Half term didn't used to exist did it?

[EthicalNonMahogany]

I feel gaslit by the world! The number of people who are saying to me "oh, at school we always used to call the Easter, Christmas and summer break half term". No you didn't! You used to call it the Easter holidays. It was the holiday that happens at the end of term.

"Half term" used to happen three times a year and was the week off, half way through each term.

I know there have been threads on this before - I'm not disputing that many people now call all the holidays half term. It seems to be the thing now. (Stupid and inaccurate as it may be, but I shall endeavour to cope and life will go on )

My AIBU is this - people are saying it was always that way. AIBU to say no it bloody wasn't!!

It annoys me too as it’s not half way through a term . It’s the end of term .

Half term (when I was growing up and for my kids) is always a week with a possible INSET tagged on. Easter/Summer/Christmas are always 2 weeks + so just called school holidays

In Scotland we tend to call feb mid term which is 3 days, then Easter holidays, summer holidays, tattie holidays and Xmas holidays.

Never heard Easter or Christmas called half term except on Mumsnet. Half term is October February and May

@TeacupDrama that's 3 terms not 4.

Autumn with October week
Winter with Feb break
Summer with two May weekends

For me this is the Easter school holidays. Whitsun week is half term. Then the summer holidays. Then October half term. Then Christmas holidays. Then winter half term.

When I was in infant school half term was three days.

Yep
Half term hols are, funnily enough, half way through each term!

@TeacupDrama sorry, just realised your counting before and after October as separate terms where I think of them as one

@dementedpixie

I'm in Scotland and don't think I've ever called any holidays a half term holiday. Easter holidays Christmas holidays, October week, September weekend, etc. Then various long weekends or random in service days

I'm Scottish too and I have never called any holidays half term.

Always just summer/October(or tattie holidays)/Christmas and Easter. Then random days here and there

I've always said the Christmas/easter/summer holidays for the 2/6 week main holidays and half term for the week off in October, February and May, half way through the term, but recently I've definitely heard people calling them all half term, and it really irritates me 😂

No such phrase in Scotland! It's Easter Holiday, Summer Holiday etc.

So when's the one week break each term or is Easter and Christmas the break and the term is August to June? Is that what it means?

I hadn't noticed the misuse of "half term" - but then not I'm greatly impacted by school holidays.
This thread has reminded me of a college where I did a change management program a few years ago - planning was around different terms, often with testing phases over the holidays.
I was leading a planning/information session at the introduction of the program - afterwards someone took me aside and said that the principle had decreed that no one should use the word "Christmas" in respect of the multi-cultural nature of the college.
I took this on board, and at the next meeting referrred dutifully to the Winter Break and the Spring Break. All went well, then halfway through, someone said "oh, do you mean Easter?"
And they all thought I was a miserable sod for not giving anyone a christmas card.

Definitely a (recent) thing to call all school holidays ‘half term’ . Teenagers and parents IME

I’m a teacher and I’ve heard it multiple times in the past few days, including from other teachers. It derives from the same laziness and ignorance as ‘3am in the morning’, ‘This oven self-cleans itself’ and ‘I could care less about [unimportant thing]’.

You can talk to me all you like about how different people communicate differently and how I shouldn’t judge, but the fact remains - if society was made up of people who used words and phrases accurately, far fewer major mistakes and misunderstandings would happen and things would be smoother and happier. If everyone was the sort of person who calls the three holidays which divide the school year into three whole terms ‘half term’, when there are three other holidays which each divide those whole terms in half, then nobody would understand anybody and society would collapse around our ears.

And no, it didn’t used to be called this a couple of decades ago. It was Christmas, Easter and Summer holidays, with half term holidays in between. YANBU.

I've only ever called it Easter break. Half term are the weeks off in feb, may and October.

I remember three half term holidays a year when I was at school exactly the same as my DC have now. The half term in the summer term - mid way between Easter holidays and summer holidays was referred to as Spring Bank holiday.

We called the half term in October Tattie picking week, (potato picking week).
.

YANBU.

Half term refers to the single weeks of holiday which occur halfway through the school terms in February, May & October. The clue is in the actual fucking name : Half term.

The Easter & Christmas/New Year holidays are not, and have never been, half term. The happen at the end of terms, not halfway through them. Why is that difficult for people to understand?

I've just started noticing this this week. Never come across it before.

There are 3 terms in a school year: autumn, spring and summer. There is a school holiday at the end of each term, so Christmas, Easter and summer. They have typically been 2 weeks/2W/6W respectively. And approx half way through each term is a 'half term' holiday, which was typically a week. October HT, February HT and May/June HT (also know as may/spring bank holiday week).

Now schools and authorities can mess about with the school calendar, we've got a range of holidays. My October half term week is now 2 weeks. I'm currently half way through Easter holidays. But I'm still in an end of term holiday, bot halfway through a term!

All school holidays are called half term, thought that was common knowledge!!

Obviously it isn’t an actual half term but it’s quicker to say when being polite and enquiring if little Jonny is enjoying half term rather than his Easter holidays.

It’s slang yo init

The only person I know who does this is my family keyworker (arranging appointments etc). Despite having a school age child herself. I don't say anything as she's generally pretty helpful.

I just use it as short hand. Not the summer holidays obviously.

The Easter holidays here started yesterday. For most people I work with, it stated last week. It's easier to say "half term" to specify I mean when the kids are off, rather than to say "Easter holiday", then I might mean the Good Friday - Easter Monday period.

@ChekhovsMum and @TokyoSushi, you are my people. I knew I wasn't going mad.

@AlphaJura

I feel like it's the other way round! Half term is the week off in between the terms of the 'main' holidays. So, there used to be 3 terms divided by a half term each. But now, schools seem to say there are 6 terms!

Que?

While we're on the subject, my recently departed Nan (94) used to call one of the half terms "potato picking week". Any idea which one this would have been? I just can't remember but I'd love to know.