Gove to ban term time holidays.

[NikChillin]

When I read this yesterday they said it was to combat regular Truancy, I don't regard one week in the acedemic year as regular truancy.

[PiqueABoo]

fair enough there are always exceptions that it wont work for but if all leas have holidays at the same time holiday firms arnt going to change their pricing why would they?

 

Not optimistic about the prices changing, but I think staggering holidays somehow would be a good thing.

 

is always shocked about what parents expect the school to teach including manners and how to use a knife and fork as an example

 

This is kind of my point. Don't recall whether Sprogette knew her A-Z when starting, probably did, but I really don't think that matters much because they do lots of it at school. We're still doing a form of bedtime reading with an 8.5 yo who can readily devour books herself, coz that's still what is supposed to happen in her universe, but I'm mostly interested in using home time for all the things school won't teach her. It's difficult to explain succinctly, but home time here is supposed to be, and often is, a bit like some extended Brownies session (YMMV but here they're brilliant at introducing the kids to all sorts of interesting things[1] in addition to the more obvious creative and outdoor adventure type stuff).

 

[1] For instance, School has 'em standing at set distances in the corridors with model sun & planets, Brownies took them all to an observatory and sent them home with a bunch of constellations to (eagerly) find in the night sky.

Edited February 20, 2012 by PiqueABoo
[1]

[nicholab]

Don't know why it is so difficult I always had my holidays in holiday time! Why do people think they should fly their kids round the world for holidays.

[pooley]

It's only £100 fine, you would probably save 10x that by booking a holiday in term time, it's worth taking the fine.

[Rydra]

Don't know why it is so difficult I always had my holidays in holiday time! Why do people think they should fly their kids round the world for holidays.

 

It's not about that.

 

a quick and simple look at just about every place that offers flights, holidays, accomodation, and even restaurants will hike prices around certain events.

 

Ever tried going away Valentines weekend? You'll pay double what you would have paid the weekend before.

 

Look at going to somewhere in August, anywhere at all..... And look at the same place say from July 1st-7th, or September 14th-21st.

 

A quick search I did on Thomson, the cheapest in August I got for 1 week in Costa del Sol was £600 per person. In July, just 2 weeks earlier was £300 for the same place.

 

Do the same again say for October half term, February half term, Xmas/Easter/May holiday..... you'll see prices go up between 2 and 10 times the price, for the same thing in the same place. And that's not just for abroad, you'll find it for the UK too; Pontins, Center Parcs, Butlins, even most travelodge/premier inn etc will massively bump up prices for the same periods.

 

Unfortunately, there is NOTHING the government can do to fix this.

 

If they made it law that companies cannot differentiate costs for school holidays, they will simply raise prices on term-time holidays. We've seen this with Car insurance, where they made it law that you can't charge different rates on wheither your male/female.... Male prices didn't come down to meet females, females insurance costs went up to meet males.

[Rydra]

The only fix to this, is to offer different school timings and systems with crossover periods.

 

For example, have schools move to a 4 term year; 4 sets of 10 week terms with a 1 week break after 5 weeks. You would still have a similar calendar, with crossover for people with the above scheduling issues, but would make it harder for holiday companies to pick "peak times"

 

Another idea I heard toyed with years ago was to run 9-5/365 schools, but this would require a complete revamp of the education system taught in these places; flexible teachers to cover their own holidays, flexible learning environment, and generally a completely different approach and way of thinking for a school.

[sted]

Another idea I heard toyed with years ago was to run 9-5/365 schools, but this would require a complete revamp of the education system taught in these places; flexible teachers to cover their own holidays, flexible learning environment, and generally a completely different approach and way of thinking for a school.

 

so basically your kids go to school whichever 200 days(or whatever the number is) you want so you could say take all the normal school holidays in one 13 week block or say not send them on a monday ever? Bit of a pain for any sort of continuity though

[sonofsanta]

As others have said, I would rather they let primary children have any holiday time at all right now instead of filling it with homework as they do at the moment. My 11 year old daughter gets more homework in a week than I did until around Year 9.

 

This half term she had: 4 sides of Maths worksheet; a Maths SAT paper; a piece of literacy (for which she regularly writes 3 A4 pages); and to read a whole book. Taking into account the times when she couldn't be doing homework as we were otherwise busy, of the downtime remaining to her in the holiday I genuinely think she spent more than half of it doing homework.

 

And don't even get me started on them setting homework by the paragraph ("write 4 paragraphs on...") without actually teaching paragraphs correctly in the first place.

 

 

 

Regarding term-time holidays, as far as price hikes go, who can blame them? It's supply and demand in a capitalist market, it is going to happen. Unless you are going to nationalise the holiday industry and create socialist tourism.

[SteveBentley]

There's a lot to be said for paring down the curriculum to the bits that are actually going to be useful and abolishing homework full stop.

[Guest Guest]

The nursery where my child will be going to actively encouraged us to teach our daughter what we could before they get there EG letters, numbers etc.

 

Whilst my daughter doesn't know the order of the letters, she can tell you any letter you put in front of her, including the umlaut and essette letters of the German language.

 

She can also count to 50 (although occasionally misses 13,15 and 17) and can count to 10 in Spanish and German also. She can also do English, German and Spanish nursery rhymes.

 

She can also write the letters C, H, I, J, L, M, N, O, P, Q, S, T, U, V, W, X and Y. On top of this, she can write 1, 2, 3, 7, 8, 0.

 

Along with that she can spell words (using sound out method) cat, dog, bus, mum, dad, nan, pig. She also does baby sign language confidently as well.

 

She is yet to reach 3 (she will be 3 in may), and teachers I know said I was setting a bad example as it undermines the work that they do....I explained that we were asked (and backed up in writing) to teach her as much as possible before she goes to nursery. The reason behind it is so the nursery can see the parents that try with the children rather than those that use the tv as the babysitter.

 

 

Good on you Sir, but all that's going to happen now (and I guess the teachers realise that too) is she is going to be a "problem child". Not because she is a trouble causer but because she is bored sick of waiting on every other child to play catch up. I was kicked out of just about every class in school but come exam time I used to get 100% - the teachers couldn't put 2 and 2 together though and would tell my parents I must be cheating. My parents obviously knew I wasn't but...

 

Unfortunately state education is only for your average child. Too clever or too dumb and the school don't have the capability/time to educate you.

 

 

On your point about TV though - "back in the day" my mum used to sit me infront of the TV when she got sick of my constant questions (I was very curious and constantly wanted to learn), but put on the open university and BBC education programs. When sky came out she put discovery on. Now though there is nothing like that, even discovery/etc is dumbed down so that your average American can follow it. But I do get your point.

Edited February 20, 2012 by Guest

[featured_spectre]

Well about the ONLY childrens programs my daughter will watch are Mickey Mouse Clubhouse (because she LOVES Minnie Mouse) on a Saturday/Sunday Morning, Little Einsteins in the evening (teaches about music and art), and handy manny (teaches about working as a group and basic spanish) first thing in the morning before she goes to my mums for the day - My mum doesn't own a TV so she sticks the classical station on the radio for background noise. She will otherwise not watch TV and prefers to play scrabble for her age group, and do puzzles and such like, things that will challenge her mentally.

 

But then again, with my daughter having an Eidetic memory (or believed to be) she is going to be a problem child for most schools as she CAN remember little things from ages and ages and ages ago, and is like a sponge when it comes to anything she can learn. We are already looking at special schools as the nursery HT who wanted a progress report on Friday said she may be looking at gifted and talented already as she is miles ahead of the other children whom she asked the parents to do the same. Not blowing our trumpets but the mrs, my mum, the mrs mum and myself seem to do a cracking job in teaching the basics to my daughter.

 

Will keep going this way

[mthomas08]

The nursery where my child will be going to actively encouraged us to teach our daughter what we could before they get there EG letters, numbers etc.

 

Whilst my daughter doesn't know the order of the letters, she can tell you any letter you put in front of her, including the umlaut and essette letters of the German language.

 

She can also count to 50 (although occasionally misses 13,15 and 17) and can count to 10 in Spanish and German also. She can also do English, German and Spanish nursery rhymes.

 

She can also write the letters C, H, I, J, L, M, N, O, P, Q, S, T, U, V, W, X and Y. On top of this, she can write 1, 2, 3, 7, 8, 0.

 

Along with that she can spell words (using sound out method) cat, dog, bus, mum, dad, nan, pig. She also does baby sign language confidently as well.

 

She is yet to reach 3 (she will be 3 in may), and teachers I know said I was setting a bad example as it undermines the work that they do....I explained that we were asked (and backed up in writing) to teach her as much as possible before she goes to nursery. The reason behind it is so the nursery can see the parents that try with the children rather than those that use the tv as the babysitter.

 

+1 on this. I am uncle to 5 kids and you have described both sisters kids (one good, one bad). You can tell who has been brought up properly and who is left to do what they want regardless.

[Flatpackhamster]

Maybe its just the way Gove is being portrayed in the media but some of the policies he seems to be coming out with are all very nice ideas but practically half of them seem to be unrealistic.

 

The up to two weeks are designed for funeral's and the such like as mentioned in the article. If schools are not allowed to say this is authorised then it will just mean that for these authorised absences will become unauthorised and therefore ruin attendance records.

 

Yes this is aimed at schools which allow this time for holidays but they those schools should be penalised in a different way rather then cutting something which a lot of schools do not do anyway. The heads/deputy's which are pressurised by parents to allow this just need to grow a backbone in my opinion.

 

It's the way he's being portrayed in the media. Or more accurately, the way he's being portrayed by the Guardian and its pet broadcaster, the BBC.

 

Gove's saying that headteachers should have the power of sanction, and they should. It is not right to take kids out of school. But part of the reason that parents do it is that they know that kids do very little in the last week of term, so what's the point in keeping them in? Teachers have made a rod for their own back.

[Andrew_C]

Let us not forget that Gove was the idiot that suggested the country buys the queen a new boat, while the rest of us face cuts in most services.

[Flatpackhamster]

Let us not forget that Gove was the idiot that suggested the country buys the queen a new boat, while the rest of us face cuts in most services.

 

No he wasn't.

 

He suggested that the money to pay for the boat be raised by public subscription. That means that rich people would donate money to pay for it.

 

See what happens when you only read the biased left-wing press?

[Dave_R]

I should think if this ever does become law, we will see a dramatic rise in 'sick relatives abroad' that need to be visited. Failing that, parents will simply phone in and say their children are ill and won't be in for a few days, but oh of course it's the end of term isn't it? All that is likely to happen is an increase in dishonesty, and aren't we trying to encourage the children to be upstanding honest citizens in society? Will passport control be looking for supporting evidence (eg doctor's certificate) when they see someone under the age of 16 go through during term time? I frequently get equestrian from parents because of restrictions of flight times, ie only one or two flights a week meaning they have to go Thursday to Thursday etc.

 

Dave

[GREED]

Let's firstly calm down (points at last 2 posters EDIT: not you Dave, although maybe for getting in there first!!), and remember Gove is not the sharpest tool in the box when it comes to realistic expectations and changes to education, some of the points in the education bill were wild to say the least!

 

This will never get put into play as the consequences are so wide reaching it will affect so many businesses not just holiday firms.

 

Such a public outcry if this were seriously suggested a referendum would be called for, which he knows he would lose.

[PiqueABoo]

It's the way he's being portrayed in the media.

 

Once upon a time Gove used to portray himself in the media as a Times columnist and I thought he was a [bleep], indeed an notably ill-informed unpragmatic [bleep], stopped reading and began to appreciate thoughtful Tory folk like Matthew Parris so much more. With Gove I just can't shake a kind of juvenile debate feeling... there's always a bit too much popularism, righteousness, small stuff writ too large etc. This is education, if there were a really good way of improving it then some genius would have presented it long ago. [Mine: Fewer attempts to improve it would likely be an improvement]

 

Will keep going this way

 

You'll likely acquire at least some of this outlook, but what works for me in a parental bliss sense with a child 5-6 years ahead of yours rarely has anything to do with academic performance at school - I'm content that she's clever enough and happy to leave the competitive stressy parents to try and manouvre their often vaguely unpleasant, and sometimes seriously obnoxious kids to the top of the pile. It's much more about the person Sprogette will be, the degree of self-motivation, the sense of justice, how she reasons about things, approaches life etc. One of our spies recently reported a parental conversation in the playground where Sprogette was described as "everyone's friend" (which we kind of knew via the birthday party invites) and that truth pleases me more than most things, except perhaps that her very best friend is one of the less academic, but most pleasant natured girls I've met - they're remarkably good for each other.

 

Short version: YMMV but given a reasonable amount of ability I think the social creature matters as much as, probably more than, the academic one.

[GrumbleDook]

One of the thing that amuses me is the folk who repeatedly pipe up about how it is terrible for a school to stop (or try to stop) them taking children out during term time but it is fine for the children to be taken out of valuable lessons to do silly things like school plays, trips to X, etc ...

 

And you will have some teachers saying the same thing too ... but the thing that most of these parents do not realise is that the teachers are *not* agreeing with them (YMMV).

 

The Teachers are saying, "Please don't take little Johnny out of my lesson as I am under pressure to get x, y and z done before the end of the term and whilst education is not just about academic facts / skills and is also about other aspects of culture and learning ... I am going to stick my neck out and be selfish and say do it to someone else and not me!"

 

The parents are saying, "I don't recognise that the extra-curricular stuff is valuable to my child."

 

OK ... a bit of a generalisation with the above, but some of the best things I have seen to motivate kids, to get them to work together and for them to grow/develop/engage/otherbuzzwordyoumightlike is with the stuff outside of curriculum-based lessons.

 

Personally ... I am against the long summer term. There is sufficient research to show it can be detrimental to children (certain sections more than others) and keeping the holidays to 4-5 weeks is best. I still go on about 5 terms, each of 8 weeks with a 2 week break between each term (4 in the summer) is a system I have seen work darned well. The argument from parents and teachers about the terms are too long doesn't wash as the 2 week break leaves you more refreshed for the next block. The argument of schools being on different systems is more relevant to some than others ... but even from this thread we can see that it already affects people ... so why not standardise?

 

Having spoken to a few unions reps about it (very heated debate and it did include a union representing support staff) they were / are dead set against it as it is disruptive to their members ... and one even said that it is not important that it might work out better for the children!

 

Short Version : the holiday system at the moment sucks for all, doesn't help our kids educationally and the moves by Gove are not going to do much to fix that, but at least trying to get the kids back in school and reduce the amount of buggering about, due to the missing child in a class, is going to be a good thing.

[FN-GM]

My parents had major issues taking my brother out of school 3 days before the end of Xmas. They where flying to Australia and couldn't get flights at other times. At the time he was in year 7. In the end they refused and they took him out anyway and he got unauthorized marks.

 

What gets me is we all know what happens on the last week of term! All the students watch DVD's etc...

[sonofsanta]

Gove's saying that headteachers should have the power of sanction, and they should.

 

They do already. A letter asking permission has to be sent to the Head and it is their discretion to allow it or not. If not, and the holiday goes ahead, it is marked as an unauthorised absence, and in conjunction with a pattern of other absences, other holidays and so on, may get the child and parents flagged up to Education Welfare who then have the power to take the parents to court.

 

So what is Gove actually suggesting? Or is he just making noise again?

[PiqueABoo]

The parents are saying, "I don't recognise that the extra-curricular stuff is valuable to my child."

 

As is the school that dishes out lots of homework.. when you both work, have to use after school clubs etc. that adds lots of pressure on available time, and ultimately the child.

 

Read and recoiled from a 'quality' press weekend article recently which was a recipe for getting your unfortunate state Primary kid in the same ball park as one at a posh prep school... in year 5 & 6 you're supposed to trade extra-curricular for academic grind. Way I see it year 5 & 6 are probably the last opportunity to still have a decent conversations etc. with Sprogette until at least 2025 and I'm not planning to waste that manically sharpening her exam passing skills. She's sat behind me now doing some piano practice and she loves doing it - given the merest hint that the repetition required for passing the next grade is threatening that love, then doing grades will be history. Exams matter to an extent, but so does being a child without premature adult concerns/pressures.

[Andrew_C]

See what happens when you only read the biased left-wing press?

Funny, I could have sworn it was the Torygraph that I read it in... As that is the only paper in the common room here, I think it must have been!

[NikChillin]

I think that taking my children on holiday is educational, I don't take them out when it is exam time and only for a couple of days at the end of term. It is for financial reasons as we are not on film star wages. The experiences they have can't be replicated through a tv program, experiencing a different environment, the shock on their face on seeing a real banana tree. (They were younger then.) Seeing huge ants, toroises etc. I think it is worth it.