Fined for taking a 4 year old out of school
Discussion
martinbiz said:
Can you get a friend of a friend to tell you to stop talking like a cock, for some it maybe the difference between having a holiday or not and zero to do with being a "tight git"
Not everyone needs a holiday abroad. If you can’t afford to go abroad during school holidays then why not go camping in the uk, or hire a cottage in France. These things will be the same price pretty much most of the year. Having a holiday to somewhere hot and sunny is not a human right.yellowjack said:
Bless! Having to QUEUE and unable to get a sun lounger some days? Someone call the ECHR.
Yes that did raise my eyebrows too. However the rest is applicable to your personal circumstances, but not necessarily typical:yellowjack said:
As it happens, my wife's an NHS worker too. And I spent 25 years in the army. We managed to go abroad once in all that time, and that was to a wedding in France. We could rarely afford it financially, and even less often managed to take leave together. We often took separate holiday periods so WE could look after OUR kids instead of palming them off on some bored teenage supervisor at a summer club in some s
thole holiday resort.
Most people would say that shared family holidays are important. A family holiday does not mean you have to go to some resort with child care, so you can put your kids in care and not spend time with them. There are all kinds of holidays. thole holiday resort.yellowjack said:
As for schools not using common sense? Well I got a day pass for four to the 2012 Paralympic Games at the Excel centre in London, free through Tickets For Troops. The very first thing I did (it was quite short notice) was to write to the Head Teacher at my son's school asking if he could be allowed a day off school to attend with us. If she'd have said "no" then we'd have gone without him. Instead she wrote back a lovely letter wishing us a good day, as it would be a "wonderful experience and an extra-curricular learning opportunity" for him. We had a great day in London watching some truly inspiring competitors fence, and play table tennis and basketball. The head made sure he wrote something up about his experience, and that he caught up on anything important he missed at school. Smooth process with no issues.
That is your experience with one school and it is not typical. My daughter was refused term leave to visit her grandmother abroad, in her 90s and recently diagnosed with lung cancer. We took her out of school anyway. It remained recorded as an unauthorised absence and we got a snotogram letter, though not a £60 fine, from the local authority.
My son had leave for NHS hospital appointments recorded as unapproved absence. Despite advising the school in advance, with a copy of the NHS letter, about the planned absence. It took some time to correct this.
While my son was 4 at the time we took him to visit his grandmother (previous paragraph, the grandmother in 90s abroad with lung cancer) so the school could not do anything about that, we did of course get the snotogram letter and also a notice that his absence would be monitored in future as by the next term he had turned 5. During the term where my son had turned 5, he had a medical issue, not serious, but required inpatient hospital admission and a number of NHS appointments before that. The snottogram from the school warning of the consequences of future absences did not differentiate between medial appointments and unauthorised absences, it just stated that any further absences would result in further action. Thus my son being recorded as an unauthorised absence, when the school has been notified in advance of an NHS appointment, was not a trivial matter.
yellowjack said:
Holidays, too can be good opportunities to learn, but far too many of these whinging parents just want to drag their brats off to some play club at an all-inclusive resort with less culture than a boarded-up Butlins. Hardly any wonder that schools aren't keen to play nice with such parents. My son only got the nod for a day off because his record was for 0% unauthorised absence too. Exactly the same record afterwards, because it went down as an authorised absence in the register.
Well again, that's your view the the only holiday is at a place not quite as good as Butlins. I've addressed the sort of things which are recorded as unauthorised absences earlier. yellowjack said:
I'm right behind schools/councils/LEAs when they clamp down on scrotes who don't see anything wrong in dragging kids out of school willy-nilly for the sake of a cheap holiday. It's an attitude that fosters the idea that it's OK to "throw a sicky" or "take a duvet day" later in life when employers and colleagues are depending on them to turn up for work. And for the record, no. I've never "taken a sicky", or "called it a duvet day", and neither has my wife. I might well have been brought up on a council estate, but I've always had high standards, and my wife's standards are even higher.
But as you say, you were unable to afford a shared holiday with your children when they were growing up. yellowjack said:
The idea that "he's only four, we should make an exception" is unhelpful too. Once one exception is granted, then someone else (and there's plenty of thick-as-mince parents about) will insist that "he's only six, we should make an exception", and so-on until there are more exceptions than rules. They are kids. They need to go to school. It's the law. It really is as simple as that...
It's not the law that 4 year olds have to go to school.Edited by creampuff on Friday 21st September 03:09
I have been reading this thread and am so grateful I don’t have kids.
Setting aside the law part of the argument as to should the parents be fined or not (it seems in this case the child is too young and that matter should be sorted eventually. Then I have a question for people in the know.
1) What are the implication (apart from fine) for the child if they are marked as unauthorised absence.
Is it put on any university application for instance.
If you get to many can they suspend the child/kick the child out of school.
If there is no real implication to the child’s future then surely every parent would just factor the £60 cost in to the how much the holiday costs.
As everybody tells me holiday prices can be £100s more in term time then it’s a no brainier. I could understand if a child was in the final years of GCSE but aged 4.
My only real memory from around age 4 was my uncle vic having a heart attack in front of me and dying. Quite a traumatic event.
So what is so important to teach a child aged 4 that missing 1 week is so important. Nothing.
Setting aside the law part of the argument as to should the parents be fined or not (it seems in this case the child is too young and that matter should be sorted eventually. Then I have a question for people in the know.
1) What are the implication (apart from fine) for the child if they are marked as unauthorised absence.
Is it put on any university application for instance.
If you get to many can they suspend the child/kick the child out of school.
If there is no real implication to the child’s future then surely every parent would just factor the £60 cost in to the how much the holiday costs.
As everybody tells me holiday prices can be £100s more in term time then it’s a no brainier. I could understand if a child was in the final years of GCSE but aged 4.
My only real memory from around age 4 was my uncle vic having a heart attack in front of me and dying. Quite a traumatic event.
So what is so important to teach a child aged 4 that missing 1 week is so important. Nothing.
MB140 said:
So what is so important to teach a child aged 4 that missing 1 week is so important. Nothing.
It's less about what the child misses and more about the disruptive effect on the rest of the class where different kids decide to take holidays at different times during term-time. And then combine with "normal" absences such as illness, dentists appointments and so on. then combine with the minority of pupils with feckless parents who skive anyway. So, for example, you might have 1/2 kids in each class who have no idea what fractions are because they "weren't in last week". So either the teacher spends time going through last week's work, or she continues with the normal teaching syllabus and the kids who dont understand get bored/get disruptive etc etcAll of this combines to create disruption which in turn has a negative impact on ALL the kids.
Countdown said:
MB140 said:
So what is so important to teach a child aged 4 that missing 1 week is so important. Nothing.
It's less about what the child misses and more about the disruptive effect on the rest of the class where different kids decide to take holidays at different times during term-time. And then combine with "normal" absences such as illness, dentists appointments and so on. then combine with the minority of pupils with feckless parents who skive anyway. So, for example, you might have 1/2 kids in each class who have no idea what fractions are because they "weren't in last week". So either the teacher spends time going through last week's work, or she continues with the normal teaching syllabus and the kids who dont understand get bored/get disruptive etc etcAll of this combines to create disruption which in turn has a negative impact on ALL the kids.
I could understand if your talking great swathes of time off but a few weeks makes no difference.
My niece when she was 13 or 14 contracted Guillain-Barré syndrom. Nearly died and took a year to learn to walk again. She got all her school work sent to the hospital a lot of this was electronic through an online portal and whilst there was talk of her retaking a year she refused to do so and just got on with it (attitude of both parents and child to continue her education).
She started University last week to become a nurse (partly due to the time she spent in hospital at the QMC and the great care she received from the nurses).
My long winded point is that it’s more to do with the attitude of the parents and child than when they take time off and issuing fines will make not a jot of difference imho.
As a parent of a 5 year old who was in Reception class last year (born late August so the youngest in the year), a few things to highlight:
1) Many schools have the first week of reception either staggered days or half days to ease the children in gently so there's not much to miss out on.
2) Reception year at our school was more aligned to guided play than structured lessons. Year 1 is where we're finding more formal teaching structure and homework.
3) The health policy of the school forbids any child experiencing vomiting, diarrhoea, chicken pox etc from returning to school until 48 hours after the last bout of vomiting / pox crusting over. So it's quite easy for a child to miss an entire week off school.
The headmaster made it very clear during our school prospective visit that before the age of 5 there is nothing the school can do to prevent us taking our child out as legally they don't have to be in school until then. After 5 years old is a different matter.
They're four years old, a week off at the start of term isn't going to do them any harm.
1) Many schools have the first week of reception either staggered days or half days to ease the children in gently so there's not much to miss out on.
2) Reception year at our school was more aligned to guided play than structured lessons. Year 1 is where we're finding more formal teaching structure and homework.
3) The health policy of the school forbids any child experiencing vomiting, diarrhoea, chicken pox etc from returning to school until 48 hours after the last bout of vomiting / pox crusting over. So it's quite easy for a child to miss an entire week off school.
The headmaster made it very clear during our school prospective visit that before the age of 5 there is nothing the school can do to prevent us taking our child out as legally they don't have to be in school until then. After 5 years old is a different matter.
They're four years old, a week off at the start of term isn't going to do them any harm.
eltawater said:
As a parent of a 5 year old who was in Reception class last year (born late August so the youngest in the year), a few things to highlight:
1) Many schools have the first week of reception either staggered days or half days to ease the children in gently so there's not much to miss out on.
2) Reception year at our school was more aligned to guided play than structured lessons. Year 1 is where we're finding more formal teaching structure and homework.
3) The health policy of the school forbids any child experiencing vomiting, diarrhoea, chicken pox etc from returning to school until 48 hours after the last bout of vomiting / pox crusting over. So it's quite easy for a child to miss an entire week off school.
The headmaster made it very clear during our school prospective visit that before the age of 5 there is nothing the school can do to prevent us taking our child out as legally they don't have to be in school until then. After 5 years old is a different matter.
They're four years old, a week off at the start of term isn't going to do them any harm.
It won't do the child any harm, but it isn't fair on the teachers who are trying to integrate a new class with a whole bunch of new things...1) Many schools have the first week of reception either staggered days or half days to ease the children in gently so there's not much to miss out on.
2) Reception year at our school was more aligned to guided play than structured lessons. Year 1 is where we're finding more formal teaching structure and homework.
3) The health policy of the school forbids any child experiencing vomiting, diarrhoea, chicken pox etc from returning to school until 48 hours after the last bout of vomiting / pox crusting over. So it's quite easy for a child to miss an entire week off school.
The headmaster made it very clear during our school prospective visit that before the age of 5 there is nothing the school can do to prevent us taking our child out as legally they don't have to be in school until then. After 5 years old is a different matter.
They're four years old, a week off at the start of term isn't going to do them any harm.
Kids are great - have loads of fun with mine 
Even better than cars 
The issue for many is of self determination and actually being allowed to be the parent rather than the state stepping in with jackboots for its own agenda with its own decisions and its 'my way or the highway' attitude. Agreed they need some powers here for the welfare of the child - only a terrible parent would say 'Pontins have a sale on' in the middle of a 15 yr old's GCSE prep. But they often over reach IMHO and blanket over rule in my opinion (no consent for a family wedding for e.g.) and so need reminding that these are someone else's children and not units of humanity they borrow for their own scholarly statistical purposes. I know an ambitious head teachers' glowing CV (they are competitive alpha males/females most of them remember...) may be affected by OFSTED's annual report based on the degree of presenteeism but to withdraw their discretion and common sense for legitimate absences in favour of a LEA fining system is alienating and regressive. But they often see only ticks in boxes and not people, life and children.
Even better than cars The issue for many is of self determination and actually being allowed to be the parent rather than the state stepping in with jackboots for its own agenda with its own decisions and its 'my way or the highway' attitude. Agreed they need some powers here for the welfare of the child - only a terrible parent would say 'Pontins have a sale on' in the middle of a 15 yr old's GCSE prep. But they often over reach IMHO and blanket over rule in my opinion (no consent for a family wedding for e.g.) and so need reminding that these are someone else's children and not units of humanity they borrow for their own scholarly statistical purposes. I know an ambitious head teachers' glowing CV (they are competitive alpha males/females most of them remember...) may be affected by OFSTED's annual report based on the degree of presenteeism but to withdraw their discretion and common sense for legitimate absences in favour of a LEA fining system is alienating and regressive. But they often see only ticks in boxes and not people, life and children.
Vaud said:
It won't do the child any harm, but it isn't fair on the teachers who are trying to integrate a new class with a whole bunch of new things...
It's the first week, they really aren't trying to do that. The first week at our school was some half days with the rest of the time split amongst the class teacher and her teaching assistants performing home visits for an hour.It's really, really simple. You have asked the state to educate your children. As part of that, the state has very large set of responsibilities around what they teach, how they teach, when they teach, a whole load of monitoring, targets, admin and god knows what else. These are in place to ensure that children are treated equally, that everybody broadly gets the same opportunities, and that the schools are able to operate in an effective manner.
For your part of the bargain, you are asked to make sure that your child attends school.
If you can't accept that, then other options exist for your child's education. But don't ask the state to make an exception because you're special, because you're not.
For your part of the bargain, you are asked to make sure that your child attends school.
If you can't accept that, then other options exist for your child's education. But don't ask the state to make an exception because you're special, because you're not.
eltawater said:
It's the first week, they really aren't trying to do that. The first week at our school was some half days with the rest of the time split amongst the class teacher and her teaching assistants performing home visits for an hour.
No, they really are. They are getting kids used to lunchtime, playtime, class rules, etc. Yes it is phased, and yes there is a lot of play, but they are introducing and establishing rules for the year. That's the point of it (recent experience of last year and talking with the teacher who was frustrated that they did not have a full class and would have to repeat the next week.)
In the scheme of things it isn't important, it affects the teachers and not the child. I'm personally fine with taking my daughter out in foundation, or even at the end of summer term for a week (as the structured stuff is all over, reports are all written, etc), I'm just flagging that it does have some impact (on teachers)
deckster said:
It's really, really simple. You have asked the state to educate your children. As part of that, the state has very large set of responsibilities around what they teach, how they teach, when they teach, a whole load of monitoring, targets, admin and god knows what else. These are in place to ensure that children are treated equally, that everybody broadly gets the same opportunities, and that the schools are able to operate in an effective manner.
For your part of the bargain, you are asked to make sure that your child attends school.
If you can't accept that, then other options exist for your child's education. But don't ask the state to make an exception because you're special, because you're not.
Ahh so if you pay again (for we all pay once) for private education you are upgraded from pleb parent and now get further options and are permitted an input? You are buying the ability to decide if YOUR child can come with you on a family holiday (as a self employed parent with seasonal work) or maybe to attend a far flung wedding? So its more about money then if it isn't equally about education - as thats what they both do. Teach... For your part of the bargain, you are asked to make sure that your child attends school.
If you can't accept that, then other options exist for your child's education. But don't ask the state to make an exception because you're special, because you're not.
Mind you its fine if the school does it and asks for £2k to take them to Thailand for a jolly, mid term...
Ken Figenus said:
Ahh so if you pay again (for we all pay once) for private education you are upgraded from pleb parent and now get further options and are permitted an input? You are buying the ability to decide if YOUR child can come with you on a family holiday (as a self employed parent with seasonal work) or maybe to attend a far flung wedding? So its more about money then if it isn't equally about education - as thats what they both do. Teach...
Mind you its fine if the school does it and asks for £2k to take them to Thailand for a jolly, mid term...
What you are buying/paying for is a gold-plated system that provides your child with the extra flexibility needed for him to take schooltime holidays that don't result in him taking resources away from his classmates.Mind you its fine if the school does it and asks for £2k to take them to Thailand for a jolly, mid term...
Our school always takes them on jollies during school holidays.
surveyor_101 said:
otolith said:
Poor child. His education will never recover from missing that week of finger painting.
My four year old has started this year. One of the gripes I have with my catchment school which is the same distance as other primary we wanted is their part time staggered . With my first child we went for the other school and go told no not in catchment. Doesn’t stop people the other side of town blagging the system and getting the school the other side of town.My daughters first week was 9 till 11, that was Wednesday - fri as as Monday Tuesday were inset days in our area anyway.
Second week 9-11.30
This week 9/12.30 with them staying for lunch.
It’s been a nightmare for us.
ClaphamGT3 said:
surveyor_101 said:
otolith said:
Poor child. His education will never recover from missing that week of finger painting.
My four year old has started this year. One of the gripes I have with my catchment school which is the same distance as other primary we wanted is their part time staggered . With my first child we went for the other school and go told no not in catchment. Doesn’t stop people the other side of town blagging the system and getting the school the other side of town.My daughters first week was 9 till 11, that was Wednesday - fri as as Monday Tuesday were inset days in our area anyway.
Second week 9-11.30
This week 9/12.30 with them staying for lunch.
It’s been a nightmare for us.
ClaphamGT3 said:
How dreadful to be so horribly inconvenienced by your children's education
Actually I think phased introduction is a good idea but there are huge variances. Our school - 2 weeks of phased. Mornings only for 3 days, Then until after lunch, then full days. Another local school - 4 weeks (!) of phasing. That is really tough on parents to juggle leave and school - for some that would consume the majority of their annual leave.
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