A question about keeping children off school in term time: to take them on holiday.

mumps

coolcait wrote: »

Ah yes - the 'customers'! My parent had more than one story to tell about bumping into 'customers' when off-duty. In latter years, my OH has been in a similar situation.


I was immensely proud of the contribution my parent made to society as a member of the emergency services. Even if society didn't see fit to provide remuneration at a level which made family holidays feasible - on the occasions when the timing would have worked out.


If people see 'spending time together as a family' or 'relaxing away from work' as being completely and exclusively synonymous with 'going away (abroad) for a week or two', then they won't understand how or why things worked for my family.


If you have a parent who works shifts and/or is restricted in the times they can take leave, then you, as a family, very quickly learn to make the most of the opportunities that you have.


Someone who works shifts isn't always free at weekends. So, make the most of the weekends which are free. On the other hand, they regularly have days free in the middle of the week. If those days coincide with school holidays, bingo.


Coming off night shift, there was usually a run of several days before the next shift pattern started. Again, plenty of scope for getting out and doing stuff together. Or days on early shift - in the Scottish summer, on days when the weather is good, you can get a good few hours outside after the shift ends. You pretty much get the beach to yourself, the water seems warmer in the evening, and if you have a barbecue disaster, there's no one nearby to get annoyed by the billowing smoke or screams of laughter.


There are plenty of opportunities for fun days out, and holidays, in the UK. And it doesn't always rain. Just as it isn't always sunny in overseas resorts.

So were you never with them when confronted by someone who has just got out of prison because of them? Not alot of fun on a day out.

In my husbands force when you came off nights you had two days off, one of those days you were sleeping after coming home after finishing shift at 6 am so not really good for a trip. The second day was usually a transition day trying to reset sleeping pattern, again not a great day for a day out.

We didn't have holidays abroad, I said previously we went camping, we found that relaxing, fun time together. Money wasn't the issue, we could afford holidays in school holidays it just wasn't always possible.

We lived 3 hr drive to nearest beach, didn't really fancy six hour round trip on a regular basis. Each to his own, we liked holidays you are obviously welcome to days out if you prefer.

mumps

Jagraf wrote: »

Did she do 6 A levels at school? :eek: that's a lot!

Well she cheated a bit :T She did maths GCSE early, then did maths A level in year 11, so in years 12 and 13 she actually did 5 A levels. Mainly as she could decide which one to drop. She was also doing a part time job, up to 24 hrs per week. She is one mad girl.

coolcait

mumps wrote: »

So were you never with them when confronted by someone who has just got out of prison because of them? Not alot of fun on a day out.

In my husbands force when you came off nights you had two days off, one of those days you were sleeping after coming home after finishing shift at 6 am so not really good for a trip. The second day was usually a transition day trying to reset sleeping pattern, again not a great day for a day out.

We didn't have holidays abroad, I said previously we went camping, we found that relaxing, fun time together. Money wasn't the issue, we could afford holidays in school holidays it just wasn't always possible.

We lived 3 hr drive to nearest beach, didn't really fancy six hour round trip on a regular basis. Each to his own, we liked holidays you are obviously welcome to days out if you prefer.

Yep, that was us. Poor but happy. Making the most of the time that we had together.


Making the most of what we had, rather than hankering for what we didn't have.


Dealing with the rough stuff as well as the smooth.


Finding the local gems for visitors, as well as the ones which were further afield.


As you say, each to their own, and we are obviously very different on a number of levels.


But we are the same in the sense that we have experienced situations where "it wasn't always possible" to have a traditional 'going away' holiday during the school summer holidays - due to parents not having leave at that time (leaving aside the financial aspects).


Where we differ is that my family - as a child and as a parent - adapted to make the most of parents' availability during school holidays. You take a different approach.


You say that "it wasn't always possible" to have family holidays during the school holidays. This suggests that it was sometimes (often?) possible for you to do so. This is good to hear, as it does mean that you weren't forced to endure three decades or more without having a family holiday during school holiday time..


Were you in the UK when you lived a 3 hour drive from the nearest beach? Or did you just have a terribly slow car?

Jojo_the_Tightfisted

mumps wrote: »

Maybe you didn't need to get away to relax, some people do. For example if you are a police officer, linvolved in quite high profile investigations, you can regularly run into some of your "customers" which doesn't make for a relaxing day out at the local park,

Do you think it is reasonable that because one of your parents chose a certain career you would be unable to have holidays? I don't understand how you had all these days out if your parents couldn't have leave during your school holidays. Did you only go out at weekends?

Have you considered that there are many families where having any holiday at all didn't happen? For example, due to lack of money, caring responsibilities, illness or disability?

I believe that, in approximately 50 years, there were two holidays taken in my immediate family. All five siblings, parents/step parents and grandparents. Possibly one day trip to the seaside a year.

I've always wondered why holidays away are seen by so many people as a fundamental human right, and cheaper ones are so important to people who can obviously afford an acceptable holiday (ie, one at all), they're prepared to lie, cheat and get angry if somebody doesn't agree that getting a fancier holiday just when they want, is so very important.

FBaby

But if a parent takes a child on holiday because its cheap, and them hires a tutor, more fool them. Something literally doesn't add up.

That's assuming the reason is costs. It isn't always. Twice I took them out because we were going away with other people who didn't have children and THEY couldn't afford to pay the fare during school holidays.

I am not undermining what a lesson plan, I am trying to understand how a child missing school truly impact on other children. In the example you provided, if children work in 5, it might be that with one missing you could have the perfect number of groups of 5 or not. In regards to the child catching up on recycling plant, just need to google it and tons of information provided there. I'm sure it wouldn't take time that long to discuss positive and negatives with his parents/grand-parents/siblings.

Spendless

mumps wrote: »

Thanks, that is interesting. So if a child is away for a few weeks leading up to and including a major event, say the Olympics, then they have a tutor with them. OK for little ones but would have to be a pretty talented tutor to copy with GCSEs in say MFL, maths, sciences, RE, etc etc etc. Also lack of labs for science. Seems quite disruptive to me.

I can't answer for sporting events, but having a DD who takes drama classes and some of her fellow students have appeared in films/tv shows/theatre work and a tutor 'for a few weeks' is unlikely. If we're talking a few months than someone would be provided. Eg I'm aware of a child who auditioned for a musical and one of the criteria is the kids have to live in the London/Greater London area or be home educated as for the first 3 months of rehearsals a tutor isn't provided, only once the show starts.

Even then it isn't completely straightforward, the child's school has to sign off the performance licence, which they tend not to do if the child's attendance is below a certain % as this recent story shows.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3128500/Mother-says-school-getting-way-13-year-old-girl-s-showbiz-career-not-letting-time-appear-TV.html

Jagraf

To me this discussion is a bit like those who are late getting onto a plane. Everyone is put out by one persons actions yet that person doesnt understand why. Except in addition it is breaking the law.

duchy

mumps wrote: »

It would work if they stayed in the same place. If you have someone who is looking to reach senior rank, as my DH did, then they will move round departments/divisions to get experience, then they will move when promoted. Sometimes when they get to higher ranks they will even move force. So the new division/department/force doesn't really care what happened last year. We had periods of several years in a row where it just didn't work out for us so we took holidays in term time.

Just to add about the 13 weeks, we liked to go camping so the October and February half terms didn't appeal. Christmas and New Year weren't great either. Easter depends as sometimes can be good but not terribly reliable so you are left with May half term and six weeks in the summer. I suppose if we had wanted to go abroad we would have had more flexibility but not our choice of holiday.

And that is the crux of the matter.
No-one forced your OH to determindly climb the career ladder in a job that would impact on family time together. That was a decision made -and no doubt chasing promotions with moving around brought other benefits to the family like increased income. For another family the increased income wouldn't have made up for the lack of family time and they perhaps wouldn't have applied for the same posts your OH did - and had more chance of holidays in school holiday time.

Neither is wrong (or right) each family makes their decisions as to what compromises are made to get the outcome they want. Ultimately those decisions are made knowing there is a price to pay - and if that means a nicer lifestyle but more moving around and less family time together or holidays together then that's the trade off you chose. Most people would like "to have it all" few achieve it. Career v family time together is a biggie for lots of families.

seven-day-weekend

I think exceptions should be made for people like mumps' husband who have no say over when they take their leave, otherwise I don't think it is necessary to take a child out in term time.

My husband was a teacher for many years in one of our city's top-performing schools (in fact his own subject normally had 100% pass rate at GCSE). His attitude was, if you want to take your child out of school so that you can sit on the beach at Benidorm cheaper than in the school holidays, fine. But don't expect me to take time away from the rest of the class to go over the missed work, or give up my own time to do extra marking. It's your responsibility to catch up on what has been missed.

As I have said before, we HAD to have school holidays, even when our son had left school (teachers don't get a choice either ). We went camping or stayed with friends.

It felt like playing wag when he finally retired and we went on holiday in June

duchy

seven-day-weekend wrote: »

I think exceptions should be made for people like mumps' husband who have no say over when they take their leave, otherwise I don't think it is necessary to take a child out in term time.

.

I don't
Plenty of people have "reasons" to take children away in school time - but choosing a career path that you know is going to impact hugely on your children isn't one of them.

I don't think something that is a choice should be given preference over say a low income family who can only afford a week in a caravan in term time.

That said I think the whole system of not allowing holidays is a bit ridiculous and it worked far better when up to 10 days could be taken with the head teacher's agreement and there was an expectation it would only be granted if the child's attendance the rest of the year was good enough that it wouldn't cause huge impact to their education.
I had less time off school even with an authorized week off after Whitsun each year than many of my classmates whose parents would keep them home at the first sign of a runny nose but wouldn't dream of taking them away on holiday in term time. As it was planned absence the good teachers would give me work to do when I was away- the lazy ones told me I'd just have to muddle through when I got back. Fortunately as a fairly able child academically the lazy ones didn't really impact on me too much.

With the current system it's one rule for those who can afford the fines and another for those who can't which frankly gives kids the message that if you can afford to pay you are allowed to break the rules. Is that really the message we want schools teaching our children ?