The Story of Childhood by Libby Brooks

usually to be resolved by a girl protagonist. Their main characters were adults in whose hands responsibility for the care of the family rested.In contrast, boys often failed to identify any adult, or to give them power. They used the family theme to write stories about a life without constraints, and if conflicts did occur they never explained their resolution, although in most cases everyone got what they wanted.
    â€˜In omitting the controlling position,’ she concluded, ‘the boys’ stories gave a lot of power to the children. In girls’ stories, on the other hand, the mother was the one who kept order and who negotiated and tried to deal with conflicting opinions. In the girls’ stories, the children were cared for, but also controlled, by the mother.’ So boys and girls explored different gender positions, as well as their own dependency.
    The holidays are nearly over, and this autumn Rosie will enter Year 2. ‘I have my teacher and she’s really, really nice. And we have this really big classroom and Livvy is going into Reception and when we go out into the playground we have to go past Reception.’ Year 2 is a bigger year and the work will be harder. They’re going to learn about the Great Fire of London.
    â€˜Sometimes it’s nice to have Livvy around the house, so I think sometimes it’s nice to have her around the school and it’s just going to be really, really good now that’s she’s with me all the time.’ Sometimes Rosie talks as though her mind is elsewhere. She’s not exactly distracted, but keeping a foot in Rosie-world. She’s been tying her purple wings round her knees fretfully.
    â€˜Sometimes I wonder if Livvy’s as stressed as me when I’m doing my work because its already really hard and I think it’s going to be even harder in Year 2.’ Rosie finds maths hardest. ‘Some of the sums have really big numbers and it’s really hard because some of the people in my class kept interrupting even though I was trying.’ Rosie hasstrict views about behaviour, and has been unpleasantly surprised by the antics of some of her peers. She adds further detail lest it be thought that she is feigning the difficulty. ‘Really, really big numbers, like 103 and 105, and I just didn’t find it easy.’
    Rosie will be tested nationally for the first time next March. Her father says he’s not particularly troubled at the prospect because, as a teacher, he considers the exams valueless. But Rosie senses something coming. As children are denied the opportunity to learn from their own experiences in the outside world, indoors their education has become further regimented.
    Priscilla Alderson, professor of childhood studies, told her audience at an Institute of Education centenery lecture: ‘Childhood is controlled and confined into child care and education institutions, and surveyed, regulated and tested at unprecedented levels.’ Certainly, children in the UK are the most frequently tested in Europe. And, with the government’s ‘wraparound’ breakfast and after-school clubs, some children are at school for longer than the adult limit set down in the EU working-time directive.
    Alderson believes that schools reinforce a child-rearing culture of rigid control by following the ethics of the marketplace: ‘Today’s obsession with outcomes is especially oppressive for children when childhood is valued so much for its effects on future adult earning-power, and not for itself.’
    Some commentators have greeted the government’s five-year plan to extend school hours from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. gladly, arguing that it will provide poor children with the care and recreational opportunities that the middle classes take for granted. But is a daily ten-hour warehousing of children – while parents’ employers are excused from introducing family-friendly working practices – really