hallowe'en then you need an adult to shop for/with you). But parent-child cooperative projects lead to better outcomes and children feel more engaged when their parents take part with them.

In our house there's no space in our kitchen for each person to make their own sandwiches, and that would be super inefficient. But yes, teenagers could take turns making for everyone; that's not good for our family though.

When you let elementary school children fail constantly at easy tasks because they forgot about them it just instills in them that the grades don't really matter.

Little children need the habit formation brought on by asking if their homework is done everyday, how they're doing in school, and if there are any upcoming projects because they just don't have the discipline at that age usually. As they get older these checks can lessen if they've formed the correct habits. It also emphasizes that their education is important to you so that they realize it probably should be important to them.

Some children form it earlier than others but you're setting your future kid up for failure and being behind early if you think you should be totally hands off with their education.

Also all the other good parents will be ensuring their kids succeed and children start getting sorted out by grades fairly early in their education. Letting them take a bunch of preventable failures early on before they even realize the importance of education, when you do just seems cruel.

You spent a lot of effort responding to a strawman that isn't at all the point I'm making.

You seemed to reinforce the GPs point?

To do all the things you said, does not require me to have an itinerary app or sheet.

It requires me to ask my kid, be involved with my kid, support my kid to be organised.

I think their childhood sounds absolutely normal and you may be the unorthodox one.

> Your parents already had access to the app, just in the form of a folder you were sent home with that had everything printed out.

Where are you from?

In the 7 different (pre-university) schools I went to in Sweden, none of them had paper folders, and only one had a digital platform like this. And that one was only for teachers and students, parents didn't have access.

I'm in the US, and my kids are in elementary school, so mileage may vary.

It is not like this would be secret in the past. The ones most likely yo not tell are actually 6-7 years old who genuinely forgot and then are stressed cause teacher is complains.

But kids have to do a lot of things they don’t want to do. Going to school in the first place is often one of them.

Let me preface this by clarify that when I say 'children', I mean young children 12 and younger, not teenagers in secondary school who can reasonably be expected to care for themselves...

Personally, I'm not seeing why this is a huge issue. In the 1980s, parents of at least the private school that I used would get a syllabus containing all the homework and class plans for the year.

If you wanted to know what was happening on week #7, you just had to look it up on paper without having a handy app to put it on your calendar. It wasn't seen as surveillance, but rather normal planning. If the teacher and school system know what's upcoming, then why shouldn't parents. It was seen as obvious that parents would help their children with homework, and that education necessarily involved parental support.

Along the way if there were any disciplinary or academic issues, parents would have to sign-off on handling minor problems, and would get a personal phone call from the school for major ones. This is in addition to monthly meetings, PTA, etc.

Has the world changed so much nowadays that people just drop off young children at school and can reasonably expect to be totally uninvolved?

Now to contrast, in my country, secondary school (13-17) is usually boarding so kids are 100% outside of your view for 4 years and are forcibly made independent.

> it is very useful to be able to look up what the kids have scheduled for the day to determine what to dress them in

I swear we just had an A4 piece of paper with my lessons on it on the fridge.

And printing out a schedule for every child is a bit silly when there is calendaring software...

Everything once done on paper is now done electronically - and revisions (fixes) happen much more quickly to boot.

You're not wrong, but, my school timetable changed once every quarter, that was sort of feature. It's not work, no one is flying in from $city on $day to kick off a project, students and teachers would follow a routine, it was easy.

Frankly there are some aspects of it I miss...

It is literally the same thing then. If one is not causing outrage, nor should the other.

Wut? Does the school do anything that involves stuff that you need to dress differently for?

Even when doing PE I’d always bring a separate bag of gym clothes.

I'm not against the app, but the use cases you gave sound like things the child needs to learn to do. If they have gym, they need to be responsible for remembering their stuff. If the cafeteria has food they don't like, maybe they learn to develop new tastes that day. And most importantly, I'd they have homework or tests that are due, the child should 1000% be solely responsible for this.

As you mention, I guess it can be a useful tool for a parent to keep their kid on track, because yeah obviously they're learning and they'll be forgetful. But IMO it would also make it too easy for an overbearing parent to prevent their child from learning important life skills, thinking they're helping.

Back when I was in school we had a schedule, for the semester. That worked perfectly well for me and my parents. Our kitchen had a pin board with these schedules pinned to it. After a month or so we all had a new schedule internalized anyway. As for food, we had a cafeteria which served warm meals, usually at least two different options, and various other things like sandwiches, along with two "kiosks" where the janitors's wives sold some more snacks and sandwiches. And there was a supermarket across the street. I never had a packed lunch, ever, simply because there was no need for it. If I really hated the hot meals of the day, I would get a sandwich. We kids didn't really keep to the schedules anyway, we sometimes went early or stayed late to make use of the table tennis, foosball (or "kicker" as it's called in Germany) or billard tables, or play board games (our school had a sizable collection of these), or play soccer (or "football" as it is called correctly) outside on the school's fields. Mom's only order was to call her (from a pay phone inside the school) if we stayed longer than 1h, so she didn't need to worry (dad was at work). Pickups weren't a problem in this system, as we would always take the public bus or bike when it was warm enough. Our school had something like 1200-1500 students, and about only 30-50 were dropped off and picked up by parents regularly, simply because they lived in some tiny villages somewhere with shitty bus service.

Homework and test prep was supposed to be managed by the students, not their parents, anyway, but most classes had just printed exercises and/or a sheet of what to expect in tests, so parents could always just check that. Test were also in about the same weeks of every semester, so my parents might not have known the exact dates unless they asked and I told them, but they knew that tests were happening. My parents kept interest, asked me how it was going regularly, if I needed help with something, when the tests are and what my results were, and so on. I think so it makes a big difference in the kid's experience if the parent asks them, or if the parent essentially goes over their head and consults some online resource.

I personally was too proud to want help with school work from my parents from an early age on, and even felt that it only slowed me down; I wanted to be outside with my friends not slowly working through the homework as a team exercise. My grades were good, so my parents let me do my stuff. My sisters (they are twins) needed some help in some areas (they are very likely partially dyslexic), and got it.

Should the grades of a student change abruptly for the worse or remain at a low level, teachers would just call up parents and discuss the situation and suggest ways to improve, and the semester reports had to be signed by a parent anyway, and that signature had to be presented at school.

This was mid to late 90s by the way, my mid and "high" school time. In elementary school my parents were still more hands-on, of course.

I too find "digital child managing systems" rather dystopian, enabling parents to micro-manage their kids even more, which I am convinced is not good for the kid's overall development. There has to be a balance between the parents need to care for a kid (and the care a kid actually needs, of course) and letting the kid grow up, and I feel such systems push that balance too much away from teaching kids self-reliance and let them make minor "educational" mistakes on their own.

Then again, I of course realize that each kid has it's own needs, and some need a fair bit of micro-management at times.

>what to dress them in

May I ask, how old are your kids? Sounds like they are still young, if you dress them? Then of course, more micro-managing makes more sense. The younger the more care kids need.

Kids are 7 and 10. I am targeting my comments more towards that age group. With that said though, I don't discount such a system towards highschool kids as well. I think most parents have a good relationship with their children and would understand on a case by case basis how to utilize the information they are given. I do think it is good to provide parents with the option of using this information though as they should know their kids the best.

"This was mid to late 90s by the way, my mid and "high" school time" You are probably the same age as me. :)

"I too find "digital child managing systems" rather dystopian, enabling parents to micro-manage their kids even more, which I am convinced is not good for the kid's overall development." The system in question is just a digital calendar essentially I think far to much malevolence is being attributed to such a simple tool.

I very much don't think packing the kids a lunch, reviewing their homework and seeing when their next tests are is micro managing, but obviously everyone is coming from different starting points.

My parents did not involve themselves in my schooling much at all. I graduated with straight A's, skipped school all the time, only did homework if it was graded and barely studied except for classes like chemistry or physics and went to college on a full ride. Then I failed out of college twice because no one had ever sat down with me taught me how to study and learn or made me think that study was important. I think I would have done much better at college if my parents had worked with me as a kid. Still love my parents though and think they were good parents.

My approach to other parents is I generally assume they are doing the best they can, mean well for their kids and will use whatever tools they have in that spirit.

The main problem with the current set of schooling management systems is that they require a lot of work from parents to extract any useful information, and that level of effort amplifies an imbalance between parents having the time and ability and the parents that don't.

What would have been helpful to me as a parent (while my children were enrolled in school) would have been a short weekly email, one from each teacher/class, simply summarizing the topic for the next week or two. That* would be useful in helping parents engage with their children before the material is covered in class. Instead my experience over the past four years has led me to believe that most teachers and school administrators are very poor communicators.

* Another option would be for teachers to provide a course syllabus at the start of each semester. But for whatever reason teachers no longer provide those, either because they think the online stuff is sufficient (it's not) or because they haven't planned ahead.

>I think so it makes a big difference in the kid's experience if the parent asks them, or if the parent essentially goes over their head and consults some online resource.

This is the important point most everyone here glosses over. It's hard to discipline a child and make them cooperate in a system of trust. It's much easier to eliminate the trust out. As a stressed parent (and lets be honest, every parent is a stressed parent) you don't have the time and patience for this. I think most of us on the opposite end of this discussion lament this.

In my opinion this is a type of failure you cannot, and should not optimize out. Children's personalities are different. Certain behaviors induce certain rewards and consequences. Failure is part of the development process of their personalities.

I'd also say that a school denying access to this information should rightly expect pointy and sharp questions coming at them. Parents being part of the education system shouldn't come as a surprise to a school. It would be like hiding the school timetable.

Usual common sense caveats still apply: Privacy and authentication are still valid aspects but not to block those who could reasonably expect to successfully authenticate, eg a parent of a kid in school.

> its very helpful to look up what homework / tests are due as the kids tend to not manage this so well themselves

How do you expect they'll develop these sorts of self-starter skills and mental models, besides experiencing things like the (comparatively low-impact!) consequences of not handing in your 5th grade homework....?

Hopefully you're going full parabola and also providing disproportionately strong incentives to do the "right" behaviors, because otherwise it's as likely they'll succeed as they'll become sand through your tight grasp.

The reactions people are expressing to a parent stating they like to know what their kids are up to in school and what assignments are due is pretty odd.

"it's as likely they'll succeed as they'll become sand through your tight grasp" lol, I have no idea how my statement on working with my kids on their homework and liking to know what is going on has evolved into an image of me being some sort of god king in my house, but hey whatever makes you happy.

My kids have homework, I sit down with them and work on it with them, we bond, we joke around, they learn and they turn it in the next day. The horror.

Edit: "How do you expect they'll develop these sorts of self-starter skills" To add some color, my 9 year old decided at the spur of the moment while they were asking who wanted to stand up and give a speech to be on student council to do it and he won. I had no input and he just made the decision in the moment so I very much don't think sitting down with kids and doing homework with them or keeping an eye on their schedule kills any self-starter skills. There are always extremes but the overall reaction to this is a bit silly.

Migrate them to keeping their own calendar, rather then using the old fashioned way of a mixture of scribbling stuff in random places and not giving a shift

What you propose is to not teach them nor give them gradually more responsibilities.

You literally demand the system in which kids are expected to be well organized. If they are not they will be punished until they learn to be organized. If they don't despite punishments in school, parents won't be told until end of year. Then they get the surprising final report and only thing they can do is to yell at kids or something.

That is rather poor pedagogy.

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