To think school have said no for my child absence for a family holiday

[HidingInTheBathroom]

We are going on holiday next month. My DS (8) school have refused the leave.

I handed the form in yesterday and got a reply today. I wouldn't mind but he never has time off school. He has not had 1 day off this year and last year he had 1 and half days off because he was sick at school and was still poorly the day after.

We have never been on holiday in school time and out of all his school life I think he has had a total of 4-5 days off ill.

They say if I take him I could get find. Going next month so my DS will be off school for a total of 10 days. We have been waiting for this holiday for 4 years.

AIBU to think they should off not refused this absence.

Here here W9W5.

She's spot on Jade - from another speech and language therapist.

I think it is really mean to pull the OP up on her grammar. So it is not perfect, does that really mean we have to go on and on about it? It's disgusting and I'd rather talk to someone with poor grammar/dyslexia than with someone who is absolutely spiteful and makes themselves look like a complete mean and prejudiced individual.

I do not agree with taking children out for so long and have to say that I don't think Disney is a good reason. You could wait till next year. But it's obviously your decision. I would try and find out how much a fine would be and whether you could afford to add that to your travel plans or whether it would make it as expensive as going during holiday time.

Peaz, is this a one off? I mean, does this happen a lot or is it just because of the olympics next year? If it would be a one off I would say that you would simply not get to have a family holiday that year. It's not like you have to go every year.
If it would be a regular occurrence I am not sure.

I've read the whole thread and can't believe I'm posting this but

jade, hang your smug head in shame. I was incredibly annoyed reading your posts and cannot believe just how rude you and others have been to the OP FFS.

I will just add both my brother and sister have learning difficulties and god help them if there are people like jade in this world.

Funny how jade hasn't been back to defend her comments after w9w5 post.......

YABU, you should have booked a holiday out of term-time, somewhere that you could afford and that isn't too hot for your DC, or waited until next year and saved a little extra, giving your DH enough notice to book some time off in the holidays next winter.
Two weeks is a lot of school for an 8 year old to miss and her will struggle to catch up as well as keeping up with the work that is ongoing when he returned.

Language problem aside where is it written down that we have to use perfect English on MN?

This is a forum for mums to communicate with other mums-period.Jade's appalling attitude will just scare an awful lot of mums away.

I have an English degree and was a teacher but I'm sure I make many a grammatical error when posting as I'm not working and often post having drunk wine.Do we all need A level English to post now?

OP have a fab holiday!!!!!!!!!!!

Sorry said child won't struggle to catch up.A class is made up of 30 different children with different abilities.A good teacher will continuously assess and kids have different levels for different things.Teachers don't just teach one level,they cater for all levels. 10 days is nothing. Parent shouldn't expect extra time given(which she doesn't) but any child doing well will little previous absence will be absolutely fine.

Tiffany, I had to go out, apologies for not being quick enough!

Working, that's fine, you can think what you like, as can I. I have no problem with people having difficulties with writing. I think you misunderstand me. I don't care if someone I know is good at that sort of thing or not, why would I? What I don't like is when people don't care enough to try, just shrug and go oh ok, whatever. I do fully appreciate that it doesn't matter what I don't like. I just find it sad, because of the effect on children.

I do understand that not everyone gives a shit, and also that others do care about things I don't. I have said this several times. If you choose to take my poststo be written in an offensive way then fine, its not how I meant it. I still stand by the content of what I said, apologies to anyone who misunderstood the tone of my post and felt put out by it.

Those of you whinging about my posts, read them properly, it isn't as if all I said was 'your grammar is crap'. Some other posters did limit their comments to that. I also commented on the holiday.

I'm sure plenty of you have said things I don't like in the past, I'm also sure none of you are paragons of virtue who never say anything that could be considered rude! The OP doesn't give a crap about grammar, fine, as i said before. I don't give a crap if you disagree with me. Also fine.

Just to confirm and clarify, I am not 'mocking' anyone, least of all the OP, just stating my views.

If anyone wants to discuss this further, PM me rather than extending the OPs post any further away from the point, please.

MrsHeffley - certainly teachers cater for many differing abilities, but if they happen to be covering any specific areas of, say maths, that don't come up often, or reinforcing an area that perhaps a child is unsure of, then yes, the child may struggle if 2 whole weeks are missed. You have no idea what the OP's child is like academically.

then fine, its not how I meant it.

You want an apostrophe in that line jade. Also a space between posts and to in the same sentence. Oh and I should always be a captial.

I don't actually give a fuck, but you know,it just saddens me as you are obviously having a detrimental effect on your children and the children of everyone else and you don't even care.

Ha cheers catgirl, the pitfalls of typing quickly, hey? Just to reiterate, I don't have a problem with typos, I think you must have misunderstood?

But it's a spiral thing,a class re-visits continuously.

As I said previously I have a degree and was pulled out every June.My dad was in the forces and I went to a different school every year or 2 and my education didn't suffer.The kids that suffer are the kids who never go to school and the rest of us are being penalised for it. They're trying to use a hammer to crack a nut(or whatever the saying is)because it's the cheapest way of trying to stop persistent truants.

A child who has authorised or unauthorised absence in our children's Belgian school is given all the work they miss whilst not at school, it's the norm here. Would parents in the UK be so willing to withdraw their children for holidays, if they knew that their children would have to do all the school work they have missed?

The school are I think obliged no to have it recorded as " unauthorised" unless there are real extenuating circumstances eg dying grandparent, religious reasons etc.

You are choosing to loose 2 whole weeks of your child's education - taking his attendance down to 80% for that term. It will impact on thei education and that is why schools bother.

No that isn't why schools bother.They bother because they have OFSTED on their backs and the gov who are trying to deal with persistent truancy the cheap and lazy way.

And on this spiral, if a child misses part of what's going on, then they are missing a vital building block of what comes next, when they re-visit it. They will be at a disadvantage - measured not so much against their peers, because as you say there is a huge ability range in any one class, but compared with where they would have been had they experienced all the prior learning. (That was probably badly-expressed, but I hope you know what I mean)

For the record, I don't have a massive problem with parents taking their children out of school for a family holiday they might otherwise not get. What I do object to though, as a teacher, is people blithely assuming that they're not missing anything much, even at the end of term. And of course, the worst time of all, is during September, at the very start of the new school year.

YABVU to even bother "requesting" that your DC be absent from school. I'd have just called in sick - although 10 days might be stretching it a bit.

It's none of the school's bloody business. Parents, NOT the state, are ultimately responsible for children. I find it outrageous that parents have to beg for time off in circumstances like this and still be refused.

If parents constantly take the piss WRT time off school, then tough shit, their kids will suffer as a result. There are clear procedures in place in all schools nowadays to deal with PERSISTENT absenteeism and truancy. A one-off holiday will make fuck-all difference to anything, unless your kids are 15+ and in the middle of exams. Seriously.

I can think what I like? It's my professional field, it's just your bigoted opinion. It upsets you when people won't try harder? God, doesn't it just make you sick when people in wheelchairs don't try harder to walk? I mean, come on, how hard can it be?!

You stand by the content of something you clearly have no idea about. Some of the students I work with have had 10-15 years of intensive therapy and still struggle with some features of language. Without it, it is unlikely they would be able to talk, let alone write. The students I work with at Year 11 and older need to be able to explain their disability to people and face a world where ignorant know-it-alls judge them on the basis of linguistic difficulties that are neurological in origin. People like you, Jade.

In this case, the OP has said she had therapy into her teens. That's a whole load more trying with speech and language processing (which underpin written expression) than I'll wager you've ever had to make. For the vast majority of us, language is a birthright that we acquire without effort (in the main) before we are five years old. You have no idea of what people with speech and language difficulties endure in working to gain something that you were born with, and yet you "find it sad" that somehow people with language disability just don't try harder and "shrug it off". Yes, years of therapy equates to "shrugging it off".

I find it sad that a small percentage of people with language impairment go on to struggle to make and maintain friendships and relationships, have ongoing difficulties with mental health perhaps in part because their skills are not seen because of their deficits and struggle to gain employment despite often having average nonverbal intelligence. I find it sad that when someone has the ability to explain their disability and its impact on them that there are bigoted individuals who choose to ignore this and judge them based on their own petty prejudices and ignorance.

I will say it more plainly: you may one day have these language difficulties yourself. In fact, as the population ages it is almost a certainty that a significant minority of us will experience strokes and associated language difficulties which may impair our speech, our understanding and our reading and writing. You may one day have much, much more severe language difficulties than the OP and be at the whim and mercy of people who will judge you for not "trying harder" to articulate or string a sentence together.