We call them all "half term" here..

[Acc0untant]

And apparently I'm unreasonable. I see comment after comment about "it's not half term, that happens half way through each term" but ever since I was a child I, and everyone I know, calls each holiday a half term other than summer and Christmas. My parents and the parents of my friends (bearing in mind I'm in my 30s) have always done this.

Is it regional? I'm in the midlands. It's not just students/parents here, teachers use it this way, our school communications. Not even just my experience with one school, it was the same at my secondary school, my daughter's primary and secondary, my other child's nursery etc.

For us this is because we have a holiday after every half of a term, not that the holiday is half way within the term.

I appreciate that this wasn't the original intention of the phrase but at what point do we accept it's fine to use? Same as staycation originally meaning to do day trips from home rather than a UK holiday, it's now been used for both for so long that it's colloquially acceptable for both meanings.

Please no bun fights, I can't be bothered. I appreciate the pedantry with things such as this (and I can be that way with other stuff) but I'd really just like a nice, chilled conversation about it.

Do you say half term for almost all holidays? What region are you from? Would enjoy seeing if there's a correlation.

I see your half term and raise you DH's "mid-term break" (he's not American) which he uses to describe the interval at the theatre/concerts. Massively annoying.

North West - it was Christmas, Easter and summer holidays and Feb, May and Oct half terms. There's 3 terms with a break half way through each i.e. "half term".

Half terms are the breaks in the middle of the terms. So feb, june and october. The ither ones are christmas holidays, easter holiday and summer holidays. Never heard of christmas and easter being called half term, becuase it's not half term😂
(Based on life within the M25)

Not regional, just wrong.

Traditionally there are 3 ‘full terms’: Autumn (Sept to Christmas), Spring (Jan to Easter) and Summer (April to July).

The first holiday is end of October which is ‘October half term’ - half way between the start and end of Autumn Term. Then we break up at the end of that term for the ‘Christmas holidays’. This can’t be a ‘half term’ because it’s not half way between anything…it’s just the Christmas holidays 🤷‍♀️

Spring term starts after Christmas and we then get ‘February half-term’. At the end of Spring term we get the Easter holidays.

Same goes for the Summer term…we get ‘May half term’ followed by the ‘Long Summer Holidays’.

To summarise:

1. October half term
2. Christmas holidays
3. February half term
4. Easter holidays
5. May half term
6. Long Summer Holidays

👌🏻🤣

I'm in NE England and have always called the Oct half-term blackberry week, the may one is Whit week and the Feb one is just February half-term. Obviously nothing getting picked or celebrated in the middle of winter 😁

That's correct

I think it is regional but is spreading. They changed all the term times and split them into more than one term with a break in the middle then a longer end of term holiday, didn't they? That's when I think it started being Term 1/2/3/4/5/6 and the rest. Now seems just like endless numbers.

We used to do that in South Wales when I was growing up. That's May half term

@MillicentFaucetlove blackberry week and it sounds much better way to spend a week than tattie week!

I think it's probably just because it's a bit confusing for those areas where people only refer to official half-terms as such?

If someone says 'half-term' to me I think of February or October mainly, or May, I definitely wouldn't think of Easter.

I had this conversation with DD the other day. I’m firmly in the “half-term is halfway through the term” camp whilst she argued that each term has two halves, and the holidays between each half is a half-term break, which is also reasonable. I still secretly thought she was wrong despite this, and then her school newsletter mentioned “the half-term break” talking about the Easter holiday and I was gagged!

Likewise, plus the Scottish May half term alternative - the September weekend.

I know loads of people who call them all half term, mostly because we don’t have kids in school and don’t really give a shit what specific schools call them! It just means schools are off which is all we need to know.

London - also keep calling them all half-term. Tbh, the half-terms are all extended now and end of terms are all shortened, so there's not much difference time-wise. Only difference is the half-day / full-day element of the last day and the normal start / late start of the first day back (depending on which it is).

No half terms here in my part of Scotland we have;
September weekend
Tattie week (October week)
Christmas
Feb long weekend
Easter
May day
May long weekend
Summer holidays

Summer holiday, Easter holiday, Christmas holiday and three half-term holidays or "half-terms", in the middle of each academic term. "October half-term" or "Summer half-term" or whatever if you need further distinction in the context.

Pretty simple and unambiguous. It would be nuts to introduce unnecessary ambiguity by calling just the Easter holiday a "half-term holiday".

Long weekend?! So you don’t get a full week off in Feb or May? 😮

Dh and I call the Feb one the "shit half-term" as we are always skint ak can't go anywhere, it's cold and miserable so can't run outside all day.

So in short we all call things different names so op your way is the only right way?

They’re all half term here (NE)

Interestingly more and more people seem to be calling the Easter holidays half term. Some even refer to the six week summer holidays as half term which makes no sense at all.

I have only ever known the half terms as what they are - a break half way into the term. I always assumed that's why it was referred to as half term break.
However, I know some areas will have term variations.

I say whit for May, not many do here (north Wales) seems to be a mix of people saying Half term for Easter or just saying Easter Hols, Christmas etc

Summer holidays just gets shortened to Summer eg, we’re off for the Summer now.

No one really cares

I’m in Scotland and only heard of the “half term” phrase on parenting sites.

Growing up and having my own children we call them Easter holiday, summer holiday, October holiday and Christmas holidays,

we don’t use half term,

So it’s just the Easter break you call half term, OP? I don’t get that if you call the other longer breaks by their names, why is the Easter holiday demoted to half term?