School sent this letter home with Dd1 today

[nutcracker]

Miss XXXXX,
Your daughter has been absent from school on the dates listed below, and so far we have not recieved any explanation for her absence.

We are required by law to seek explanations for all absences and to categorise these as either authoerised or unauthorised.

Please enter a reason for each period of absence on the reply slip below and return it to school in order to enable us to hold an accurate record for your daughter.

Yours Sincerely Mrs XXXXXX

Date of absence Fri 24/02/06 PM

Now I have never recieved one of these before wether i have explained dd's absence or not, but this letter is even stranger as on the day in question, the school sent dd home as she was sick.

Me thinks someone has made a mistake somewhere along the line.

Yes, they probably have, nutty! They do sometimes Don't worry about it.

Was it a half-day absence maybe? If she was sent home in the morning and wasn't there in the afternoon and it was counted later when whoever it was had forgotten they sent her home?

we got a letter saying that every absence had to be explained in writing

i don't know if this is a change to the way it used to be done

maybe the secretary forgot to mark her down as sick

Sounds like they are tightening up their system. Perhaps she was registered as absent at the second registration and whoever sent the letter hadn't noticed she had been there initially and was sent home. Just drop a note back politely explaining and all will be well. Also they are only obliged to do this once the child is legally of school age so may not have been relevant before.

Yeah it was just the afternoon she was off for. I think her teacher must have forgotten to mark it down.

Am gonna take the letter in on monday and tell them.

Nutcracker i think they have tighten up their procedures as i too have had a similar letter from school. It may be that the teacher who sent your child home didn't tell the person in the office who is responsible for keeping track on absenses, i'm sure a quick note to the school would sort it all out

I had a similar letter from school last term about DS1 who'd been off for 2 days for an operation, which the school had been told about. I asked them why, since I'd written, and they said teachers don't always remember to give letters etc to the office or it doesn't always get tallied up with the days in question on the register.

We always have to phone if child is going to be absent, and explain any absences in writing when the child returns, for school records.

We've had one of these letters - very similar wording - for a day when ds had a major tantrum on the way to school and was 5 mins late..he was signed in at the school reception, but ob. not on the register. I was a bit peeved as the date in question was almost 2 months previous so I had to rack my brains for what had happened that day!
We had 5 days to reply or the day would be put as 'unauthorised' - not sure what the punishment is for taking an unauthorised day (but do know that the school fines parents who take their kids out for some reasons, and they lose their school place if they are away for 10 unauthorised days in a row)

I got a similar one too.

Dd was ill and I phoned to say she wouldn't be in. When she returned I backed it all up in writing. Still got this back though.

I'm afraid I wrote on it a bit of a terse 'Well I did the phonecall and sent a letter. Very surprised to get this' reply.

I checked some time later. Apparantly the office sends these out, they are automatically generated and I think my letter hadn't made it back to the office from the teacher. It comes over as being a personal rap on the knuckles, but I don't think that is the case. I wouldn't worry too much, I think it's a red tape thing for their records.