Extending school term at end of July

[NeverForgetYourDreams]

That's not going to work. Another ridiculous idea. What about all those people that moved their cancelled holidays for 2020 by a year. Summer holidays may go ahead if vaccine roll out happens and who is going to cancel and lose their money - I'm not. Will be lots of absent children.

The long summer holiday us an anachronism, left over from the days when children helped with the harvest.

I'm sure the government leaks this stuff knowing that the unions will reject it and then they can blame the unions for "failing our children".

The teachers will never agree to that
The media need to remember teachers have been working throughout school closures and won’t be happy at the prospect of a longer term
It’s simply not going to happen

@randomer but it is also the time to get exams marked and turned around for students, to do maintenance work in schools that simply cannot be fitted into 2 weeks and for pupils to have a break.

If everyone has just 2 weeks off in the summer then prices will skyrocket even more than they do now. People don’t want their long break in the winter. When will you get exams sorted? When are you maintaining schools?

It won't happen
Parents and children will want their freedom this summer; teachers can't possibly be expected to work even more, on top of the year they have had; a bit of pointless curriculum cramming at the end of the summer isn't going to cut it....but in any case it all needs a bit more vision, imagination and investment to make any difference...so what will happen is...nowt...

I think longer days and longer holidays would be better.
Primary could be extra pe some days.
Or even just sitting reading to themselves in ks2.
Many kids are in till 5 anyway.
But i would start ant changes in sept so hopefully teachers parents and students are all vaxxed .

My dc will likely miss the last 3d of term because school have been using those days as inset and havent this year. But i had to decide on the holiday dates moved from last year. I havent booked a term time holiday.
But also if we are unvaxxed hoping devon/cornawall might be less busy that first week?

I wouldn't send my son to school over the summer. I won't go into work during my holidays either - not even if they paid me. Which of course the government can't afford to do. It's a non issue.

The government may be able to find some teachers who would agree to this for additional pay - likely young and in need of the cash.

However, those of us with families will be looking forward to the only work-free break we will get with our own children. My two year old said this weekend ‘No Mummy, you work on ‘pooter, Daddy play’ because I’ve needed so much time at weekends to keep up with demands of remote learning.

Really? Hopefully they'll soon realise this is a really dumb idea.

I think it’s a good idea!

The long summer holiday us an anachronism, left over from the days when children helped with the harvest
Helping with the harvest, I remember it well.

I might be confusing harvest with the 1980s when it only rained on one day each summer!!

You can't have it both ways.
If you want children to make up for lost education then it has to be done sometime. After school is much less efficient as concentration levels are bad enough in last period.
Shorter holidays for a year seems like a good solution.
I doubt if anyone will be holidaying abroad this year anyway.

@randomer

The long summer holiday us an anachronism, left over from the days when children helped with the harvest.

Whilst being true it's still lovely to get a long break with endless summer days.

They'd better not do this. We have a UK holiday booked for July that we'd moved from October 2020, because we didn't feel it was a good idea going then, even though we'd have been allowed. Also, how much catching up can they do in 2 weeks? Just let kids be kids, they need a proper break in the summer after all this. The English school holidays usually seem to miss the best of the weather as it is!

Is this a policy or just an idea?

If it's just for this academic year and it's not compulsory because of booked holidays then I guess you make a decision as a family.

What else to do if it happens?

If you want children to make up for lost education then it has to be done sometime then it should be optional because mine haven't lost any education, although they have missed out on the fun of after school clubs and sport.

Maybe it is just me but @CureCovid idea seems to be the solution in terms of keeping term dates and holidays the same??

Highly unlikely to happen. Too many obstacles to overcome to make it work.

We have holidays booked end of July and beginning of August that we shall be going on in the uk so my son would not be attending even if this was passed.

As I said on another thread regarding the longer school day, school transport is a huge issue and barrier. Cost, passenger assistant contracts,available buses. Cuts have meant bus companies have scaled back massively. Government won't fund this, even if it was possible.

We have 300 passenger assistants, their contracts wouldn't cover this. Bus companies may not want to give up summer contracts for holiday trips either - assuming these are up and running.

More BJ BS to tide us over the bad news. It won't happen and 'anyone' else can be blamed!

Full timetable is happening for us. School as normal 08.30am-16.00 so no this won't be happening with our school

What would help would be to fund schools properly, smaller classes, better adult to child ratios , that would catch children up, with whatever arbitrary measure we are trying to put on education

Between 25 and 50% of children are currently in school anyway. I doubt they will be happy about working through another term. Children are very tired at the end of term too and need a break

The thing is you can't 'catch' children up by cramming them. Learning doesn't work like that! Children need time to process what they've learned and to assimilate. Just piling on more and more 'learning' will not achieve anything other than adversely affect their mental health. As a teacher social opportunities and playing together is what I want children to catch-up on. It is what I worry about them missing. All the social interaction.
I am also utterly sick of hearing all the angst in the media about children 'catching' up. Catching up with what exactly? Arbitrary adult conceived 'targets'!
As for working extra weeks in the summer. No. Just no!

@Italiandreams you are right

@Macaroni46 I completely agree! Very well put.