Are we losing the plot re: attendance?

[BlueySchmooey]

Are we losing the plot re: attendance?

https://x.com/catinthehat/status/1840399910769672198?s=46&t=G9BWOZlYGPa11_pR7aKkbHQ

Where are the studies to back it up? DD school reports state that if less than 90% attendance it may have affected attainment level.but there are so many variables in that too. Dd progressed the most in the year she had most time off, because i gave her time off to recover. She went back to school ready to learn straight away rather than low effort for longer.

OMFG that is awful.

"Where are the studies to back it up?"

The government / education bodies have years of data about pupils sat GCSE results etc to analyse correlation with attainment, ethnicity, sex etc.....

A lot of people here complain that work is more flexible attendance wise but most measures emg evidence of appointments etc come into place for attendance of less than 90%.

With absence management policies being what they are today I don't think it bodes well for people for people to have a day off ill every 2 weeks....

This focus on attendance in England doesn't seem to have any real impact. I now live in Australia where you can take your kids out for holidays without any threat of punishment. I took mine out for 9 weeks last year, a once in a life time extended trip, and just informed the school, did a bit of English and Maths while we were away and no more was said.

The attendance where I live now is pretty similar to what England was when i lived there. It's got worse post covid but so has England. It's almost like parents mostly actually care about their children's education and do their best regardless of sanctions.

I love it. You want data from others but offer the observation of your own child as something valid.

It's quite hard to read this. I'm guessing you were a bit tired when you wrote it.

i understand that, for children with a SEND need and children with chronic illness, attendance levels like this are unattainable. However, there are some parents who take any opportunity to have their child off sick. I worked last year with a child in yr 6, who was frequently away from school - at one point not a week went by without this child missing a day. Excuses included ‘had a headache’ and ‘felt a bit ill in the night so kept home in case she needed paracetamol’ and the family also always took term time holidays.

her grades at SATs were shocking, despite lots of catch up work when she was in. She just kept missing whole chunks of the learning and, thanks to Michael Gove, the primary curriculum is now huge and there’s very little time to catch up students who miss stuff. Her writing was called for moderation and we had a huge issue because she barely had any completed work to show.

i should say that there’s no long term illness here, no SEND need and no disclosed anxiety - she always seemed happy to be in school.

She wasn’t the only example in the class of this sort of thing, and has gone off to high school not really prepared. I assume her pattern of absence will continue at high school.

and remember, schools are forced into producing these kinds of communications about absence - if you don’t have a ‘robust’ absence policy and can show improvement, you get hammered by ofsted.

The people having that much time off in a work week probably have underlying issues, plus as adults, as stated above somewhere, there are far more options than are available to children in the school system.

There’s also the fact that work isn’t one homogeneous thing where most work places are very much like every other work places. Adults can choose from a myriad of jobs in different environments, different hours, it really isn’t comparable to school.

That's interesting about Oz. I wonder what other countries are like too.

We are not post covid though! It's very much around, so that alone will account for some increase.

More ridiculous school diktats in press today. Crackers.

My neighbours GC don’t really go to school, I suspect because they don’t feel like it.
Poor attendance does usually equate to poor outcomes because those children aren’t doing any other learning. These children spend a huge amount of time just going shopping with their parents or playing out front.

DD has had poor attendance but has been working at home. It’s not recognised though. I think there needs to be a flexible school system for some children. Where the work they are doing at home is recognised as attendance, like lockdown. Like actual jobs work these days.

Blimey @ColdinSeptember. Maybe reread your post and don’t be part of the judgmental attitude and assumptions that the school seem to be embracing!

I think there needs to be a flexible school system for some children. Where the work they are doing at home is recognised as attendance, like lockdown. Like actual jobs work these days.

Agreed @ColdinSeptember . My children genuinely love learning. They both happily have extra tutor sessions and would be keen to do work sent home on days they were too ill for school but not so ill they couldn't concentrate. I fail to see why I should be treated like some parent who doesn't value education just because my children have chronic conditions. I paid a lot for tutors during the pandemic (because I still had to work, albeit from home). I value education more than the government does, I was prepared to keep it going even when they closed all the schools. And so do my children, they genuinely wanted to keep learning and did their own self led learning during that time too.

I think there needs to be a flexible school system for some children. Where the work they are doing at home is recognised as attendance, like lockdown. Like actual jobs work these days.

Yes to this.

When people/neighbours see my home educated children, they probably think we're just going shopping (lots of life skills, maths, English etc to be practised there...), travelling on a bus, or playing out in our back garden. What they don't know is that by 11am, we have covered maths and English (writing, spelling, grammar, composition), plus a selection of five of the following subjects - British history, Chinese history, world history, poetry, picture study, composer study, geography, science, citizenship, literature (currently a retelling of the Canterbury Tales and Shakespeare's As You Like It), religion, nature study, baking/cooking/handicrafts and learning about special days. We also read aloud at every meal, and go to a variety of classes throughout the week.

They do go shopping and spend hours in the garden every day though 🙄

Tbh, what we need to be focusing on is why so many children are becoming traumatised by school, and what can be done to prevent that from happening. Neither the previous government, nor the current one seem to want to do that though, preferring punitive measures. We see so many children who have struggled with school, come out of their shell and slowly heal once they leave school (baring in mind this is what I am seeing in children who have left school in the primary years). The problem is that home education should be a positive choice for families, not something forced upon them, because the current school system is harming children. School should be a space where children thrive and right now, for too many children, it isn't.

They are not home educating. They are a family who has never attended school that much.
I can remember the elder GC not going to school much 20 years ago and just hanging about the streets and visiting their gran. I see the middle GC in a uniform for a local secondary occasionally.
I can promise you they aren’t reading Shakespeare.

When you talk about non attendance you do have to remember there will always be families that don’t see attending as that important. The parents/grandparents didn’t enjoy school so pass that attitude on and will give them a free pass. It’s a massive social issue to sort out though.

But one of the problems is you can’t treat children who feel unable to attend but want to, with children who don’t want to attend. They are different issues entirely.

please please please report this

I’ve had to purchase books from CGP to try and keep my children in the loop with learning. It is in no way comparable to school but it’s the best we’ve got right now.