Kids will thank us for shortening the school summer holidays

Oh for a normal summer – so close now, but Covid remains capricious, a wave across Europe threatening to wash it all away. But just think: for some schoolchildren, and their parents, the normality of the long six-week summer break may not be such an appealing prospect.

Sure, the middle-classes are able to pack it with enriching activities – exciting new skills, friendships and memories. But, for kids in families with stretched budgets, it can be isolating, impoverishing, boring. And, as quite a substantial body of evidence now shows, very bad for their emotional and cognitive development – some studies even conclude that the majority of the attainment gap between rich and poor children can be explained by the cumulative impact of successive summer breaks.

After a year of spending so little time in school, with the structure, socialisation and stimulation it brings, we really need to rethink urgently whether children, especially those from less privileged homes, would benefit from spending the usual extended period of time away from it over the summer.