How do you pay for School Trips

jellyhead

we recently went to disneyland paris and the children came back speaking french lol! (they are only aged 5-8 though, it was only very basic french).

Caterina

Isn't it amazing how quickly little children pick up languages! You must have been very proud of them!

When the twins were 4 years old we went on a camping holiday in France and taught them how to ask for a baguette (french stick) in French - gave them a few francs every morning and off they went to buy the baguette.

If I ask them now to go and get anything at the shops, I get rolling eyes and excuses! Ah, happy days!

Caterina

jellyhead

:-)

the staff at disney spoke mainly in french. they all spoke second or third languages but they spoke first in french unless you spoke to them in english so we picked up quite a few words and hubby and i brushed up on our school french. i think it's as good a place as any for a french trip, pity schools don't go there because it's cheaper than the school trips i've seen lol! yes i suppose i was proud of the children, they really enjoyed learning the language and i thought it made the trip much more exciting. we saw lots of english children who didn't learn a word of french and we thought they were missing out a little. we didn't carry a french dictionary or anything, we just tried to pick it up as we went along and the staff were happy to try to understand our bad french. i'd recommend anyone who can't afford the school french trip to find a cheap disney deal lol!

Spendless

apologies for going off topic here

bargain bunny - yesterday someone had done a thread about how buying x amount of shares in Dineyland Pairis entitled them to discounts. I think it cost £4 for the shares plus £15 admin - i can't remember where it was tho - sorry - but thought you might be interested.


Right back on topic - I am surprised how many younger childrenschools do residential trips. My son won't do them till he's in secondary school - yr 7 onwards.

I considered another school for him and that did do a residential trip in yr 6.

I didn't do a residential trip till i was 11 equivalent of yr 6 and my sister never did one at all cos the headmaster had changed and he didn't beleive in them

16011996

my kids have done residential trips, but not in school til year six for the eldest, but with brownies and scouts. i thinkit does them good.

jellyhead

i've never been on one. our school does them in years 4 and 6. it's a bit scary for some of the year 4's but it does do them good :-)

Zoetoes

Won't they need spends while they are there? Maybe they could use some of their own money for that.

Caterina

Yes, that is a definite! I cannot give them any spending money and they know it and don't complain about it, especially since they earn their own money for this very reason (additional recreation).

I am sure they can forgo a couple of games or cds or cinema outings without feeling too deprived!

Caterina

Savvy_Sue

Caterina, when my eldest said he wanted to go on a school ski trip, c. £650, I said yes but he would have to pay half himself. He had a paper round at the time and it encouraged him to save his money and I felt it was more worthwhile than a pile of games. I didn't know how we'd find the other half, but we did, and last year we found it for two of them but again I insisted they each pay half. Even if we could have afforded the lot I'd have asked for a reasonable contribution as a matter of principle: you want to do something expensive, you save for it.

But back to the original topic: I think we have to make a distinction between 'in-school' trips and 'out of school' trips. An in-school trip of £400 is, IMO, completely OTT. However much notice you're given.

If it's out of school time, I'm a bit more philosophical about it. The ski trip is in half-term, it's a small percentage of the children who go, but then a fair number of those who don't go wouldn't want to. I guess we would somehow find the money if any of mine wanted to do anything more than the ski trip - eldest got excited about a trip to Israel until he realised he wouldn't miss any school if he went!

And do we want to get to the situation where political correctness has gone so far that schools can't offer extra curricular activities and trips for which a charge has to be made because not everyone will be able to afford it?

The current school is very good: if you can't pay for in-school trips there is ALWAYS a note on the letter that you can apply to some fund or other. You don't have to be on benefits, you don't have to go into gory detail about your finances. There is always an Activities Week at the end of the summer term, and the first year my son was there we were stony broke and the choice of activities was not very appealing to him. I really resented being asked to pay £40 I couldn't spare for something he wasn't much going to enjoy, so I wrote in and said we were unable to afford the full cost and offering £20. No more questions.

Previous primary school I thought had a very good scheme: in Reception and year 1 there was a day out, costs kept as low as possible and support from local church and PTA. In year 2 there was a 'bedtime story' evening: kids came back in pjs with teddy bears, had cocoa while listening to stories. Year 3 and 4 was an overnight sleep at school, followed by a car wash the next day - again cost minimal! Year 5 and 6 did a more traditional school journey. It gave children who hadn't been away much a chance to get used to being away from home. And again, PTA and church would help keep costs down.

Savvy_Sue

With the eldest child I tried writing to the school about trips but the head teacher never even replied. I should have taken it further, but there is the feeling of the parent stirring things up if you complain.

If you feel singled out because you're asking awkward questions, why not gang up with other parents who feel the same way? Take it in turns to be bolshy and awkward.