School declined holidays and branded the kids truants

jackieblack

malkie76 wrote: »

That they miss something they'll never be able to repeat in the same fashion. Could be something completely random which plays an important part in later life. It's just not worth the risk.

That 'something' could equally be an experience/event that happens whilst they are on holiday!

Is it worth the 'risk' that spending valuable quality time together, on holiday, away from the stresses of everyday life that affect most families could be missed for the sake of a few days schooling?

Schools have our children for 38 weeks a year for at least 12 of their first 16/17 years. I simply don't believe that missing one or two of those weeks in order to give a child a unique experience in a different part of the world (educational in itself) can be so desperately detrimental - and if it is, what does that say about the state of our education system?

Parents know their children best. If the parent is satisfied that taking their children out of school for a few days will not be harmful, then fine - they are, after all the children of their parents -not of the education system.

In our area all requests for holidays are routinely declined, the reason is because schools attendance records form part of any Ofsted inspection and our headteacher doesn't see why her Ofsted result should be detrimentally affected just because parents want to go on holiday!
Sorry, whose children are they?

malkie76

That 'something' could equally be an experience/event that happens whilst they are on holiday!

Which can just as easily be achieved during the summer holidays rather than during term time.

I've repeated myself about 7 or 8 times making them point, yet people refuse to actually read whats being posted, and prefer to make their own context up by paraphrasing things I've said.

As someone who moved schools and missed school due to circumstances beyond our control; it didn't affect me one iota and I [shock horror] even got O levels, A Levels, HNCs, Degrees, and [wait for it.....wait for it] POST GRAD QUALS

Had you stayed in school you may have obtained a Nobel Prize by now - you'll never know just how far you may have been able to go. True, I'm being slightly dramatic, but the claim that "I did well at school despite term time absence" is an entirely flawed arguement.

My daughter and son are both doing very well at school and have NOT suffered at all by us taking them out for 2 weeks for a family holiday.

You can't say that for sure. You've no idea just exactly how far ahead they could have been had they not been taken out of school. Please don't take that as a personal attack, I'm just raising a point about the example you give. They may not have fallen behind, but you'll have no idea how far they could have been pushed had they remained in school for the entire term.

Because myself and my husband work very hard all year and feel that we deserve a ONCE a year family holiday!

I could not afford the extra £1000 it costs to go in the school holidays,and i feel that myself and my husband both work very hard for our money and we all needed a family holiday ONCE a year!

Absolutely not. Holidays are a luxury item, not something which is deserved or something you are entitled to. I agree that if a holiday during the summer is too expensive then travel every other year, and do something cheaper and more local in the other years.

Again, it doesn't cost £1000 more in summer - it just costs £1000 less during term time.

No one actually needs a holiday. Children actually need education.

Zazen999

malkie76 wrote: »

Had you stayed in school you may have obtained a Nobel Prize by now - you'll never know just how far you may have been able to go

True, I'm being slightly dramatic, but the claim that "I did well at school despite term time absence" is an entirely flawed arguement.


No one actually needs a holiday. Children actually need education.

And children GET education. However 2 weeks out of 10 years is such a minute dint in this education that it will make NO difference...esp during those last few weeks when the kids are doing precious little at school anyway.

sunshinetours

I think its probably quite obvious that many won't agree on the principle of taking children out of school term time for holidays for financial reasons and my earlier post covered why I thought some people were like this.

I do think if there is no other "feasible" option , then a family taking a holiday together in term time is better than not, providing no exams etc. Taking it because its cheaper (or more expensive in school holidays ) and because you believe you deserve it really isn't a particulalrly solid reason IMO

Plenty of reasoned debate but think Malkie76 you should accept that your entirely "blinkered" view, in the respect that there is no possible valid reason in your opinion, is not going to be accepted (even though I agree with a large part of your view) by many who have too differing viewpoints

Murphy_The_Cat

malkie76 wrote: »

No one actually needs a holiday. Children actually need education.

Malkie, I've really enjoyed reading your posts and I've appreciated seeing an alternative viewpoint, but I'm now struggling to understand why your views are so deeply entrenched and that you are unable to look at things from 'the other side'.

Are you posting out of some sort of bloody mindedness, to get a reaction, or do you have some sort of experiences (work or family) that have affected you in such a way.

OR, are you the LEA person that sets the Policy and you get hacked off when Head Teachers don't follow your Diktats (that was a joke )

BTW, a few posts seem to havedisappeared off this thread overnight, does anyone know why ?

thommy

malkie - saw you on another thread and couldn't resist returning to this one.
thought you might be interested in this...
http://www.hotukdeals.com/item/700134/2-weeks-orlando-florida-return-flig?page=3

mods! i know you are going to remove it but it is only a joke! (honest malkie!)

malkie76

However 2 weeks out of 10 years is such a minute dint in this education that it will make NO difference

Can you provide some supporting evidence? I'm assuming you must have some to make such a strong statement.

esp during those last few weeks when the kids are doing precious little at school anyway

Already covered at length earlier in the thread.

Plenty of reasoned debate but think Malkie76 you should accept that your entirely "blinkered" view

but I'm now struggling to understand why your views are so deeply entrenched and that you are unable to look at things from 'the other side'.

How can my view be blinkered when there is no rational counter point of view?

If you could clearly define the counter point of view then I'll happily discuss it. You appear to be saying that it's either A or B, whereas I'm saying it can be A and B - where's the opposite point of view to that ?

moneypooh

The arguements for and against will rattle on forever as we all have different perspectives and priorities in our lives.

As it stands at the moment not allowing term time holidays does preserve some sort of order in most schools. The problem would come if it became common place with many students taking term time holidays. This would then be very distruptive to learning as teachers plan their courses. If holidays were allowed, how many students per week? if many parents applied, who would get priority? I could see that causing many problems.

Another thought, most school residential holidays (including abroad trips) happen during term time. If the trip was to say Rome, would they benefit more with a school trip or with family??

easy

malkie76 wrote: »

Can you provide some supporting evidence? I'm assuming you must have some to make such a strong statement?

I think a number of us are still waiting for YOU to provide supporting evidence of your assertions that term-time holidays cause real damage to a child's education, actually Malkie.

Several posters here have pointed out that they/their children have taken time out of school during their childhoods, but still ended up with A levels/degrees/PhDs etc, myself included (and my 10 year old son, who has taken 3 holidays of 2 weeks or more in the last 6 years, is at SATS level 5 and working 2 years above his peer group in class).

So, there is our evidence, where is yours?

easy

moneypooh wrote: »

The arguements for and against will rattle on forever as we all have different perspectives and priorities in our lives.

As it stands at the moment not allowing term time holidays does preserve some sort of order in most schools. The problem would come if it became common place with many students taking term time holidays. This would then be very distruptive to learning as teachers plan their courses. If holidays were allowed, how many students per week? if many parents applied, who would get priority? I could see that causing many problems.

Another thought, most school residential holidays (including abroad trips) happen during term time. If the trip was to say Rome, would they benefit more with a school trip or with family??

You know, when I was at school, it was fairly common-place for families to take holidays when it suited them. There weren't umpty children away every week. Teachers didn't find their course plans disrupted. Yes, at secondary school we would expect to get extra work to catch up what we had missed, which was considered fair enough.

What I'm saying is, it happened, it worked, and every-body was happy. But an over-bearing government, who wanted to have control over EVERY PART of our lives, put regulations in place to try to stop it. So now you get disputes like this, and parents feel hounded, and unrespected by the school, as no credit at all is given for parents making sure that homework/projects or whatever is done all through the rest of year. On top of that, our school is always begging for money, volunteers to help out on school trips, run school fetes, assist in swimming lessons etc etc.

All we, the parents, are asking for, is a little give and take. compromise. understanding that although there are 13 weeks of school holiday a year, actually it isn't ALWAYS possible to fit in with that, either for financial reasons, or for reasons of work/business/service commitments.

Murphy-the-Cat has pointed out that he can't take family holidays in school holiday time, because that is when his business is busy. I pointed out that service families can't necessarily take holidays in school holiday time, because they have to fit in with leave constraints, similarly those in essential jobs such as nursing or the fire service can't ALL take their holiday in the same 13 week periods. It's fair to assume that over 50% of the staff in those jobs will be parents. So, over the 6 weeks summer holidays, you are happy for the emergency services to be running with only 60-65% of it's full staffing, because of juggling the holiday availability of the others to fit with school holidays? Of course not.

And to those who say "A Holiday is a luxury, not a necessity", then fine. But in our FREE COUNTRY (ha), which is fighting at the moment for fairness, and suggesting we should all have as equal a chance at life as possible, shouldn't we all have the opportunity to partake in luxuries now and then??