Long Holiday and child school

kingfisherblue

pelirocco wrote: »

tbh a week before school holidays they seem to do little learning anyway , my grandaughter had one whole school day watching videos , then there are the end of term parties etc , plus they normally tack on a day or two of teaching training

If its such a problem tacking time off for holidays why do school trips take place during term time ? ( I did a few school trips , they werent particulary educational ) . if anything they cause more disruption as it involves a few teachers being off too , and at secondary level you can not argue that the class will be off too

My two go to different schools - one is in a normal secondary school and the other attends a special school as he has a learning disability, physical disabilities, and several medical conditions. They both have the usual timetable of learning upto and including the day they break up for Easter. The end of the summer term is a bit different, but easter is in the middle of the school year.

I have also volunteered in schools, and all have had full timetable upto and including the last day before breaking up for Easter.

OP, I think a lot depends on how old your child is, the reason for the long holiday, and whether they have good or poor atttendance already.

dundeediva

how old is your child? TBH I just dont agree with taking a child out of school for a holiday at any time. They get 13 weeks holidays a year, book the holiday then or pay up!

Put it this way, imagine you are a primary teacher (im assuming your child is of primary school age, if not imagine the 10 or so teachers your child has) and you are teaching the children their normal lessons blah blah...2 weeks later little johnny/jemima returns from holiday so instead of spending your precious time teaching the whole class the next unit/subject/part of the curriculum, you then have to spend time with this one child catching him/her up on what he/she has missed.

Its not about you, its about the fundemental educational needs of not only your child, but the rest of the class.

Bluebell1000

I'm quite surprised about how much this has changed since I was growing up. My school teachers would quite happily encourage term time holidays on the basis that we'd learn more from travelling around and seeing places than being in school (went away for a week in my GCSE year, never did me any harm etc etc)! Though the secondary school policy was no more than 2 weeks missed in a year for holidays, which seemed fair enough.

Spendless

OP- Who has told you that the fine is £50 x per day? I live in an area that fines for unauthorised absense and the wording is '£50 per child per parent' and doesn't make it clear the duration they mean. I believe it to be (for me) per absence though someone (on mse, not living in my area) told me it is meant per week. I don't know anyone in RL who has been fined, so am unable to say for definate.

Browsing my son's Secondary school website recently, I came across their policy on taking an authorised absense to court and they would only do this if the absence meant the child dropped below 85% attendance.

I would suggest you clarify the situation at the school office or with your LA to establish how much if anything you would pay if you took your child out of school for 10 days.

sarah_id1

What about people who belong to China/India. They would always prefer a holiday for 3 to 4 weeks at least to spend time with their loved ones back home. How can a school penalise these people and stop them have good time with friends, family, grant parents etc etc...

Nicki

sarah_id1 wrote: »

What about people who belong to China/India. They would always prefer a holiday for 3 to 4 weeks at least to spend time with their loved ones back home. How can a school penalise these people and stop them have good time with friends, family grant parents etc etc...

In our LA, and I suspect most others, if you take your children out of school unauthorised for more than 2 weeks, you lose your right to a place in the school. As good schools near me are oversubscribed and often have waiting lists for all years, this effectively means you need to apply to a less good school for a place when you return.

If you have relatives in China/India/Australia the obvious answer is to go in the summer holiday break which is 6-7 weeks long. It may not be the nicest time of year in the country you propose to visit in terms of climate, but if the reason for wanting to go for such a long period is to see family or to educate the child about part of their heritage, that shouldn't really matter, should it?

The LA policy I refer to does not mean by the way that you are allowed 2 weeks authorised holiday - just that the sanction of losing your child's place in the school kicks in at that point. You can still be fined £50 per parent, per child, per week for unauthorised absences less than that, and be referred to the EWO.

Kaz2904

Well the Indian nurses I work with always take their families home in the school holidays so that they can have 4 or 6 weeks at home.
Incidentally, that is really unfair for the rest of us because it means that we can't book any holiday whilst they have it due to maximum holiday bookings etc at work. NOT that I think they shouldn't be allowed to go home but I don't think it should impact on everyone else.
Sorry for being off topic.

Can you not book this holiday using the last week of the summer term and your child will miss less school time?

balletshoes

sarah_id1 wrote: »

What about people who belong to China/India. They would always prefer a holiday for 3 to 4 weeks at least to spend time with their loved ones back home. How can a school penalise these people and stop them have good time with friends, family, grant parents etc etc...

they run the risk of losing their child's place at the school they went to before they took the long holiday.

My DD's friend at primary school did this twice, her family took her to their parents' home country for a few months (once it was a year), and both times she was no longer on the school register. Her mum had to apply for her school place back when they returned to the UK.

bizzielizzie_2

Well you could make up a big sob story (if you can trust you child not to dob you in!). Or perhaps there is a compelling reason anyway? I'm sure that it's down to the discretion of the head whether or not they penalize you or not. 2 extra weeks is a long time though, you can see that the school can't approve of this unless there is a really valid reason. Maybe ask a kindly secretary if there's any way around it?

Sezzagirl

OP Have you asked the school whether they are able to approve your child's extra time off or are you still working in the dark?