Sick kids in school. How really important is attendance?

[FishCanFly]

Plenty been said in holiday threads of how terrible it is to take even one day of school. Also that "sniffles" or a headache isn't a good enough reason to miss school.
But then when kids get full attendance awards there is a bunfight that it's selfish and unfair to send sick kids to school to spread germs - others get I'll and then their attendance is hurt.
SO LET'S DISCUSS

It's the lack of common sense that annoys me. In Year 4 DS2 had close to one day sick every week for a lot of the year (he had several blood tests etc. but they never found anything). His end-of-year report laid the 'attendance is crucial and he will have missed out on so much' thing on thick and then went on to indicate that he was in the top two or three in his class for pretty much everything.

I think it just makes the Educational establishment look stupid and lose credibility. And saying 'it's just the system' is no excuse. Change the system.

I don't like attendance awards because they penalise kids who are genuinely ill, sometimes with chronic conditions.

That said, in our house it's in school unless there's been d&v or hospitalisation.

I haven't had a day off work sick for over a decade, and I expect dc to be the same. But I do appreciate that we're blessed to be generally healthy and not having any serious conditions (except asthma & allergies) and that it's not the same for every family so I definitely don't judge other people whose kids have poor attendance.

I can't bare attendance awards, I'm not sure what good comes from it, and actually feel they put my DD more at risk as kids more likely to come in I'll.

When DD started in reception we intended to send her in if she just had a cold etc, however an unknown at the time genetic condition woke up after the first term and since she has to take days off from school almost every two weeks. School are very understanding (mainly because I've shared every medical appointment and letter with them), they and I do encourage her in if she is having a minor flare (obviously not catchable), but it is completely beyond ours and her control as to how she well she is. The medication she has to take is constantly being adjusted and after 15 months on this current one we still have no improvement. She wants to learn, she wants to be in school, so it's nothing to do with bad attitude etc, her body is miswired and lets her down. Her meds are trying to surpress her immune system so that leaves her prone to what other children are carrying into school with them. It's incredibly frustrating when you see a child at school who clearly shouldn't be there.

3 of my kids dont have good attendance there are things that i keep them of for thats not D&V, BUT. They have chronic disbalitites and one very servere mental health DS3 has days of splated about but thats because hes in so much pain he cant move, crying, screaming, swollen. If my kids cant move of there bed in pain there not going in, same witnh Ds5 if he cant keep food down/is in agony eating and drinking, i need to keep an eye on him. If DS1 (no longer at school) ,mental helath was so bad- he was having psychotic epsidoes for example he was off. The same three DCs have slightly reduced immune systems the school tell me if theres anything going round and sometimes, as a precaution i have to keep them home (epsecially DS3) this soemtimes happens cause parents (/schools) think if the there not psychially dying (slight exaduration) or havent thrown up in 24 hr they send them in. I do undertand childcare i have to re arrgange a lot. My children have been sent home with letters/attendance officers droping in and DS3 and 5 have never been on the attendence trips. It may sound like i keep my children of alot, but if you saw how much pain there in, how pale they look soemtimes, shivery etc you wouldnt ever.
My children didnt chose to have disabilitys they would rather be in school and i dislike a system that bascilly rewards good immune systems (in one respect) my DSs feel crap because of this syetmn and feel like there failing, there not there amazing for fighting the days they go in and fight cronic pain and the rest of there sysmptoms

At that age as long as it’s just a cold etc send em to school, better to spread it round and build up immunity, will help later in life when they get a proper job.

I see that any kind of award or recognition causes quite a pickle on MN
Despise attendance awards and did indeed send one back to school with a curt explanation to the head teacher as to why when one of my children got one.
Sad for your kids. What lesson does it teach them? If full attendance is not worthy even a token gesture of recognition - so what is wrong with pulling sickies then?

And those who were unlucky to get ill - there sure are plenty of other awards going around?

many working parents cannot afford to keep the DC home for every sniffle. I used to send the DC in unless they had a high temperature or V&D. I had to show up at work, didn't get paid for staying at home with ill children and have no support network. I don't care about attendance rewards. DD1 is disabled and never got them in any case.

Yes, Sotiredofthislife, thank you for posting this - it’s exactly what I came to say! Shouldn’t we be teaching children that a cold or feeling under the weather isn’t a reason to take time off? Proper sickness, yes. But for lots of children in school they aren’t really sick and unable to work. You can’t do it with a job.

Mine were only off if they had sickness or diarhoea. They rarely got colds, but if they did, they got paracetamol and got sent in, just like I would do for myself. However they never got 100% attendance awards as they had dentist appointments every three months that couldn't be fitted round school hours.

The school I work at is on a really deprived area and I think the attendance awards are brilliant for our kids, but they are done slightly differently.

For example, the attendance reward will be for a fun activity at the end of term. However, ALL children are eligible, despite having previously poor attendance. They have to have 100% attendance in a given period - usually in the last few weeks of term when attendance is notoriously poor for trivial reasons (e.g. Christmas shopping)

Students who have been off due to an ongoing illness or bereavement would still be considered for the activity. Students who are extremely poorly behaved would not.

It's not perfect, but does encourage our students as lots of them do not have the opportunity to do such activities outside of school.

I missed loads of school as I was ill constantly with tonsillitis which was incredibly painful, made it hard to swallow and kept me awake at night. Calpol didn't help much.

Some of us are just unlucky.

And I didn't do well in school, but given that I loved learning and always caught up on all the work, I think the horrendous bullying I suffered - and that the school did absolutely nothing about - had a greater impact...

I think attendance awards are crap.

I might get flamed for this, but I think there is too much Ofsted/scholastic pressure on kids. Some kids will do well no matter what, they will study at home and do extra to make sure they do well on tests (it won't really matter if they get the occasional bug or not). Other kids will struggle no matter what, and they can have 100% attendance. There should be less drive to send everyone to university and education should become personalised so that students who won't go to university can try to learn a trade instead. We need to stop the drive of pushing everyone to university when it just won't be worth it or possible for everyone. It also devalues degrees for the students who will go to university.

I think it’s important to listen to the child. I nearly sent dd1 in with what sounded like a fairly mild cold (headache, sore throat, not coughing or sniffling) but she likes school and so I figured that she must be feeling worse than she looked / said.

Glad I did - she had four days in bed, then I caught it. Wiped me out for a long weekend, and I was close to tears with the level of pain all over, even alternating paracetamol and ibuprofen. Dd1 couldn’t express quite what was wrong, but I was very glad that I had listened to her. It was a truly nasty bug.

@FishCanFly you need to read the rest of my reply again - you've missed the crucial point! Returning the award teaches my kids NOT to be discriminatory against other children for things that aren't in their control! Her sister had done a phased return to school after 18 months of home education due to extreme school anxiety (she has ASD) her sister was, therefore automatically, unable to get an attendance award. This is precisely my point that attendance awards by law are discriminatory and shouldn't be allowed in school unless each child is set a target individually and illness is taken out of the equation. As it was my DD (the one who got the attendance award) didn't get an award for for progressing from below average for are age for reading to a free reader in yr 1 (a progression of around 14 Oxford reading tree levels) - no - instead they rewarded her luck at not getting ill!!

If mine has an illness that means he will get nothing out of being in school but will still have to put up with 2 hours on transport to get there and back, then he doesn't go in.

I hate the sheer hypocrisy of LA or schools sending letters about attendance at the same time as forcing other children on part time timetables or providing no or inadequate education for months/ years on end.

Meh. So athletics awards are discriminatory against unathletic, overweight, or with various health conditions not allowing to play sports. Also academic awards are discriminatory against the un-academic. Arts awards are discriminatory against those without talent.
No wonder schools give out participation trophies or scrap any awards at all because there will be someone left unhappy.

Attendance awards at primary age are based purely on luck.

Couldn't agree more @Sockwomble @FishCanFly no - attendance awards are different. They go against legislation that the schools SHOULD be abiding by as it is written in law!!

What rate of attendance is rewarded? In our school the award is only for 100% attendance. So I’ve had devastated dc crying at not being allowed into school between bouts of vomiting. Then if they’ve missed one day, they push it a bit if they’re feeling under the weather because there is no incentive to bother.
And then there are the parents who game the system who wait until 10pm to pick up sick children, or take them out for other reasons because the attendance is recorded by then.
Personally I teach mine that they have a responsibility not to spread infection.

I don't agree with attendance awards they mean absolutely nothing. The kids winning or missing out on them actually have no control over it.

I only keep my kids off if they have a very high temperature that won't come down with medicine, sickness and diarrhoea.

A cough or cold or anything minor that doesn't seem to be stopping them eating and playing and behaving normally they go in. School can always phone if they're struggling or have gone worse.

I know people who keep their kids off for every little cough and sniffle and then wonder why they missed out stuff or are behind with work.

Stupid.

One of mine has 100% attendance this year... the other just falls below the threshold where school start monitoring as a mild concern (just below 95%). One's just been lucky and not been ill... the other's had surgery and post-op recovery time off school, plus medical appointments before and after the surgery and a couple of stomach bugs. The lower-attender is not in any way less focused or keen on school than the 100% attender - and has just been hit with bad luck and circumstances this year.

Thankfully our school don't go over the top on attendance and no fuss was made over the 100% and no fuss was made over the 95% either (I only realised that one was on full attendance when the report came home with the percentages on!) School just have been through Ofsted where attendance was praised without any of the ridiculousness concerned with attendance that some schools get up to.

I'm coming at it from an ex-teacher perspective though - fucks the education of my own kids AND everyone else's kids up if I send my kids in ill and they make the teacher ill and off work!

It's very easy with DD1 though - she is such a gobshite and never stops talking that if I ring school to tell them she's off the words "she's gone quiet" is close to an adequate proof of illness for them!

I send them in unless they are extremely ill. I wouldn’t keep them off for a cold unless they had a raging temperature. I kept them off for sickness bugs and chicken pox obviously.

I think attendance awards are wank because it’s only really rewarding the fact they were lucky enough not to get ill that year...

I love in Scotland where common sense prevails.

It's ok for children to be off if they need to be off for whatever reason. There is no obsession with attendance, no rewards just simple common sense.

Um, we’re in Scotland and have attendance awards at our school.....