Aucklander Charlotte Lay explains why the new methods of teaching reading, writing and maths will be good for her 6-year-old daughter Margot. Video / Alex Burton
Opinion by Stuart Deerness
Dr Stuart Deerness is a senior lecturer in the School of Education – Te Kura Mātauranga at the Auckland University of Technology.
Teachers of new entrant school children and early childhood teachers report seeing more children than ever with poor language skills, research by the Education Review Office has found.
The recent anonymous teacher’s account in the Weekend Herald (Mar 15) describing children’s lack of school readiness raises some fair points.
Indeed, many teachers would recognise the scenarios described – students struggling with basic self-management, limited resilience and delayed acquisition of fundamental skills needed for classroom learning.
What is happening with our tamariki (children) reflects much broader shifts in New Zealand society. Parenting doesn’t occur in a vacuum.
The contexts within which families operate have changed dramatically and these changes profoundly influence how children develop the capabilities they need for school.
Since the 1980s, we’ve seen substantial restructuring of New Zealand’s economy and social landscape. The intensification of work demands, along with housing pressures and the weakening of neighbourhood connections have fundamentally altered family life.
These are not simply excuses for parents – they are material conditions that shape the daily realities of raising children.
The prevalence of risk-averse parenting mentioned in the article – where parents “jump in and fix everything” – needs contextualising within our increasingly individualised society.
When families bear sole responsibility for their children’s outcomes in a competitive educational marketplace, the stakes feel enormously high. Parents often respond by attempting to shield children from failure.
Research by Peter Gray highlights the global decline in unstructured playtime, a trend that is also evident in New Zealand.
This reduction correlates with an increase in anxiety among young people and a diminished ability for self-direction - exactly the concerns expressed by the teacher.
The article glosses over how socio-economic factors influence approaches to parenting. Families facing unstable employment often juggle multiple jobs with unpredictable hours, which restricts their time for the developmental activities suggested by the teacher.
Although Annette Lareau’s research is not specific to New Zealand, it is highly relevant to this discussion. It found that middle-class parents typically engage in “concerted cultivation” – deliberately structuring children’s activities to develop skills – while working-class parents often follow a “natural growth” approach with less adult direction.
Both approaches have strengths and limitations, but schools generally reward the former.
The teacher’s observation about children who can navigate screens, but struggle with pencils, reflects another tension many Kiwi families navigate daily – the contradictory messages that parents receive about technology use.
Sonia Livingstone’s work highlights how parents are simultaneously told to prepare children for a digital future while limiting screen time. Research in the Growing Up In New Zealand study also considers how parents are trying to navigate these complex issues.
'The teacher’s frustration about children lacking basic skills when they start school overlooks how the goal posts have moved.'
Without clear guidance, many New Zealand families are making these decisions in isolation, balancing competing priorities as best they can.
Concepts of community, along with Māori values like whānaungatanga (relationship building) and the Pasifika emphasis on collective responsibility for children’s wellbeing, offer alternatives to the individualised model of parenting that dominates mainstream discourse. Yet urbanisation, migration patterns, and economic pressures have fragmented these support networks for many families.
Human development psychologist Urie Bronfenbrenner has a theory of ecological systems that illustrates how these broader societal structures influence what happens in family homes across New Zealand. When community networks contract, the burden on individual parents intensifies.
New Zealand’s education system has undergone repeated reforms, with each iteration introducing new expectations about what constitutes “school readiness”.
The teacher’s frustration about children lacking basic skills when they start school overlooks how the goalposts have moved.
What was once taught in Year 1 is now often expected before children start school. Research by David Elkind about “hurried children” describes how developmentally inappropriate expectations create unnecessary pressure on both children and their families.
Rather than reinforcing a deficit view of parents, we might consider more productive approaches that acknowledge shared responsibility:
Genuine school-community partnerships: Schools that recognise and value the diverse knowledge families bring create stronger foundations for children’s learning.
Rebuilding collective responsibility: Not-for-profit community initiatives that support families provide crucial scaffolding for childhood development.
Policy recognition of family circumstances: Workplace policies, housing affordability, and community resource allocation all influence parents’ capacity to prepare children for school and to support their ongoing learning and development in the home.
Resourcing early intervention: The teacher rightly notes the unacceptable waiting times for developmental assessments. This reflects chronic underfunding that disadvantages vulnerable children.
The challenges identified by the teacher deserve serious attention. Children do benefit from developing independence, resilience and practical skills before formal education begins.
However, creating environments where this happens requires acknowledging the complex relationships between social, economic and cultural factors shaping New Zealand childhoods.
Parents are doing their best within constraints that are not entirely of their making.
By recognising these complexities, we can move beyond simplistic blame and toward more nuanced understandings and effective responses that support both families and educators in preparing our tamariki for learning. It is our collective responsibility.
Stuart Deerness teaches future secondary school teachers at university. He leads the Graduate Diploma in Secondary Teaching programme in the School of Education at AUT.
