to think book vouchers for 100% attendance is an issue?

[DancesWithWoolsEnPointe]

DD2 had 100% attendance at school this year. DD1 had a tummy bug and stayed at home 1 day.

DD2 got a certificate in assembly. Fine with that.
But she also got a £5 book voucher. Not fine with that.

DD1 is jealous and cross with me that I made her stay at home for 24 hours after vomiting, as per school policy. She says that next time she is sick, she is going to school anyway. So what lesson are they trying to teach here?

people on here saying it's not discrimination and it doesn't matter because other children don't win other prizes (sports, maths) for the most part can't have any experience of having a disabled child or of disability themselves.

My lb is always ill with his asthma / chest, but he got 100% in his last term :) I was really happy for him! Get a grip

I don't think there is a single phrase that I hate more on mn than 'get a grip.'

Six, thank you. I think you are possibly in a minority though. I would be interested too to see what parents of disabled children think about this issue depending on whether their child has been ill/disabled from birth, compared with those who have developed ill health/acquired a disability later on. It might make a difference and then again it might not!

Thanks for your post Phacelia - I was already thinking all this rewarding of 100% attendance was pretty dodgy - and lazy and unimaginative too.

Your post reminds me it's worse than that

pinkyp if your child is always ill you must be sending him into school whilst he is sick (I am not sure what LB means though).
So if anyone needs to get a grip, I think its you

Sending a sick child to school is neglectful and irresponsible.

I was mega-stupid-competetive at school and managed 5 years 100% attendance.

I can remember being so ill once I had my head on the desk, eyes closed, headbuzzing, seriously awful. What was the point?

Now I am a grown up and there are no prizes any more. If I am poorly I have a day off and recover properly - the kind of respect that should be awarded to children as well.

pinkyp I really hope you wrote your post without having read Phacelia's post that came just before, because if you did read it your post was bloody nasty and insensitive.

I really do see both sides of the argument.

I don't think genuine medical appointments should be counted in attendance.

But I do think that 100% attendance all year is something for children to be proud of achieving. We try to instill in children that if you are really not well then you shouldn't be at school, and that it can't be helped.

Attendance awards are a direct result of Ofsted's insistance that attendance and punctuality should be raised in schools. Complain to them, not the school, if you don't like them.

Is the general feeling that by rewarding 100% attendance we are punishing less than 100% attendance? I struggle with that concept - in secondary, 100% attendance is rare, so no-one feels punished by not getting the award. We have done it for years, well before the latest targets and shite.

If the reward/ punishment argument holds, then surely we should stop doing races at sports day, because it punishes all the ones who are not picked and only one person wins. We should stop giving curriculum awards, because Child X is never going to win the music prize as he is tone deaf. We should stop giving merit prizes as Child Y is a little shite and she will never have a hope of winning...

So should children not feel proud of 100% attendance?

Yeh, for that reason I find it all a bit patronising to the parents too, rooftops

If my children are well enough to go then I send them to school, otherwise, as per guidelines from school and doctor, I keep them at home.
I think many parents do the same !

It all seems a bit common too

Great post Phacelia

pinkyp why the 'get a grip'?

I don't actually think 100% attendance awards are anything to be proud of, no, particularly in primary age children. What's to be proud of? One of two things:

Either;

Being lucky enough to be healthy all year - great, but something to be proud of? Really?

Or,

Going into school even when feeling rotten in order to get the award - including with D&V bugs, contagious bugs etc etc. Something to be proud of? Flouting school rules and infecting other dc, including possibly immune suppressed and chronically ill dc?

Where's the pride in that? I really, truly cannot see it, at all.

Haven't read the entire thread so probably it's already been said. But the 100% attendance thing is stupid, illogical and at best misguided.

We all know why schools are doing this. It's because a persistent minority are too fecking lazy to get their child into school on time. For those parents, giving their child a certificate and/or a £5 book voucher isn't an incentive.

So what ends up happening is the majority of us have to put up with this stupid crock of poo where our kids learn that it's a bad thing to be ill.

You'd be better off sanctioning the parents. You know, less than 90% attendance = 10% of child benefit docked. etc. Except where accompanied by Dr's sick note

I think being proud of carrying on when you're feeling a bit off is a good thing. Obviousy the D and V thing is a different matter. And of course some children have real health problems. But I think children are encouraged to give in to minor illnesses too much- some children I know practically live on calpol. And before I get flamed, that doesn't include children with serious health issues.

I agree that instilling a sense of not giving in at the slightest sniffle is a good thing. I think that instilling in children that being there, not takiing off except when absolutley necessary is a good thing.

DS HATES time off school. he will always insist on going to school unless he is actually throwing up. He is a real soldier-on-er. He has as much chance of winning an award thorugh not catching a temporary bug, or going to school with a bit of a headache as the same as every other child. But he has a mobility disability which requires various hospital appointments not within our control. THAT is what makes it an unlevel playing field.

I'm happy for there to be modest recogniton of kids who work hard at being there. But think that the unavoidable absences which are strictly in respect of a disablity should not count against attendance awards. That would be the 'reasonable adjustment' that the DDA requires, for example.

Teens may not care about certificates - but an iPod will get them to think again. I don't really agree with such huge extrinsic rewards, and do not think it is Ofsted's fault that schools take this bribery route. But if they do, they should do it fairly.

"My main issue is it is adults who get primary to school. Children are reliant on adults getting up, getting them up, supplying clean uniform and driving or walking the school run. So we punish the kids of adults who don't."

Leaving aside whether or not the absence of a reward constitutes punishment, to reward the children of adults who do all these things is just as ridiculous. As I have said ad nauseum, you may as well reward children for their parents' income, as this is a much bigger indicator of educational success. Primary aged children do not have control over their attendance, their parents do.

"You'd be better off sanctioning the parents. You know, less than 90% attendance = 10% of child benefit docked. etc. Except where accompanied by Dr's sick note"

This is what I find so confusing- in the case of persistent non-attendance, the parents are prosecuted, not the child. So how can attendance be the child's responsibility on one hand, and the parent's on the other?

It's nonsense, and makes a mockery of any reward a child receives for their own achievements.

It's not something I agree with either. It was very hard to explain to DS5 that he couldn't go on the special cinema trip DS3 & 4 were going on because he was unfortunate enough to get ill during term time.

So DS3 & 4 got their treat, 100% attendance up to June half term. Then DS4 had the last week off school with chickenpox! Lucky DS3 gets to have it during the holidays, thus keeping his record clean!

And all the lazy arse parents who can't be bothered to get their children to school on time/at all are still being lazy arses, because a trip to the cinema isn't going to encourage them to get out of bed.

A certificate would be a nice gesture from the school. Book vouchers are unnecessary. If some pupils never get a certificate it's not the end of the world. Not everyone can get the maths prize, the English prize and so on. I think children realize this.

They give these out at the dc's school. This term was the first time my two qualified (aged 8 & 6). They both have minor but ongoing health issues, which means that their immune systems are compromised. Not their fault, not my fault: just how it is. I have seen dd sink into herself in assembly, when these certificates are handed out, trying to hide her red face and her tears. Me telling her that I am proud of all the achievements she has worked for, much more than I would be if she got lucky and stayed well, makes no difference to her: she wants one of those certs!

One term this year they both got the d&v bug repeatedly. They would get better, go back and go down with it again (and again). School appeared to be making them ill. At one point the head asked dh, 'Do you need to fumigate your house?' We were a bit annoyed by that, as we were when he asked, 'Is your house too clean?' It was neither and they don't give out certs for not thumping the head, either.

The problem is that this whole stoic 'I just get on with it' attitude is affecting attitudes to the extent that people think that those who don't 'get on with it', ie those who do take time off sick, are in some way weaker and more useless. This then bleeds into the whole way of thinking about those disabled scroungers who won't work....etc. There's a whole culture of thinking that labels sick people as weak, and these certificates are playing into it at an early age. Bet Call me Dave loves them

The 'getting on with it' attitude is all very well, and I have a firm work ethic myself, in fact when I was teaching I would drag myself in whenever I could (I wasn't contagious to others, only with my lung disease), even with pneumonia. Looking back it was ridiculous and only meant I couldn't teach properly and the kids were getting a worse deal, yet that kind of attitude was applauded - ie she is so ill but still keeps going, etc etc - in the end, actually, I collapsed, my lungs got irreperable damage and now I'm unable to work ever again. My stoic attitude did me very little good.

I am totally with those saying that dc with little sniffles/headaches should be sent in, and as for those keeping them off for a little bit of rain/snow, well, I won't go there. But it's the seeping attitude that worries me, the doing down of the weak, the playing into the hands of the Fail and its' ilk.

Brilliant post madhairday.

The "Get a Grip" attitude implies that those who take time off for ill health aren't trying hard enough.

I'm so sorry you can't work again